The Illinois Federation of Teachers is urging Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, the Illinois Department of Public Health, and school districts to move to complete online learning until the COVID-19 pandemic is under control.
With record cases of COVID-19 being reported recently and with the IDPH urging people to stay home as much as possible over the next 3 weeks, the IFT says that it is important for in-person schooling to be completely shut down to protect all involved.
IFT says it recognizes the strain of shutting down schools puts on both students and parents, but it says it would best protect all involved in the education system by closing schools.
With the winter holidays approach, IDPH has assumed that numbers will continue to increase creating more of a risk to return to in-person learning. The IFT has tried to ensure the return to in-person learning was both safe and healthy thus far with individual plans at local school districts, however they say that in lower income school districts, it is almost impossible to keep out outbreaks due to the out-of-date buildings and ventilation systems.