Is a hybrid model for school worth it?

Some high school districts in California have decided to give their students a hybrid model option for their second semester. A hybrid model for schooling entails that students spend part of their week at school and another part learning remotely from home.

Students’ parents now have an option to send their children back to school once, twice, or three times a week depending on their district. However, I believe that a hybrid model for school is not worth it as the numbers of COVID-19 cases are still consistently increasing.

Although a hybrid model indeed reduces face-to-face contacts relative to a full in-person model as it were before COVID-19, there is still a high risk of getting the virus from teachers and the student’s peers. However, some people and infectious disease experts believe that hybrid learning is safe if students and staff carefully follow public health guidelines. For example, Dean Blumberg, the chief of pediatric infectious diseases at UC Davis Children’s Hospital, believes a hybrid model for school is safe if class sizes are kept small and everyone adheres to the proper use of masks.

However, there is no guarantee that allowing a smaller number of students on campus will completely prevent the spread of the virus. Connor Kim, a sophomore at Troy High School, agrees, “I believe that in our current situation of COVID-19, going back to school once a week is still very dangerous. With the constant spread that is still going on, everything is still on edge.

Although online school may be full of academic dishonesty and many other issues, it’s a lot safer than going back to school.” He believes that students should stay home before the situation gets worse. I also agree with his idea that although academic dishonesty or cheating on online assessments is one of the big issues with online learning, the most important thing is to keep students, teachers, and their families safe.

Furthermore, Ryan Lee, a junior at Sunny Hills High School, believes that “it is not safe to go back to school yet and that we should have a total quarantine in order to make sure life can go back to normal as soon as possible instead of trying to rush the results.” He also believes that hybrid learning in the coronavirus pandemic is still risky. Although those hybrid school plans sound safe, there is still a high risk of spreading the coronavirus. Therefore, since online learning is the only way to prevent the virus from spreading, students and their parents must decide to stay home for their second semester.

<Frederick Suh / Cypress HS 11th Grade>