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When Erin Serrano Back at school after a recent winter break, the 15-year-old was back in the hallways that were nearly empty, her classmates absent, and an atmosphere she described as “dead.” Over time, her peers showed up less and less at MetWest High School in Oakland, California.Her teacher and classmates tested positive Coronavirus disease, or have been exposed and are awaiting testing, or just worried about their safety.
Serrano and her friends decided that if the school didn’t take steps to make them feel safer coming to school, such as providing regular testing for all students, they would have to ask for those measures themselves. Serrano and her classmates Ximena Santana, 15, and Benjamin Rendon, 15, decided to start a petition on Google Docs. Maybe, Rendon says, they’ll get “a few students” to sign it. They do better than that. The petition attracted so much attention that it became a story on local TV news. “I went to see them when they aired, and I was like,’ Lendon recalls.damn‘”
In Oakland and across the U.S., millions of students return to classrooms amid highly contagious surge Omicron variant. Most schools are insisting on face-to-face learning, even as record breaking numbers Covid cases are sweeping the country.Chicago Public Schools to close for five days confrontation Agreement with teachers unions to restart in-person schooling.Parents with school-aged children worry about not being able to Go to work If schools remain closed, but they are also concerned about children being infected at school, especially since their youngest is still cannot be vaccinated.
At the same time, many students feel left out of the conversation. “I feel like my school is failing me,” said Jaiden Brese, a 15-year-old sophomore at the Denver Public Schools in Colorado. Since returning to school for winter break, he has been wary of crowded corridors between classes and classmates who don’t pay much attention to wearing masks. (Bris was coming home from school and recovering from the coronavirus when I spoke to him.)
His 15-year-old classmate, Haven Coleman, shared the same frustration. experienced organizer For climate action, Coleman was already thinking about how to get the district’s attention at the start of the semester. As she browsed social media, she noticed other students’ actions were starting to happen — including a petition launched by Serrano, Santana and Rendon in Oakland, a thousand miles away.
Coleman texted Brees. They texted other classmates about the petition idea; soon, word got to students at another high school in Denver. After a few days, student-led petition Demanding safer conditions in Denver Public Schools joins chorus of similar actions from students Boston, chicago, New York City, and Auckland.
“You need to listen to us”
Student protesters who spoke with WIRED described how they used text messages and social media apps to connect with their peers to help shape their demands for the district.
The protests in New York began with late-night texting. Cruz Warshaw, a junior at Stuyvesant High School, pitched the idea to her friends Rifah Saba and Samantha Farrow, also juniors: Do you want a strike to get the mayor to close schools?
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