GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Parents, students and teachers are voicing their concerns about possibly returning to the classroom this fall. 13 ON YOUR SIDE spoke to parents around Grand Rapids to find out what most concerns them about sending their kids back to school.
In Garfield Park, Tonya Roush says her biggest concern is that there is no solid plan.
"Both people that do believe in the virus and people that don't believe in the virus, are hesitant to send their children back to school because there is no right or wrong way to handle this," Roush said. "And the people that are in charge, they're battling. And for our children to just send them back into that is not okay with a lot of parents."
Joseph Barnes says right now he is skeptical, and that he would not send his kids back to school.
"Right now I don't know that they have instituted any kind of safety measures as far as how the school is going to be when the kids come," Barnes said. "Is it safe? Is it clean?"
When asked if he would be okay with an all online learning program, Barnes says that if it ensures everybody's safety, he and his kids would make it work.
"If it comes down to safety, then you gotta do what you gotta do. I don't think it (online learning) slowed them down because they were good students before this happened, so the online learning part wasn't a problem for them," he said.
"It's just something to you have to get used to."
Ruth Ann Evans lives in Caledonia. She doesn't like the idea of the kids having to attend school only through online instruction, but says she doesn't want students and teachers to return to an unsafe environment.
"I don't want them going back to school until we know that everything is safe, because if we do everything right the kids won't get sick," Evans said. "We don't want our children to get sick, we don't want our teachers and educators to get sick. So let's make sure we have good plans in place that we can go forward instead of taking two steps back."
Libby is going into 3rd grade this fall. She says wouldn't want to wear a face mask all day long, and that she did not enjoy the online learning program that was implemented when schools shut down in March for the coronavirus.
"I like to interact with the teachers and for them to talk to us and we can go up and ask them stuff," she said.
Paul Nilsson says he thinks there should be stages set up to get students and teachers back into the classroom. But he says they should pull the plug on everything if anyone at the school does get infected with the coronavirus.
"I heard an elementary school teacher talking candidly on TV, who wanted anybody to go back right away to come and sit in the back of her classroom for certain days and see how they feel about it," Nilsson said.
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