The pandemic, having gripped Wisconsin beginning late last winter, seems likely to last well into the coming spring. There have been numerous district meetings, declarations, assessments, positions, and revisions of policy over the last several months; there are likely to be more before next June.
Through it all, one sound truth: it is not on any of these (often shifting) statements – or on any temporary closures – that one should base an assessment of the district’s management of the pandemic.
See September Arrives: Consequences Will Settle Claims (‘A reminder that, for a thousand discussions, predictions, warnings, or assurances — what has been predicted about the pandemic & economy will prove true or false as against daily events and their consequences.’) and Whitewater School Board Meeting, 9.23.20: 5 Points (‘Once the novel coronavirus became widespread in communities across America, specific predictions about particular institutions’ ability to carry on were destined to be unreliable. The level of overconfidence about particular outcomes was always ridiculously unsound’).
Patience in an assessment is an affirmation of responsibility: that one weighs the fullest amount of evidence against the many claims & contentions made along the way.
The story, so to speak, yet waits to be told.
[…] 2. Emotion. It’s understandable that many would approach these matters with concern and worry (and while doing so, sometimes insist that those of opposing views are approaching these matters with excessive concern and worry). A sound maxim: the hotter the subject, the colder the man. An assessment of the district’s conduct now, with months of a pandemic yet ahead, would be premature. See A Fair, Thorough Assessment of Whitewater’s Schools and the Pandemic Awaits (at the End of the Sch…. […]