![]() ![]() It’s a complete and utter joke.”Īcross Massachusetts, student participation in distance learning has varied wildly, with 95 percent participation in towns like Andover and 30 percent in Chelsea, the Boston Globe reported in April. “Today my daughter said at noon, ‘I’m done for the day,’” Goldstone lamented. Initially frustrated that Newton was taking too long to pivot, parents later criticized what they say is a dearth of live instruction and lack of academic rigor in a district that has the resources to do more. The sudden shift to online learning has plunged school districts nationwide into a heated debate over how to teach students during a global pandemic, and that’s certainly been true in this affluent suburb of Boston. “They’d already signed an ironclad contract that they have to honor,” he said. The parents had essentially been pre-empted by the union. It was then that Goldstone realized he arrived late. Two days later, the Newton Public Schools released one after hastily negotiating an agreement with the local teachers union. He ultimately corralled 15 other parents into launching a petition, dated March 31 and eventually signed by 905 parents, that beseeched the Newton Public Schools to put forth a plan for distance learning. ![]() Goldstone said he emailed all of the school and town officials he could think of. Two weeks after schools closed on March 15, his daughters at Newton South High School were still awaiting word of the district’s distance learning plan. The Newton father of three watched with growing frustration as his youngest daughter, a seventh-grader at a religious private school, quickly fell into a new routine of online learning between 8:30 a.m. It wasn’t long after Governor Charlie Baker ordered schools across Massachusetts to close because of coronavirus that David Goldstone recognized a tale of two cities playing out in his own home. Newton North High School in Newton, Mass. ![]()
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