The San Francisco Unified School District will not begin the phased reopening plan that was proposed last week.
According to a statement from SFUSD, the plan was put on hold due to "significant new requests" from school unions that go beyond the guidance from the Department of Public Health.
"The District cannot meet all of the new requirements SFUSD’s labor unions have proposed, and there is not sufficient time to complete bargaining in order to reopen any school sites on Jan. 25," the statement said.
"Most significantly," according to the statement, labor unions have requested that schools remain remote until San Francisco has remained in the orange — or "moderate" — tier for 14 consecutive days. The state's color-coded system classifies transmission risk in each county.
In a statement, Mayor London Breed said: "It is infuriating that our schools are not going to reopen for in-person learning in January. I can’t imagine how hard this is for our families and for our young people who haven’t been in the classroom since March and are falling further behind every single day. We should not be creating a false choice between education and a safe return to classrooms. As a society, we have a responsibility to educate our children, and safety is embedded in that responsibility. We can do both. We must do both."
Susan Solomon, president of the United Educators of San Francisco, the teacher's union, said in a text message that "at the same time the report came out that schools can’t open yet, all of us in the Bay Area received an emergency alert on our cell phones that we must stay home because 'COVID-19 is spreading rapidly.' UESF will continue to work hard to reach an agreement with the District to open schools in a way that will keep students and staff safe."
Earlier this week, during a debate over a resolution related to reopening, outgoing Supervisor Sandra Lee Fewer became irate at a San Francisco board meeting over the city's lack of progress in bringing students back into classrooms.
"(F)or those of you who are currently public school parents, it is great that you have internet access. It is great that you have a home for your children, and a place for them to do online learning and distance learning," Fewer said. "But man, you talk to some of these parents, and you talk to some of these children, and you go to those community learning hubs, it would break your heart. This is a disservice. This is racist, and this is a disservice. It is one thing to say 'Black lives matter,' it's another thing to be saying 'while they're alive.' "
She encouraged the parties to work through the holidays to resolve the impasse.