covid

4MONTH

evolution of COVID-19

Monday, Jan. 10, 2022:

WIS returns from winter break

5-6%

students quarantined

Mar. 3, 2022: Announcement that no negative COVID-19 tests will be required post-spring break

WIS continues to mandate masks indoors in accordance with D.C. mandates

Week of Jan. 31, 2022:

1%

students quarantined

The school urged 12-17 year olds to receive a booster COVID-19 vaccine

Mar. 12, 2022:

Mask mandate lifted on the Primary School campus

Mar. 10, 2022:

Mask mandate lifted on Tregaron campus

51% masking 49% not masking

Mar. 17-19, 2022 First in-person high school musical

since fall of 2019

february DMV students reflect on two years of learning in the pandemic

By ALEK DANIELYAN and CAMILA LEVEY, 2022

Almost two years after being sent into distance learning, schools across the D.C. metropolitan area have begun removing mask mandates. In light of this major step towards normalcy, Maryland and Virginia public school students reflected on the complications they’ve experienced in school throughout the pandemic.

Gray Rager is a senior at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School (B-CC) in Maryland, part of the Montgomery County Public School system. Rager was firm in his critical stance on B-CC’s response to the pandemic. “[B-CC’s response] has been inadequate,” he said. “From the beginning of the pandemic until now, there’s a lot that could have been different.”

The school was one of many that implemented a hybrid learning model halfway through the 2020-2021 school year, along with providing students with masks and tests when the Omicron variant hit. While vaccination rates in the D.C. metropolitan area have been steadily increasing, Rager still notes that at the beginning of 2022, “many kids [didn’t] feel comfortable coming to school… many kids want[ed] online school.”

Despite many of the student body sharing Rager’s sentiment, B-CC’s administration has not addressed dissatisfaction with their recent COVID-19 response. Rager notes that the school policies have not been revised and student feedback was unacknowledged after winter break. “The administration loves to pretend they care about [us] and then not do anything,” he said.

Claire Ducharme, a senior attending a Fairfax County Public School (FCPS), has been relatively pleased with her school’s response. “It could definitely be improved, but I can tell that they’re at least trying,” she said.

However, she has questioned the justification behind certain policies, like having to eat lunch in the cafeteria. “If [students] eat anywhere outside the cafeteria we get in trouble, but we can eat in the cafeteria glued to each other, which truly does not make sense to me,” she said.

Unlike Rager, Ducharme feels that FCPS has taken student feedback into account. “I totally feel that FCPS is listening to student feedback because they heard us say that we wanted to keep our masks and went against the governor to keep us safe,” she said.

The recently elected governor of Virginia, Glenn Youngkin, amassed controversy over his signing of Senate Bill 739. The bill requires that Virginia schools end mask mandates and remain open for in-person instruction five days a week, according to the Virginia’s Legislative Information System. Despite this, many schools in Northern Virginia, like Arlington Public Schools and Loudoun County Public Schools, continued to mandate masks for students, something Ducharme believes has been effective in preventing COVID outbreaks.

Andrea Villafuerte, a senior at The Potomac School in McLean, Virginia, notes that, although the majority of students at her school are vaccinated, there are still some students and parents who openly support anti-masking and anti-vaccinations. “There’s definitely anti-maskers and anti-vaxxers, which is kind of scary for the rest of us,” she said.

As schools in Virginia and Maryland have adjusted their policies for education and safety in light of COVID-19, D.C. policymakers have been faced with the challenge of developing their educational approach. WIS has risen to this challenge with policy adjustments such as the mask mandate being dropped for the Tregaron campus on Mar. 10.

january Students turn to remote options during quarantine

By NAOMI BREUER and GABRIELA LEON-ACOSTA, 2024

The school day starts for most students with an early alarm and the morning rush to get to school on time. By 8:15 a.m., they are sitting in a classroom for period one. Meanwhile, students at home get up at their own pace, in no rush to get to a classroom or leave the house. These students have COVID-19 and have no other option.

WIS is not offering a virtual learning option for students with COVID-19, so students have worked to stay caught up with their classes independently in a remote setting. The school requires students to quarantine for eight days after a positive test or appearance of symptoms, and they may return if they receive a negative test after the first five days.

Senior Natalie Sanchez tested positive for COVID on Jan. 4, during Winter Break. She tested negative on Jan. 8, the day before school restarted, but had to remain at home because WIS was still requiring a 10 day quarantine due to D.C. Health guidelines.

“I was negative at the time that I was missing school, so it seemed counterproductive,” Sanchez said.

Sanchez missed three days of school. To keep up with schoolwork as much as possible, she texted her friends about what they did and FaceTimed into class.

“For one of my classes, I was going to have a test that week, so I didn’t want to miss review,” she said. “So what I would do is FaceTime my friends and just listen to the classes, even though I wasn’t able to participate and ask questions, but just so I wouldn’t miss content.”

Sanchez said she was a lot more productive while working from home. She worked all day, since she had just had all of Winter Break to relax. However, she did fall behind a little in some of her classes.

Upper School Environmental Systems and Societies (ESS) teacher Trish Beck has only had one to two students out from each of her classes at a time, so there hasn’t been too much overall class disruption. She has been letting students FaceTime, like Sanchez, into class to listen, especially during lectures.

“The school’s a little late in trying to come up with policies for [students quarantining], because it’s such a new thing,” Beck said. “So at first [the school was] kind of saying, ‘no, don’t do [FaceTime].’ But now it’s like, ‘help people however you want.’”

She also has lessons from last year recorded that she can send students. Recently, teachers had a tech training meeting where they were taught how to audio record their classes and send them to students who are quarantining.

Senior Olivia Matuschek tested positive for COVID on Jan. 16 after a week of being at school. Her teachers were very accommodating and she had more time to work on her assignments and got to work at her own pace.

“I know that, obviously, I’m not going to learn the full extent of the content that was taught in school,” Matuschek said. “But at least I have a good idea because of my teachers sharing it with me and on OnCampus assignments.”

Sophomore Mia Lahrech’s experience staying at home was somewhat unpleasant, partly due to her severe COVID symptoms which made it hard for her to concentrate on her assignments.

“There [were] some days where my brain fog was so bad [that] all I would do is stay in bed and eat bags [full] of cough drops,” Lahrech said.

Lahrech feels that teachers should be more understanding towards students who are symptomatic. She did her schoolwork by checking OnCampus and Google Classroom. Her assignments started coming in at around 11:30 am and she finished her schoolwork at 2 p.m.

However, while in quarantine, she would’ve appreciated some sort of virtual learning. “It’s really infuriating and kind of irresponsible,” she said. “I’ve got finals that I have to work on. It’s very hard to figure out what’s going on.”

It is better for the school to be either completely virtual or in-person, according to Matuschek, who is sympathetic to why WIS is not offering virtual learning options for any students.

“I know that especially [for] a lot of people in my grade, at times it can be really overwhelming and it would be really nice to take one or a few days off to just go virtual, even if you don’t have COVID,” Matuschek said. “From that perspective, I understand that they want to keep school open and to not have hybrid.”

Sanchez, on the other hand, would have preferred WIS to offer a virtual option, especially since students have to miss a lot of class time.

“If WIS put specific rules in place, they would definitely be able to offer the option and it would work towards their goal of being safe,” Sanchez said.

A virtual option would be more disruptive to the overall learning, according to Beck. She also said that the school is worried about not having enough bandwidth for every class to be on Zoom.

“I’m not going to make the whole class do a distance learning lesson and not do something interactive there because we want to include the couple of people that are home,” Beck said.

As of now, Beck believes that the current method of helping students individually is working. But if more students are away, then a more substantial solution will need to be put in place.

Matuschek thinks that WIS needs to have a proper solution in place for students who have to miss exams, especially finals. She did not miss any exams and was a lot less stressed with the extra time she had at home.

“As long as your teachers are able to offer a sustainable solution while you’re at home, and to allow you to learn from home, that makes it possible to not have to have an online option,” Matuschek said.

Upper School Math Teacher Neil MacDonald has had four students in quarantine. According to MacDonald, the best solution for students at home would be for teachers to get on a call with the student at home, as well as teach the class to the students present.

MacDonald said he did this for a particular student. “The call wasn’t totally clear, but it was better than nothing,” he said.

However, there are multiple problems involving this method of teaching, namely bandwidth problems. MacDonald’s advice for students at home is to follow the school day routine and reach out to teachers over email if they need help.

When Sanchez returned to school, she was very excited to be back after a month of not being at school. “I felt super safe,” she said. “Especially knowing that I had been negative for the past five days. So it felt like I was safe and that other people were safe. It didn’t feel like a hazard to anyone.”

Sanchez strongly suggests other COVID infected students reach out to friends and teachers to stay as up to date with their work as possible. However, all of this should only be done if students are feeling fine and able to do so.

“I think [at] the beginning of me being sick, I pushed myself too hard,” Matuschek said. “I was still trying to keep up with all my work, but I was still having symptoms. Now I’m actually feeling better, and realizing that I should give myself a break.”

EDGES

A Song Cycle

By ABIGAIL BOWN, 2023

“Edges: A Song Cycle” by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul was WIS’s first in-person musical since “Mamma Mia!” in the fall of 2019.

Directed by John Munt, Peter Fischer and junior Ariana Sabathier, the show is a collection of songs with a common theme of growing up and discovering self-identity.

Sabathier emphasizes the challenges of being a student director. “Directing a musical while being in the IB has been one of the hardest but best experiences of my life,” Sabathier said. “The stresses that came along with being the director of the cast, stage managers, as well as tech, was crazy to deal with.”

Furthermore, the cast only rehearsed “Edges” for a little under two months. Freshman Calder LeValley describes how quickly the show came together. “We didn’t get anywhere near enough rehearsal time,” he said.

Nonetheless, the show provided students with an opportunity to make new friends. “It’s nice to connect with people who I wouldn’t necessarily connect with outside of the theater,” junior Bianca Pattison said.

The show featured a pit band, with senior Michelle Hobdari on piano, junior Sumner Hood on bass and sophomore Henri Greamo on drums.

“Edges” premiered on Thursday, Mar. 17 and played through Saturday, Mar. 19.

march april

COURTESY OF CHERYL TANSKI

To mask or not to mask: WIS lifts mask mandate NOLA to NYC: 10th grade trip revised for the Class of 2024

By ANDREA BRUDNIAKBERROCAL, 2025

Almost exactly two years ago, the WIS community transitioned into distance learning. On Mar. 9, Head of School Suzanna Jemsby announced the mask optional policy at the Tregaron campus, also stating that the Primary School would be lifting the mask mandate effective Mar. 14. Students and faculty had an array of reactions.

“I expect these changes will be welcome for some and a source of anxiety for others,’’ Jemsby wrote in the email sent to the school, acknowledging that the lifting of the mask mandate would provoke controversial and sensitive responses.

Though many in the WIS community think of this as positive news, students worry about the school’s instantaneous response to D.C. Health’s decision.

“I feel like the fact that WIS lifted this mandate immediately after the city allowed them to make it seem almost like they were only doing the precautions in the first place because the city made them, and not for the safety of the students,” freshman Madeleine Fine said.

Another important factor that has been emphasized consistently is that members of the community should have respect for people’s choices when it comes to not wearing a mask or choosing to keep it on. “When there is a mask mandate, all individuals should adhere to mask wearing,” Upper School Math teacher Andrew Sopher said. “That said, now that the mandate is lifted, individuals have the right to wear a mask, or not, at their discretion. It’s important for everyone to respect each other’s choices.”

The faculty stressed the importance of the students’ responses to their peers and their personal choices. “It’s an interesting conundrum, because it took so long for everybody to get accustomed to wearing masks and now we are going the other way, getting unaccustomed to wearing them,” former WIS math teacher and now substitute teacher Mary Knautz said.

Others said they have been following the crowd and basing their decisions off of what their peers were doing. “I played it by ear and just wanted to see how many people were and weren’t wearing masks,” sophomore Robert Heneghan said.

Students against the mask optional policy said that everyone should wear masks, despite the option to be able to have them off, in order to provide a safer environment for staff and students. Some have chosen to prioritize their family members at home by keeping their masks on.

“My little brother is not vaccinated and has asthma, so I really don’t want to risk anything and bring anything home,” sophomore Sofia Braccialarghe said.

Some students worry about the future and how WIS will handle any further COVID outbreaks. “I think the removal of the mask mandate is good right now with how the levels are, but I’m worried that if it gets a lot worse the school is not going to be very proactive in changing back,” senior Ana Diaz-Young said.

Other students are wondering about future mask usage in a post-COVID world. “I can totally imagine myself putting on a mask in times like the flu season,” sophomore Alex Wiseman said.

Students being accustomed to COVID regulations could possibly result in students wearing masks for other non COVID related reasons, decreasing the general spread of respiratory diseases.

The removal of the mask mandate is also seen as an opportunity for a step in the right direction. After two years of not having regular contact with students and the community as a whole, it is seen as a relief and progress in getting life back to how it was before the pandemic.

“Students and teachers need to be able to see each other’s facial expressions,” school nurse Molly Foa said. “It’s been a long two years.”

By SOFIA BRACCIALARGHE, 2024

The Upper School administration announced that the 10th grade trip is being brought back, but will be relocated to New York City (NYC) for the 2022 trip. Due to COVID-19, the 10th grade New Orleans (NOLA) trip has been canceled for the past two years.

The logistics of the New York trip first came out towards the end of February. During a parent meeting, the 10th grade parents discovered that instead of visiting NOLA, the trip would move to NYC. This decision was made due to the higher risk of infection of COVID-19 by getting on a plane, rather than taking a bus to NYC, according to Grades 9/10 Assistant Principal Allison Ewing.

During the NYC trip, the same COVID precautions in place at school will apply. This includes keeping a safe distance when going to public locations, bringing masks and wearing them if required by shops and making sure to bring vaccination cards.

At the start of the school year, Ewing was unsure of whether this trip would happen. Upon seeing the COVID-19 cases dying down, this 10th grade trip started becoming a possibility.

However, a number of parents expressed concern over the virus, so a survey was sent out to see what families were comfortable with and if they wanted to participate. “With a lot of students coming with us, we must be mindful with COVID and the Omicron strand going around,” Ewing said, “We were worried about the flights and the possibility of getting stuck in [NOLA] if a flight were to get canceled, so we’ve settled on a day’s driving distance by bus.”

Both the Class of 2022 and 2023 have missed their 10th grade trips due to the rise of the COVID-19 virus. “As a senior, not getting to go to NOLA was not as big of a deal as it felt originally in 10th grade,” senior Zach Roberts said. “But I think we did miss out on the culture of [NOLA] and experiencing Louisiana.”

Similarly, the Class of 2024, now 10th-graders, missed their eighth grade language trips to Paris and Lima due to the pandemic in March 2020.

The eighth grade language trips consisted of a student exchange program led by WIS and the partnered schools in Paris, France; Lima, Peru; and Madrid, Spain. The students each had a correspondent, who would live with them for 10 days in the fall. During the spring, WIS students would travel to their designated country to visit their correspondent.

Although the current seniors and juniors did not get to go on their 10th grade trip, they did get to go on their eighth grade language trips and many felt it was a great bonding experience for their grade.

“I’m definitely grateful that in the fall [of 2019] we did get a chance to have correspondents, but I think not being able to go was heartbreaking, because I wanted to experience a new city with my friends,” sophomore Klara Young said.

Many sophomores share Young’s opinion on the trip, as they want to experience a trip outside of the DMV and be immersed in a new environment.

The 10th grade trip to NYC consists of visiting the Tenement Museum, watching a Broadway show, walking the Brooklyn Bridge, visiting the Empire State Building Observatory and a number of other group activities. Students will be staying at the Wyndham New Yorker Hotel in Midtown.

“A goal of mine throughout this trip is to learn more about New York and see places I haven’t before, while also experiencing a new culture and a good New York pizza,” Young said.

In the future, the WIS administration hopes to have more trips for the younger grades so everyone can experience such an opportunity as a grade. “I really do hope that the current 10th-graders can enjoy this trip,” Ewing said.“I hope they create a sense of community, bond and make good memories.”