Mixed feelings from parents as Waterloo region schools remain open Wednesday

Parents in Waterloo region can send their kids to school today, despite public health units in nearby regions choosing to close for the next two weeks. 

And they have mixed feelings about it.

"At this point, I feel it's fine that kids are going to school," said Cambridge's Asma Akmal, who has two school-age children and hopes schools will remain open as long as safely possible.

Akmal said if cases get out of hand, she trusts local health officials will shut schools down. In the meantime, she trusts the safety protocols in her kids' elementary school.

"For the time being I think it's fine," she said.

The region's medical officer of health, Dr. Hsiu-Li Wang, has said currently the COVID-19 situation in Waterloo region doesn't require an order shutting schools down. But she said officials are monitoring the situation closely and will "take additional actions as required."    

More notice, please

Kitchener's Michelle Lea, who has a child in Grade 1 and another in Grade 3, said if an order comes to shut down schools — she hopes to get some advance notice first.

With classes nearly done for the day on Tuesday, Toronto Public Health announced schools would close the next morning. Officials in Peel Region announced their shutdown Monday, effective Tuesday and Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph announced its shutdowns Monday, effective Wednesday.

"I hope we get more than 24 hours of notice because that's ridiculous," said Lea.

Lea said a more targeted shutdown of schools could also make sense. For example, particular boards or schools could be shut down if they have high case numbers, she said.  

"I hope it's not just another blanket 'All schools are shut down in the entire province,'" said Lea.

"It isn't fair to parents who need to rearrange their entire schedules in 24 hours just trying to figure out where to send their children."

Shut it down and 'get it done'

As for Vanessa Orchard, she thinks schools in Waterloo region should shut down — and the sooner the better. Orchard said she's concerned about the 82 new COVID-19 cases reported in Waterloo region Tuesday.

"If the cases are going up it doesn't mean it's status quo, it means we do something to change it," said Orchard, who also lives in Cambridge.

Orchard said she feels particularly strongly about the need to shut down schools given a recent positive case in her six-year-old daughter's class.

It took more than a week for her daughter's negative test results to come back after she first received a false positive, although it later turned out her daughter's swab was unable to be tested, Orchard said.

The situation was stressful enough but would have been worse if her daughter actually had COVID-19, Orchard said.

"It was a horrible experience that I wouldn't wish upon any family," said Orchard.

"The only way to do that is to close down the schools, lock down, go back to shutting down work, even.

"Get it done and over with."

Despite their different perspectives, all parents expressed a similar desire: for their children to be safe and for an end to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"I just hope the entire world gets vaccinated and COVID is gone," said Akmal.