Coronavirus in rural America (Part LXXXIV): Back to school

Here are two stories about what's happening in rural places as America goes back to school.  The first it about a private school in Nevada County, California, as reported by the Los Angeles Times.  Anita Chabria reports from Grass Valley, population 12,860:

Thursday morning, Principal Edee Wood wore a red paisley-printed mask as she wielded a digital thermometer intended to protect the 160 students at her school, one of the few in California attempting in-person classes this fall. At Mount St. Mary’s, life is going back to normal with crisp uniforms, sharp pencils and classes five days a week. 

While remote learning is the rule at nearly all public schools right now, Mount St. Mary’s is opening because it is in Nevada County, which is not on the state’s coronavirus watchlist, and also because its administrators believe it can do so safely. 

As parents across California struggle with plans for more at-home schooling, Mount St. Mary’s is engaging in an experiment it hopes will provide a model for other schools like it, said Lincoln Snyder, superintendent of schools for the Catholic Diocese of Sacramento, which oversees 38 campuses enrolling about 13,000 students from the capital north to the Oregon border.

The second story, from the Washington Post, is about a public schools, the headline being, "Virus keeps spreading as schools begin to open, frightening parents and alarming public health officials."  The dateline is Columbus, Mississippi, population 23, 640, but the story actually covers news of school reopenings from Mississippi and Alabama to Ohio and California's Central Valley, a recent hot spot/region.