A walkout on Tuesday by students at all eight high schools in the Saint Paul Public School District and some middle schools looks to protest how the district is handling COVID-19 cases and the Omicron surge.
Minnesota Teen Activists, a nonprofit led by Executive Director Jerome Treadwell, will lead the walkout at 1 p.m. with a press conference scheduled for 10 a.m.
Organizers plan to publicly release their list of nine demands, which include a demand to move immediately to distance learning for a two week period so the district can make plans to returns students safely to the classroom.
Treadwell told WCCO Radio's Vineeta Sawkar during the WCCO Radio Morning News on Tuesday that...
"We feel like the district have not sought out our voices and those that have spoken haven't been heard," Treadwell said. "Students are being most effected and our lives and education are most at stake. Meanwhile, district officers and superintendents aren't in the buildings. They're not spending an abundance of hours surrounded by unmasked kids, overwhelmed teachers, understaffed nurses, and an abundance of other things."
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Once the two week distance learning period is over, the group hopes their nine demands are met by the district:
1. Create a metric with SPFE to temporarily shift to remote learning for individual schools that takes into account transportation availability, staffing and substitute numbers, and COVID-19 positive cases at the site.
2. Provide KN95 masks for staff and students and provide surgical masks immediately until more KN95s are available.
3. Provide additional PCR tests for all staff to test twice a week regardless of vaccination status. And explore options to create a faster turnaround for staff to receive test results.
4. Provide antigen or PCR tests for all students to test weekly.
5. Provide each school with a sufficient supply of take-home Covid-19 tests to provide to any student exhibiting cold or flu symptoms and any student, staff member, or school volunteer who requests one.
6. Continue contact tracing and notifying individuals who have been a close contact and quarantining according to MDH guidelines.
7. For individuals who test positive for COVID-19, maintain the 10 day isolation period or require two negative antigen tests to return to school/work sooner.
8. Allow schools to create a modified daily schedule to meet the needs of the students in the safest, most educationally sound manner.
9. Call on the city and county to support SPPS in finding solutions to make sure our students and families are safe.
The full list of demands from students can be found here.
"It seems to me that the SPPS district is attempting to risk students' lives for the sake of remaining open as the Omicron strand passes," added Treadwell.
An online survey supporting the walkout and students' demands had gathered over 1,200 signatures as of Tuesday morning.