NEW YORK -- School started Monday for about a million New York City public school students in the nation's largest experiment of in-person learning during the coronavirus pandemic.
The first day of school coincided with several milestones in the city's pandemic recovery that hinge on vaccine mandates.
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Nearly all of the city's 300,000 employees were required to be back in their workplaces, in person, Monday as the city ended remote work. Most will either need to be vaccinated, or undergo weekly covid-19 testing to remain in their jobs.
There will also be a vaccine mandate -- with no test-out option -- for teachers, though they have been given until Sept. 27 to get their first shot.
Unlike some school districts across the country that are still offering online instruction to families that prefer it, New York City officials provided no remote option despite the persistence of the highly transmissible delta variant.
New York City kept schools open for most of the last school year, with some students doing a mix of remote and in-person instruction, but the majority of families chose all-remote learning. That choice won't be available this year, Mayor Bill de Blasio has insisted.
"There are kids who have not been in a classroom in a year and a half, and they deserve better," de Blasio said Monday. "Kids need to be back in school for their mental health, their physical health, their ability to develop socially, and for so many reasons."
U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona visited a Bronx elementary school and appeared remotely at the mayor's briefing to praise the city's school opening plan. "They did it right, and I know this is going to be an awesome year for New York, for everyone," Cardona said.
Masks will be required for all students and staff members, as is the case in schools across New York state.
There is no vaccine mandate for students 12 and over who are eligible for inoculations, but vaccinations will be required to participate in contact sports like football and basketball as well as some extracurricular activities like band practice and theater. About two-thirds of the city's 12- to 17-year-olds are currently vaccinated.
De Blasio, a Democrat in his final months in office, has insisted that masks, cleaning protocols and random covid-19 testing makes school buildings safe. But he has gotten pushback both from parents who want their children home and from unions representing teachers and other school staff members.
The city has been in arbitration with the United Federation of Teachers, which represents almost 80,000 teachers in city public schools, over issues including accommodations for teachers who say they have health issues that prevent them from being vaccinated.
The arbitrator ruled late Friday that the city must offer non-classroom assignments to teachers who aren't vaccinated because of medical and religious exemptions.
Nationally, most schools are meeting only one of President Joe Biden's demands for reopening, which include the need to require vaccinations for teachers and staff, regularly test unvaccinated people and have universal masking.
In a sample of 100 large urban districts, including a district in each state, 9 in 10 are requiring students to wear masks, according to the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington, which has been tracking districts' responses to the pandemic since its start. Just one quarter are requiring teachers to be vaccinated. Fifteen are regularly testing students. And student quarantine policies are generally much less strict than they were last spring.
Under the New York City school system's coronavirus protocols, if there is a a positive case in an elementary school classroom, students in the class will receive remote instruction while quarantining for 10 days. In middle schools and high schools, only unvaccinated students will quarantine.
De Blasio said he does not expect many classrooms to close.
"We do not expect to see anywhere near the kind of closures or classroom disruptions that we saw last year," he said Monday.
IOWA LAW HALTED
In Iowa, a federal judge on Monday ordered the state to immediately halt enforcement of a law that prevents school boards from ordering masks to be worn.
Judge Robert Pratt said that the law passed in May substantially increases the risk of several children with health conditions of contracting covid-19.
Pratt said he has looked at data on the effectiveness of masks to reduce spread of the virus and agrees with recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Academy of Pediatrics on mask wearing in schools.
"Because Plaintiffs have shown that Iowa Code section 280.31's ban on mask mandates in schools substantially increases their risk of contracting the virus that causes COVID-19 and that due to their various medical conditions they are at an increased risk of severe illness or death, Plaintiffs have demonstrated that an irreparable harm exists," he wrote.
His order said Gov. Kim Reynolds and Iowa Department of Education Director Ann Lebo cannot enforce the new law banning local school districts from using their discretion to mandate masks for students, staff, teachers and visitors.
He issued a temporary restraining order to be in effect immediately. It remains in effect until the court issues an order for a preliminary injunction.
Eleven parents and The Arc of Iowa, a group that defends the civil rights of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, sued the state on Sept. 3.
The U.S. Education Department has opened civil-rights investigations in five Republican-led states, including Iowa, that have banned or limited mask requirements in schools.
Reynolds said in a statement that the judge "unilaterally overturned a state law, ignored the decision by our elected legislature and took away parents' ability to decide what's best for their child."
She said the state will appeal and "exercise every legal option we have to uphold state law and defend the rights and liberties afforded to any American citizen protected by our constitution."
Information for this article was contributed by Karen Matthews, Bobby Caina Calvan and David Pitt of The Associated Press and by Claire Cain Miller of The New York Times.