Recent editorials from West Virginia newspapers:
___
April 21
The Intelligencer on learning lessons about the state education system during coronavirus shutdowns:
No reasonable person can blame public school teachers and/or officials for not being ready for the COVID-19 shutdown. For years, in a much different context, many of them have been recommending two steps that, had they been implemented fully, would have helped students and teachers deal with the extended break from in-person classes.
We refer to ensuring every student has some sort of computer and vastly increasing access to internet service, of course. Many children do not have computers at home and many do not have internet service there.
Removing those obstacles will take time and money. We already knew that. Educators’ experiences during the past month or so make the link between technology and pedagogy clearer than it may have been to some in the past, however. Both initiatives need to be viewed as high priorities.
One reason for that was cited during a teleconference meeting of the Indian Creek Local Board of Education last week. During a report on distance-learning practices being employed to help students, Indian Creek Education Association President Karen Lloyd discussed technology limitations. “When high school teachers have hundreds of students and they have trouble connecting … they’ve been making more efforts to really connect with parents,” Lloyd told board members.
Precisely. Parents are always critical to the education process, for obvious reasons. Their importance grows exponentially when students must learn from home, rather than in their classrooms.
A significant number of parents do not seem to have adopted the role of surrogate teachers, however. Throughout our area, teachers report some students are not completing the homework assignments they have been given. Hence, the need, as Lloyd mentioned, to connect with parents and attempt to persuade them to act as enforcers for schools.
Most school districts seem to have adopted a lenient attitude toward completion of assignments during the shutdown. They have little choice in the matter. No one saw this coming. No one was truly ready for it.
Lessons learned from the shutdown - about technology and how to cope with gaps in its availability, and about parental cooperation and failures in that respect - need to be put to use in preparing for the next epidemic. No one can say when, but there will be a next time.
Online: https://www.theintelligencer.net
___
April 19
The Bluefield Daily Telegraph on the upcoming June primary election:
Although West Virginia’s primary election has been postponed until June 9, the impact on area voters should be minimal. Absentee voting is still the best and safest way to cast a ballot, at least for the time being. And area residents who wish to vote absentee can still request a ballot by mail now.
County clerks have been taking applications for absentee ballots, and there are plans to mail additional postcard absentee applications to West Virginia’s registered voters, according to Mercer County Clerk Verlin Moye.
Gov. Jim Justice announced earlier month that he was postponing the state’s May 12 primary until June 9 due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Justice and Secretary of State Mac Warner postponed the primary in the hope that the pandemic will slow by June and allow more people to cast ballots in person at their regular polling places.
Of course, no one knows what the future will bring in these uncertain times. While we hope the pandemic will have run its course by June, this crisis also could linger into the summer months.
That’s why casting an absentee ballot is probably the best course of action, at least for now.
In fact, a majority of the state’s county clerks are urging the governor to have an absentee-only election, Moye said.
“We were wanting that as a group,” Moye said of absentee balloting. “We thought that would be sufficient to have no in-person voting. That way, the risk is minimized because they already relaxed the law to account for that to make it OK; and every registered voter would have gotten an application and you still may. We were in the process of doing a mass mailing to every registered voter; that was an application to order an absentee ballot.”
In Union, Monroe County Clerk Donald J. Evans also supports using only absentee voting for the primary election.
“It keeps the contact down between voters and poll workers,” Evans said of absentee voting. “You vote your ballot inside your own home, and we can wear the appropriate equipment and such, and make it as safe as we can get.”
The postponement will give the clerk’s office more time to prepare for the election without jeopardizing people, McDowell County Clerk Don Hicks said. However, Hicks warns that doing the election only by absentee vote could present problems such as ballots getting lost or delayed in the mail. Hicks said some voters simply prefer to cast their ballots in person.
Some are also worried about the possibility of voter fraud occurring if a majority of ballots are cast by mail.
It is our hope that most voters will still be able to cast a poll at their normal polling precincts come June 9. That would be the best outcome. But right now, no one can say with 100 percent certainty that it will be safe to have large crowds voting together at polling precincts this June.
So absentee voting is certainly a good option to consider at the moment, particularly for senior citizens and others who are considered high-risk due to chronic health conditions.
We still encourage everyone to vote, and this is a great way to do so for now.
Online: https://www.bdtonline.com
___
April 17
The Charleston Gazette-Mail on the PGA golf tournament leaving West Virginia:
The PGA has officially cut ties with the state of West Virginia and The Greenbrier resort, pulling out of its contract for an annual tournament in White Sulphur Springs that ran through 2026, through a reported mutual agreement with The Greenbrier.
This decision was inevitable. The COVID-19 outbreak, which resulted in the cancellation of this year’s event, set to take place in September, merely hastened the end.
In truth, the tournament - originally called The Greenbrier Classic and later changed to A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier - had been in peril ever since it was cancelled in 2016 after a catastrophic flood that killed more than two-dozen West Virginians and devastated the golf course at The Greenbrier. That was followed by the PGA moving the tournament from the July 4 holiday week to early September. As noted in a statement from The Greenbrier, the change made it more difficult to draw crowds and sponsors.
Some of the shine also had also taken away after the event discontinued the concert series that revolved around the tournament, which had drawn acts like Tim McGraw, Brad Paisley, the Black-Eyed Peas and Bon Jovi.
The writing had been on the wall for some time, but that doesn’t make it any less sad that West Virginia has lost a major sporting event and tourist draw. In fact, it’s easy to recall the optimism and air of disbelief when the resort first landed the tournament, and hosted the first event in 2010. It was a coup for the state and for Greenbrier owner Jim Justice - long before he was governor - who had just saved the famed resort from bankruptcy.
It’s a shame the event came to a premature end, even if it had already hit hard times. It’s also hard to see this news and not think about what else West Virginia might lose because of the economic toll from the coronavirus.
For now, there’s no recourse but to ride this out and try to rebuild once things return to some form of normal.
Online: https://www.wvgazettemail.com
Please read our comment policy before commenting.