On the same day that North Carolina reached a new record in COVID-19 hospitalizations and an almost 16% positive test rate, Wake County rolled out an initiative to keep schools open as the winter break comes to an end.

From an online News & Record report yesterday:

That plan would include incremental “bonuses” based on the number of days a sub worked in Wake County Schools per month. Ten days would be $250; Fourteen days, $425.

Some might look at this as incentivizing people to work during an unprecedented pandemic. Others see this as offering hazard pay to some.

But not to others. And those others are the actual full-time teachers who have had to go into the classrooms when mandated by the same school board that is about to vote on this plan.

And does this school board have a concrete plan and schedule when educators get the vaccine?

It is hard to not look at this monetary incentive as hazard pay for substitutes only. Full time educators who have endured going into classrooms and schools despite their own health concerns have received nothing like this.

If there is money there for this plan to be a reality, then why is that money not being used to offer full-time educators more PPE and resources? And if this incentive is being offered because of the quarantining of so many full-time educators, does the school board not realize that they are the ones who stipulated that quarantining keep those same educators absent from classrooms in the first place?

Oh, and in most cases the lesson plans that substitute teachers are to implement still are being constructed by the very educators who are not allowed in classrooms because of quarantine protocols.

This may set a dangerous precedent.