MMAC supports new Milwaukee school reopening guidelines

Safe reopening plans provide parents, students with educational options

MILWAUKEE – The Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC) supports new safe school opening guidelines that Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett announced today.

“This is a great step forward for parents and children in the city,” MMAC President Tim Sheehy said. “The Mayor and the Health Department have worked tirelessly to develop guidelines that allow city schools to open and operate safely in a variety of formats this fall. The city’s guidelines strike the appropriate balance between the health and safety needs of students, teachers and families with the educational, psychological and developmental needs of a generation of young people in our city.”

The guidelines announced by the Mayor today provide protocols to allow schools to reopen this fall in virtual, hybrid or in-person learning formats. The re-opening plan sets out criteria for safe operation of in-person instruction and articulates how schools must respond if they experience an outbreak of COVID-19. Schools who wish to conduct in-person instruction will have to submit an operational plan for approval by the City Department of Health that accommodates the safe school guidelines announced today.

“One of Milwaukee’s unique strengths is the way it has empowered parents to choose the best educational setting for their children,” Sheehy said. “The safe school guidelines unveiled by the Mayor today apply that strength in the context of the current COVID crisis by giving parents the ability to choose from a variety of school settings the one that they believe most effectively balances the physical and educational needs of their child.”