Policy of Living with COVID-19

Attitudes and policies have certainly evolved in the year and a half that I've been living in Korea. Back in the summer of 2020 with only 600 or so COVID-19 cases per day, classes were switched to an online format and my English summer camps suddenly changed to online at the last minute.

Earlier this spring, even with cases over 1000 per day, schools had shifted to having 2/3 of students at school while the other 1/3 would have online classes at home.

After the Chuseok holiday this September, cases spiked to an all-time high of 3200 per day, and currently, we are settled in with a consistent daily count of over 2000. Yet, even though cases are much higher than in previous months, South Korea has adopted a policy of "living with COVID-19" and a return to normal life will be implemented.

For my schools, this means that all classes are to be held in person at the school unless the severity level is raised to the highest level. Previously, online classes were required even for lower levels of COVID-19 in the community. Busan has relatively few cases so it is unlikely that we'll have online classes for any stretch of time for the remainder of the year unless there is a large outbreak in the city.

But that is policy, and conditions can change rapidly, as they did on Wednesday, just three days into the "Living with COVID-19" policy at my school. Apparently, a parent of a first-grader had tested positive for COVID-19. Just a few minutes before classes were to start for the day, the entire freshmen class was ushered out of the school and sent home. I wasn't sure what was happening at first because of the chaos in the faculty office, but eventually, this situation was explained to me. 

I don't teach first grade at that school, so none of my classes were cancelled and I had a fairly normal day. The freshmen class studied online for two days before they were permitted to come back to school. None of the students tested positive, thankfully.

Moving forward, we can expect all students to report to school each day. The lunch hour at my main school has been extended to 70 minutes so the students can eat in phases. This will hopefully avoid crowding in the cafeteria and minimize contact with students while they are eating with their masks off.

Living with COVID-19 is off to a rocky start. We can only hope that Busan remains relatively covid-free and everyone stays safe.