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LIVE FROM MARYLAND PUBLIC
TELEVISION, THIS IS "DIRECT
CONNECTION" WITH JEFF SALKIN.
>> Jeff: Good evening.
Welcome to "Direct Connection"."
Coming up tonight, a look at 
your holiday weekend.
Coronavirus advice for the 
holiday weekend.
Also a tribute to John Thompson,
Jr. but we begin with a very 
strange back-to-school season.
The classrooms are quiet.
The chairs are payment the 
chalkboard is blank.
How can your students get the 
most out of distance learning?
Joining us tonight are the 
Baltimore City teacher of the 
year kyair butts who teaches 
sixth-graders grater paver 
Waverly elementary middle school
and Teresa Beilstein, the 
Maryland teacher of the year who
teaches third grade at South 
Shore elementary in Anne Arundel
county.
Thanks to both of you for being 
with us.
A want to start with the middle 
school view on this.
Just what is it like teaching 
remotely?
What's the experience for you?
What's the experience for the 
students?
>> Kyair Butts: Good evening, 
everybody.
Thanks having me on the show 
tonight.
Certainly teaching remotely was 
been difficult but what's great 
is there's an opportunity to be 
incredibley creative, to reach 
students and families in 
different ways, ways that I 
really never thought that we had
be able to use before so it's 
awesome to be able to use the 
power of the Internet to bring 
more information to students.
One thing that's difficult is 
maintaining that stamina just 
being in front of a screen.
That's for teachers and for 
students.
That stamina with all of that 
screen time one of the ways we 
combat that is making sure 
students have independent work 
time away from the screens and 
giving them enrichment 
opportunities as well.
But what I've also seen is that 
some of the students really do 
respond well to doing work 
online.
Some of my Dwight students have 
actually opened up more online 
and they're engaging with each 
other outside of school.
See it's been a really good 
experience even if it's been a 
difficult experience but been a 
learning process for sure.
>> Jeff: Teresa, what's your 
experience been with younger 
kids, third graders?
>> Teresa Beilstein: I think 
learning experience is right way
the about it we have learned 
lessons in the spraining that 
we're going to be applying this 
fall.
With your younger 
Latin-Americans we have to 
remember and focus not on on the
academic portion, which goes 
certainly critical to their 
development, but also III social
social/emotional learning.
For your youngest learners was 
this is where they learn how to 
develop friendships and team 
work skills and communication, 
and I so it's been very 
important to continue to 
emphasized those experiences and
simulate them as best as we can 
in this online experiment.
>> Jeff: How can parents, maybe 
grandparents or guardians, help?
How involved do you want them to
be?
Is it possible they could be too
involved during a school day in.
>> Teresa Beilstein: They can 
never be too involved.
I think that would be a mis
misconception that I think a lot
of families have that they think
the school wants them to kind of
back away and let the child 
handle everything.
And I would say just the 
opposite.
I would encourage families and 
parents, grandparents, whoever 
is going to be supporting the 
child at home, to really engage 
with the school, engage with 
your child's teacher p, talk 
about what works best for you.
The teacher wants to help and 
wants to support you and your 
learner as best as possible, and
the easiest way to do that is 
with as much information as we 
can possibly share
.
>> Jeff: First let me remind our
viewers if you have a question 
for the teachers, all you have 
to do is raise your hand.
No, no, we need to you call in 
or email us.
We'll have the information for 
that on the screen.
So, kyair, your thoughts.
>> Kyair Butts: I think one 
thing that parents or guardians 
could easily do is make sure you
know the platform.
A lot of schools are using 
Google classroom or maybe school
schoolology.
So I would say that teachers 
need to caution against having 
too many links or too many 
different websites, otherwise it
kind of looks like alphabet soup
to families, and we certainly 
don't want that.
We don't want to have a divide 
between us.
So teachers, we just need to 
make sure to keep it simple so 
that everyone's on the same page
page.
Families, we want to end scourge
to go to Google classroom when 
you get the code or when you get
the link and ebb explore those 
resources.
If your school is having a back 
to school night virtually or a 
grade level orientation, attend 
that.
Read the documents that are 
being sent home and make sure 
you can walk your student 
through that process.
Ir, like Teresa, am actively 
encourages all of my students 
hang out for the lesson as much 
as you can just so you get that 
muscle memory and that 
flexibility with going to the 
various websites and 
understanding the schedule, 
those basic routines and 
procedures.
That's going to be the biggest 
help honestly is sitting with 
your students and going through 
the process with them so that 
you know it and they know it.
>> Jeff: Teresa, what were your 
experiences like in the spring 
with this?
Obviously there was a steep 
learning curve and it happened 
on an emergency basis, and how 
do you expect it to be different
going into the new school year?
>> Becky Gurley: Anne Arundel 
county has said many times that 
in the spring we were building 
the plane while we were flying 
it, and so there were a lot of 
things that were hit but there 
were some things that were 
missed as well.
So in the spring we had some 
students that had great success
success, 
and those tended to be our 
students that had reliable 
access to technology, they had a
parent at home who was actively 
supporting them in their 
learning, but we know that that 
is just not the reality for many
of our students across the state
of Maryland, and so we work over
the summer across the state to 
increase access to technology, 
to encourage families to learn 
about the platforms so that they
are ready to do more synchronous
learning or more live learning 
in the spring -- or in the fall 
than we had in the spring, and I
think that's really going to 
help with student engagement 
which was a problem that we saw 
in the spring.
Some students were either not 
able, due to technology 
restrictions, to log in or they 
just stopped coming because they
were not engaged in the learning
learning.
So we're very hopeful that that 
will turn around and we'll see a
lot more engagement across the 
grade levels in the fall.
>> Jeff: And can I air, kyair, 
your thoughts on what might be 
different this time and 
hopefully the number of students
without good access, either 
because of equipment or band 
worthy somebody to help, that 
that problem will be sharply 
reduced
.
>> Kyair Butts: I really agree 
with Teresa that to me great 
kudos goes out to our district 
and county for sure to make sure
that the issue of techuity, tech
equity is really reduced.
I think Baltimore City has done 
a really great job of on a 
rolling basis since April making
sure that names and students 
have access to a laptop.
I know that these are still 
issues that we're working 
through right now but the idea 
that the district is working 
through them and that they 
recognized that, that's the step
in the right direction, also 
making sure that students have 
reliable access to wi-fi via a 
hot spot, again, that's 
something that the district 
recognizes and it's doing oning 
a an going basis to really help 
families.
There were a lot of good lessons
learned in the spring as Teresa 
was saying, and one of them was 
the shear capacity to be 
flexible.
We all were learning, as trees 
are a was saying, ephedrine sort
of building the plane in the air
air, but I think we all sort of 
learned as messages on the plane
plane, if you will, to 
accommodate each other, to give 
each other grace, and that 
hopefully when we take off again
this fall, that we have a far 
more complete plane that's able 
to serve everyone on the flight.
Right?
So from the learning itself 
to the content and the 
professional development, 
everyone working together 
ultimately means that not only 
will the plane be able to fly, 
we can also land it safely in 
the future again.
>> Jeff: Let's take a call from 
Washington.
This is Juan Julio.
Juan, thank you for calling.
Go ahead.
>> I my daughter is iny pre-K in
the school system in Washington,
DC.
The online curriculum only have 
an hour and a half of live 
instruction.
So would I like to know what are
teaches doing with the rest of 
their workday?
I would also like to know your 
opinion about some teachers that
are working for the public 
system and they are offering 
their services as private tutors
during the daytime.
>> Jeff: Thank you for the phone
call.
I'm not sure I caught the second
part about private tutoring.
But in terms of the work day for
the teacher, I'd be surprised if
it's gotten easier, but you tell
us.
>> Teresa Beilstein: So I can 
speak from an elementary 
perspective.
I have never worked as hard as I
worked last sprung, never put 
more hours in than I did last 
spring.
Just the level of preparation 
and instruction and then 
follow-up that's required when 
you are in an online environment
is tremendous.
So it's just we work hard to 
create a model that is be 
developmentally appropriate for 
each child.
So a pre-kindergarten student 
may only be in live instruction 
for an hour and a half because 
that is what is deadly 
appropriate for a child that's 
four years old.
As they get older, they will 
spend more time in live learning
learning, for example, when they
get to third grade there are 
about four hours of live 
instruction.
I know for kyair's students it's
five hours a day.
So when teachers aren't engaged 
in live instruction, they're 
often providing one-on-one 
support with different students 
and families, small group 
support or creating content to 
post for students to work on 
later, so there are a variety of
different things that teachers 
are doing that aren't live 
instruction but are still impact
impacting student instruction.
Students -- teachers are also 
engaging in tremendous amount of
professional development to 
develop our skills as virtual 
educators because this isn't 
something we've ever done before
before, so we are taking a lot 
of time to also train ourselves 
to become more efficient in the 
online learning landscape, and 
that is being built into the 
schedule as well.
>> Jeff: Before we go, I just 
have time for about a sentence 
or two from kyair on this.
Bottom line advice for parents.
What do you want them to know 
before the first day of school?
>> Kyair Butts: Basics.
Take a deep breath and make sure
that you reach out to your 
students' teacher or teachers as
often as possible.
If you have a question or, it's 
entirely possible that the 
teacher is going to make sure 
they they set some boundaries in
terms of not calling too early 
or calling too late or texteding
too early or text can too late, 
but we're here to help.
That's our job.
And we want to do our job as 
best we can.
>> Jeff: We have to leave it 
there.
Thanks, so much to our heros, 
our teachers of the year.
"Direct Connection" continues in
a moment.
>> Our job is the truth.
>> Jaime journalist.
>> My destiny is to rule this 
country.
>> I will not run away!
>> Yes, ma'am.
>> It's very exciteing.
♪ Lord, I'm getting tired of 
being so lonely ♪ 
♪ I've got to fire inside ♪
♪ that burns more than it lies ♪
♪
>> Sir, are you a gentlemen?
>> How dare he.
>> 
♪ I'm I'm a strong woman and 
I've got my own ♪
♪ I'm in control ♪
♪ I need somebody ♪
♪
>> 
Fire!
♪♪
>> I refuse to be tamed.
♪ too hot.
>> Kiss me ♪
♪ too hot to turn ♪
♪
>> It's terribly hot, isn't it?
>> No.
>> Please be mine again.
>> No.
>> Jeff: Joining us for our 
"Your Health" segment tonight is
very Vinisha Amin, a hospital 
medicine physician at the 
University of Maryland upper 
Chesapeake health.
Doctor, thank you very much for 
being with us.
We're about half a year, 
unbelievably, into this COVID-19
crisis.
Curious what you're seeing at 
your medical center.
>> Here's the thing, Jeff.
You know, the numbers are 
absolutely -- we're seeing an 
improvement.
The numbers are holding steady 
but definitely an improvement 
from what we had seen earlier on
on, especially the month of 
March and April.
I mean, we had a surge.
We were seeing thousands of 
cases throughout our hospital 
system, our University of 
Maryland hospital system.
Now the numbers are steady.
There are days that we have 
where the number might be in the
single digits, which is great.
>> Jeff: You know, you think 
about how the world has changed 
over the six months.
People wearing masks.
You have people working from 
home.
You have schoolkids learning 
from home.
I'm curious in the hospital 
environment, is there a new 
normal?
Is business not only in your 
unit but across the medical 
center, has it settled into a 
new routine?
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: Absolutely.
The COVID-19 is a virus that's 
highly -- I mean, it's proven to
be highlight highly detrimental 
to the well-being of millions of
people around the world, 
millions of people within our 
country.
It's cost us hundreds of 
thousands of lives.
So we 100% have adopted and 
conformed to what is now our new
normal.
That new normal does entail 
contact tracing, testing 
rigorously, not taking upper 
respiratory symptoms lightly, 
along with that, just following 
more stringent hygiene methods.
Oftentimes when I'm on the COVID
Internet, I'm fully geared up.
You could basically see my eyes 
and that's really about it.
>> Jeff: Are those the things 
that have helped across the 
country?
I know the numbers in Maryland, 
which are a little bit under 400
people.
That's the census across all the
hospitals in the state, how many
coronavirus patients there are 
today.
At the peak it was more than 
four times as great, 1700.
And I don't think you have any 
great new therapeutics that are 
helping people.
Do you have anything?
Is there a silver bullet?
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: No there 
isn't a silver bullet.
This virus is highly dynamic.
From March until now we have 
learned so much about this virus
virus, and we're still learning 
about this virus.
I think it is a new beast.
It is a new beast that we're 
tackleing and we're trying to 
figure out day in and day out.
So we don't have a silver bullet
bullet, but we do have non-
non-pharmacological methods that
are proven to be extremely, 
extremely preventtive and help
ful 
with this virus, the three top 
methods which I'm sure I sound 
like a broken record saying this
but I will go ahead and 
reiterate, social distanceing 
yourself six feet apart from 
other people, hand hygiene, 
washing your hands 20 second, 
soap and water or using alcohol-
alcohol-based sanitizers, and 
third making sure that you're 
wearing a proper mask, you're 
covering your nasal cavity along
with your oral cavity and snug 
fitting that mask under your 
chin, and these are
three non-
non-pharmacological methods that
I would si is a say silver 
bullet for now.
>> Yolanda: Is that something 
somebody should do if they have 
somebody a family member or 
roommate that has the disease?
It's been a situation where 
somebody's economic situation 
ever situation can affect their 
memorabilia situation.
If you're in tight quarters with
a lot of people.
What's the best advice in that 
situation?
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: In that 
situation would I say hand 
hygiene and masking.
If social distanceing is not an 
option for you, then I would 
strongly urge you to wear a and 
follow appropriate hygiene 
methods, hand hygiene.
I also strongly urge you not to 
touch your eyes, your nose or 
your mouth.
Once again, if you have a mask 
on it serves as a barrier and it
will almost be a reminder for 
you not to be you touching those
or physicals.
>> Jeff: What is the testing 
situation -- orifices.
>> What is the testing 
situations in terms of the 
different types tests?
eBay people may be less 
enthusiastic about the one that 
involves the long swab up the 
nose, but what is more accurate?
And what's the turnaround time 
like?
Because we've heard cases where 
people get the results 16 days 
later when it's kind of a moot 
point.
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: So here's 
the thing.
It depends on the Sievert the 
situation.
There are greater levels in an 
institution.
A person Mai might need a test 
sooner than others.
So patients get prioritized to 
getting the rapid test.
The rapid cities turnaround time
is as fast as within 24 hours.
It could be within hours that we
get the test result.
Really 45 minutes is how long it
exactly takes to run the rapid 
test.
So we can have the results 
within an hour if we really 
needed it.
If we needed that it fast.
The accuracy of the test.
There is a false negative rate 
to the test.
So the only -- which is why the 
only patients or the only people
that we are really testing are 
ones that are symptomatic, are 
stick sick that we have a high 
clinical clinical suspicion for,
and in that setting that false 
negative rate almost gets, it 
almost gets curbsideed.
So the turnaround time does vary
vary, and the varieties of test
testing test
testing we have available also 
varies and it just depends on 
your physician, the labs that 
you have available, and the area
in which what it has available 
for you.
>> Jeff: Doctor with, a lot of 
people are looking forward the 
Labor Day weekend, the last 
blast of summer of.
The long range forecast looks 
terrific so people are inclined 
to go to the beach, have a cook
cook-out, that sort of thing.
Assuming they're going to be out
outdoors, does that confer a 
little bit of safety?
What's your advice.
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: Absolutely,
rule of thumb, Jeff, outdoors 
always safer than indoors.
Is it okay to have a last Labor 
Day barbecue before the fall 
hitssome 100%.
Get some fresh air, invite a few
friends, maybe a couple family 
members and go have a barbecue 
outside.
But even once you're outside, 
just understand that you still 
have to follow the appropriate 
precautions of social distance
ing
distancing, hand hygiene and 
masking.
Don't share utensils.
Don't share drinks.
These are all important things.
Also, if you have alcohol 
involved, that also basically 
inhibits your response time.
So you might not be following 
the appropriate precautions if 
you have alcohol involved in 
mixed.
So would I say try to avoid that
that.
If you're gathering a bunch of 
people together because they do 
need to be vigilant about the 
precautions they need to follow.
>> Jeff: This may be outside 
your area of expertise a little 
bit, but I think about football 
season about to start, the 
stadium at Baltimore is going to
be empty, no fans.
It seats 60,000 or 70,000 people
people.
It seems like there has to be a 
number that you could put in 
there that wouldn't be too 
unsafe.
In other words, if the thing is 
completely empty except I'm 
sitting alone in the upper deck,
there's really no safety issue.
On the other hand, if it were 
full, it would obviously be a 
problem.
How do we figure out if there's 
an optimal number?
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: So here's 
the thing.
I think if I'm not mistaken the 
ravens have opted to not have 
fans in the beginning.
I think teams, the reason 
they're opting not to have fans 
in the beginning is because 
they'd like to control the 
number of people that are 
already there, right?
They want to first get a feel of
how the proppization of the-- is
going to be just with the 
players and the vast number of 
people that are already involved
with the game itself.
So is it wrong to just say, hey,
we're not going to add fans to 
the mixed just yet?
Absolutely not.
But when they do choose or teams
choose to advance the mix be 
with then once again the the 
same precautions apply.
If you're safely socially 
distanceing your fans six feet 
part, then that's good because 
screaming, cheering, cheering on
your team, speaking, these are 
all things, they produce 
respiratory droplets.
This includes breathing.
It produces a respiratory drop
droplet, and this is how this 
virus is transmitted.
The COVID-19 or the czar coV2 is
a respiratory drop let 
transmission.
So if you are able to social 
distance your fans, it is not 
necessarily -- it's not 
necessarily a wrong decision 
to make are a right decision.
I think teams are just choosing 
to first gain control of 
probably their own vast number 
of people that are going to be 
on that field or in that stadium
before they add fans to the mix.
>> Jeff: Great analysis, great 
advice.
Dr. Vinisha Amin University of 
Maryland upper Chesapeake.
Thank you very much for your 
time.
>> Dr. Vinisha Amin: Absolutely,
Jeff.
>> Jeff: The sports world is 
mourning the loss of longtime 
Georgetown university basketball
coach John Thompson Jr.
Our Charles Robinson spoke to 
Kevin blackstone.
>> I can truly say this, this is
a guy who was larger than life.
Physically, spiritually, for the
game of basketball, mentally for
young black men who would be 
tutored, is it -- his impact was
beyond belief.
>> Charles: Being here in 
Baltimore, the influence of John
Thomas specifically on the 
Dunbar high school, that I was 
unique pipeline for him.
Tell me how he cultivated that 
pipeline.
>> I know that he had a 
relationship with bob waiting 
and I know that Waite and 
I know he had a desire to help 
young black kids out of tough 
urban areas to get the best 
education they could and to get 
the best basketball coaching 
that they could, and that meant 
obviously from him, and so he 
did establish
that pipeline, and 
in a matter of -- in a matter of
a few years, he had some of the 
best basketball talent in 
Baltimore, bypass 10 University 
of Maryland and College Park, 
and instead going to Georgetown 
university and Tony Georgetown.
>> This whole idea, the mystique
of Georgetown, I remember in the
'70s George coun U. town was a 
kind of afterthought, but he 
arrives, and that Georgetown 
jacket becomes one of the most 
popular jackets in black 
America.
>> You will find that jacket 
right now in the museum of 
African-American history and 
culture.
The starter jacket.
He made it an iconic image.
>> Jeff: Charles, thank you.
John Thomas, Jr. was 78 years 
old.
And that is "Direct Connection" 
for this week.
Remember, you can see videos of 
our recent programs online at 
video.MPT.TV.
And please follow on us twitter 
@mptnews.
For Charles and all of us at MPT
MPT, I'm Jeff Salkin.
Thanks for watching and have a 
good night.
.
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