SCOOP: San Diego Unified School District tells white teachers they are guilty of “spirit murdering” black children and should undergo “antiracist therapy for White educators.”

I've obtained explosive whistleblower documents from the training session. Let's dig in. 🧵

Dear Colleagues,
With just one week remaining before the winter break, we are all looking forward more than ever to a couple of weeks of respite from the intense duties of teaching, which are even more overwhelming in pandemic times. 1/
#bced

Like teachers everywhere, we have had to face so many additional challenges this year. Constant handwashing &mask-wearing, pivoting to online learning, upholding health and safety protocols, struggling with tech issues, adapting to different school schedules &the list goes on. 2/

Underlying it all is the constant worry about our students, our children, our partners, our elders, and ourselves. Yet, despite all this, I constantly see #bced teachers’ energy and creativity shining through. 3/

I want to express deep gratitude for all you are doing every day. All of it is evidence of the consummate professionalism and deep commitment of #bced teachers. Thank you! 4/

Of course, we all welcomed Wednesday’s wonderful news about the approval of the Pfizer vaccine, which will begin rolling out to high risk populations in long-term care and health care next week. 5/
#bced

Now, what exactly is an applied epidemiologist, and why are they needed? In the late 90s- early 2000's there were a series of articles in AJPH, AJE, JECH, and IJE dedicated to answering these questions. I'll focus on Stephen Thacker's review.

He states, “The applied epidemiologist is by definition an activist, moving rapidly from findings to policy, putting epi knowledge to good use. The 21st century epi must do all these things while maintaining a foundation of high-quality epi research and practice.”

Susser warns the field of what he considers “the black box paradigm… the current international focus on risk factor epidemiology.” He advocates for expanding our academic training to include socializing epis to “keep the improvement of the public’s health as a primary value”

Morabia argued that epidemiology has historically found its balance in the tension between the search for causal relations and the improvement of public health; overemphasis on either perspective puts epidemiology at risk of losing its value.

How does this play out in real life? I’ve been an applied epi for 13 years, working mainly in local, state, and federal health agencies. My work has focused on conducting cool analysis that lead to policy or systemic change.

As my Christmas present to you all, here is a list of my top-10 metal tunes of 2020, in no particular order. It's a mixed bag of genres and styles, but they're all bangers!

First up, The Terror Begins by Make Them Die Slowly. Horror-movie inspired grind/black/industrial from Mick Kenney and Duncan Wilkins.

Next, Northern Irish thrashers @gamabomb, with Lords of the Hellfire Club from their excellent new album Sea Savage.

Now for something a bit off the beaten track: brilliant New York black metal experimentalists @imperialnyc's City

Time for something a bit more accessible: this year's best symphonic metal from Sweden's @eleine. Here's the title track from the fantastic 'Dancing in Hell' album.

@KaylaAncrum 1) This reminds me of junior high back in the Chicago suburbs when some classmates pretended my name was ‘too hard’ & relentlessly teased me as ‘Shoehead,’ ‘Shitvo,’ & ‘Shamu’ for almost 2 years until my social studies teacher Mr. C decided to absolutely GO OFF on them:

2) In class one day, to everyone’s utter astonishment, he stopped his lecture & said ‘I think some of you are having trouble pronouncing Shuvo’s name. It’s easy to say shoo-VOH, but your behaviour inspires me to give you new names now. Let’s point out a few examples.’

3) Mr. C turned to a red-haired jerk who often led the bullying and said ‘If you don’t shape up, you’ll be known as Carrot Head in my class, since you’re uglier than Carrot Top and you’re certainly bigheaded and arrogant.’

His face turned redder than his hair.

4) He then then turned to a classmate named Edie & said to her ‘I won’t call you Edie anymore, I’ll call you Dedie, as in DD, since that’s the grade you get in my class & it’s short for Dum-Dum, which is what you proved to be.’

I actually felt bad for her she was so mortified.

5) Then he turned to another kid whose last name was McCracken & said ‘You will be known as McChicken, since you’re a coward, & based on your performance it seems the most you can ever aspire to be is a fast food server, so wipe that smug grin off your face, cluck cluck.’

!!

1/9 - “In the second wave we acquired much more evidence that schoolchildren are almost equally, if not more infected by SARS-CoV-2 than others.”

2/9 - “The problem is not that schools are unsafe for children,” Mr. Boris Johnson said last week. “The problem is schools may nonetheless act as vectors for transmission, causing the virus to spread between households.”

3/9 - “An antibody survey conducted by researchers in Geneva in May and December, using thousands of random samples, found that children of age 6 to 18 were getting infected as often as young adults. The study has yet to be peer reviewed.”

4/9 - “One reason for this: The Swiss city’s schools have been open since the summer, while restrictions have been placed on adults, meaning schoolchildren played a bigger role in transmitting the virus during the autumn surge.”

5/9 - “In Austria, a nationwide survey by universities and medical institutes found that children under 10 showed a similar rate of infection to those between 11 and 14, and that the children in general were getting infected as often as teachers.”