The Impact of Teacher Deaths
They have shaken communities and upended the school reopening debate.
Jan. 29, 2021
This is the Coronavirus Schools Briefing, a guide to the seismic changes in U.S. education that are taking place during the pandemic. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.
Image
Erick Ortiz, center, with his family on his birthday. He died after contracting the coronavirus.Credit.Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York Times
The teacher death toll
No one knows how many educators have died from Covid-19. Our colleague Dan Levin reports that the American Federation of Teachers, one of the nation’s largest teachers’ unions, knows of at least 530.