一半的美国公立学校学生在家上学

As of Thursday afternoon, 26 states, representing about half of the nation's public school students, have recommended or ordered their schools to remain closed for the rest of the academic year, according to a tally by Education Week.

根据《教育周刊》的统计，截至周四下午，26个州(约占美国公立学校学生总数的一半)已建议或下令其学校在本学年剩余时间关闭。

The closures affect about 25 million of the nation's 50.8 million public school students. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards announced he would extend the closure of his state's schools.

关闭学校影响了全国5080万公立学校学生中的2500万。路易斯安那州州长约翰·贝尔·爱德华兹宣布，他将延长该州学校的停课时间。

When states began closing schools in mid-March, state leaders suggested the closures would be short-lived — perhaps just two to three weeks. But the surge in coronavirus infections has forced states to extend the closure of both schools and businesses.

当各州在3月中旬开始关闭学校时，各州领导人表示，这些学校的关闭将是短暂的，可能只有两到三周。但是冠状病毒感染的激增迫使各州延长了学校和企业的关闭时间。

Maryland's schools are scheduled to reopen after April 24. but that seems unlikely.

马里兰州的学校计划在4月24日后重新开学，但这似乎不太可能。

While nearly all of the nation's K-12 schools are currently closed, a recent review in The Lancet of research on school closures questions the extent of their effectiveness. "Recent modelling studies of COVID-19 predict that school closures alone would prevent only 2-4% of deaths, much less than other social distancing interventions," the authors wrote.

虽然美国几乎所有的K-12学校目前都关闭了，但《柳叶刀》最近发表的一篇关于学校关闭研究的综述对它们的有效性提出了质疑。“最近对COVID-19的建模研究预测，仅仅关闭学校就能避免2% -4%的死亡，远远低于其他社会距离干预，”作者写道。

But note the authors' use of the word "alone": In the U.S., school closures have not been implemented on their own and have played a key role in keeping adults at home. Though, in keeping schools closed, state leaders are making it increasingly difficult for the Trump administration to make good on its commitment to reopen the U.S. economy as soon as possible. As long as tens of millions of children are stuck at home, their parents will be too.

但请注意作者使用的“仅仅”一词：在美国，学校关闭并不是单独实施的，在让成年人留在家中起到了关键作用。不过，在关闭学校方面，各州领导人正使特朗普政府越来越难以兑现其尽快重启美国经济的承诺。只要上千万的孩子被困在家里，他们的父母也会被困在家里。

School closures aren't just hard on the economy; they're also hard on kids. The Lancet review cites "loss of education, harms to child welfare particularly among the most vulnerable pupils, and nutritional problems especially to children for whom free school meals are an important source of nutrition."

关闭学校不仅对经济不利，对孩子也不利。《柳叶刀》评论引述“教育的丧失，对儿童福利的伤害，特别是对最脆弱的学生，以及营养问题，特别是对那些免费学校餐是重要营养来源的儿童。”

In the days after schools initially closed, districts raced to build new ways of distributing food to kids, including packaging more than one meal at a time and even distributing food on traditional bus routes. As one big-city school superintendent told NPR, for many kids, school is simply the safest place they can be.

在学校最初关闭后的几天里，各个学区竞相建立新的分发食物给孩子们的方式，包括一次打包多份食物，甚至在传统的公交路线上分发食物。正如一所大城市的学校负责人告诉美国国家公共电台，对许多孩子来说，学校就是他们能呆的最安全的地方。

With so many schools closed, students have been forced to learn remotely, either online or, for those without access to a device or Wi-Fi, through printed paper packets. But it's becoming increasingly clear that many children are being left behind.

由于许多学校关闭，学生被迫远程学习，或是在线学习，或是通过打包的纸质资料学习(对那些无法使用设备或Wi-Fi的学生来说)。但越来越明显的是，许多孩子没有被照顾到。