(WXYZ) — Getting children back in the classroom safely is the focus of tonight's 7 UpFront segment.
The governor is encouraging school districts to reopen their doors to in-person learning by March, but there's a political battle between her office and senate Republicans over billions of federal dollars to help districts during the pandemic.
We're bring joined by the Superintendent of Woodhaven-Brownstown Schools and the President of the K-12 Alliance Mark Greathead to talk about it.
You can see the full interview in the video player above.
"Nothing is more important than the well being of our children and if we can't see that, I don't know where we go," Greathead says. "Funding, so that we can begin to address the learning loss for our students, the social/emotional needs of our students and our staff. We need funding for that and we need it without political gamesmanship."
"When you've had something unexpectedly taken away from you, you don't know when it's going to come back and you don't know when it's going to be taken away again, and that's how our students are feeling right now," he says.
"Schools are not the outbreak centers for the coronavirus, as they were feared," Greathead says. "Students and staff are practicing good hygiene practices, they're wearing their masks, they're practicing social distancing, so those things are in place, and with those things in place, that's how we can have our students safely back in school."