93-3-WMR Audio on Demand presents the Preston and Steve show podcast.

And now, Preston and Steve's news updates with Kathy Romano.

All right, today is Tuesday. It is March 31st.

Good morning, Kathy.

Good morning in the news this morning.

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolfe said schools and businesses in the state will be closed indefinitely and a state-at-home order has been extended for 26 counties until April 30th. This is the total number of coronavirus cases in Pennsylvania topped 4,000. Wolf extended the state-home order to several additional counties, mostly in central Pennsylvania. The order was already in effect for

Philadelphia and the surrounding counties. The stay-at-home order has been extended until April 30th,

Wolf said, which is in line with what is being done on a national level. Wolf said that there's

no date for when schools and businesses could reopen. We're going to keep our schools and businesses

closed as long as we need to keep them closed in Pennsylvania to stay safe.

Right now it isn't safe, he said.

So do you think, Kathy, because obviously now we talked about a lot of actual getting down to teaching online that started occurring yesterday, and they're getting into this.

If this becomes moderately effective, that the consensus will be just to finish out the year this way?

You mean like because of the coronavirus?

Right.

In other words, just just to air.

Listen, if you're airing on the side of caution and pre-calling snowstorms and having kids stay home before they ever occur, I can't imagine them being haphazard with this as we get into May. Right, exactly. I think the effectiveness. I think that's the, yes, I think that's what will probably happen, but you can't predict it. You know, we have to wait for the official word to come down. But I think more and more school districts and, you know, knowing a bunch of people who work in the industry, that's sort of what the talk is and that's probably what's going to happen but you can't predict it

all right and the publicness of the of the online teaching is almost secondary to the public health

you know that they keeping the kids at home is probably the better move just as far as gathering and

large gatherings in one location.

Yeah.

I would, if I were a betting man, I'd say, yeah, that's going to end up happening. But obviously, they need to weigh the timetables and see where things are going. But, you know, this indefinite hold is just a stepping stone. I think so that's going to be next. Yeah. And, you know, I saw a lot of... exactly what's going to happen.

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