COVID-19 Forces K-12 to Think and Act Agile
Historic school closures nationwide are exposing equity gaps, but they also offer fresh explorations into new models
Publisher’s Riff
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To date, the United States has experienced a historic and unprecedented level of simultaneous school closures that have hit nearly all school districts nationwide. The continued spread of COVID-19 has forced policymakers to make tough decisions while pushing educators to once unimaginable limits. Closures have happened in all 50 states, with only a few rural states like Nebraska, Iowa and Maine allowing some districts - depending on their size - to stay remain open.
This national K-12 closure also pushes cities and states to get digital. The closest alternative is online learning. However, not all districts can deliver such equally. That will stress the need for creativity, agility and flexibility from educators. Districts will naturally ask: How do we do that?
Today’s answer depends on equity variables. As data from the National Center for Education Statistics note …
[t]he percentage of public school students in high-poverty schools was higher than the percentage in low-poverty schools (24 vs. 21 percent), and both percentages varied by race/ethnicity. The percentage of students who attended high-poverty schools was highest for Hispanic students (45 percent), followed by Black students (44 percent), American Indian/Alaska Native students (38 percent), Pacific Islander students (24 percent), students of Two or more races (17 percent), Asian students (14 percent), and White students (8 percent).
More than half of all public school students in the U.S. qualify for free or reduced-price lunch programs. The National Center for Homeless Education found in its annual Federal data summary that more than 1.5 million students nationwide are homeless.
Hence, the size, scope and extent of closures will expose and even aggravate pre-existing equity gaps along race and income in most places. That impact is felt most by vulnerable or underserved student populations. School districts already challenged with the monumental task of providing instruction to economically distressed Black and Brown populations are discovering an even greater challenge in figuring out the best way to do so in a new, virtual environment. How districts adapt and deliver instruction during closures depends greatly on how severe or deep that economic distress is: from students who don’t have access to basic items for online learning like laptops to households that never had broadband or Wifi access to begin with. In some major cities, large portions of the student population that are either homeless or facing major food insecurity.
This has refreshed a needed conversation on agile, blended and personalized learning models in a future fraught with pandemic and natural disaster uncertainty.
The more flexible a K-12 institutional model, the more able it is to rapidly respond to student needs during a crisis. In the case of personalized public-partner school networks like Learn4Life, for example, the agility of a learning model is crucial: it’s already working as L4L administrators work with partners to deliver 5,000 laptops to students in need, as well as “MyFi” hotspots and other expanded broadband capabilities. That California-based 100+high school, 50,000 student network of trauma-informed academies specially designed for “at-risk” and economically distressed students offers insights useful at the moment as educators consider how they’ll adapt while closures continue and as they assess how to prepare for the future.
A personalized learning model allows students to immediately transition from on-site instruction to remote learning … and quickly. Learn4Life students, as an example, don’t regularly assemble in large class settings to begin with and, instead, absorb curriculum through scheduled one-on-one meetings with teachers and tutors. With the implementation of school closures, students can continue instruction through technology such as Google Hangouts, a private YouTube curriculum channel and instant messaging. Students can also get access to remote one-on-one instruction and group labs, tutoring, counseling, as well as special ed IEP meetings.
Hot spots and devices are offered to students who need them. This is also a trend developing in large urban, rural and suburban school districts: not only did 37 school districts in Southeastern Pennsylvania distribute laptops and other devices to their students, but so did the Miami, Florida School District as it delivered technology to 53,000 students. Boston, New York City and Broward County, Florida followed suit. That’s a combined 1.7 million students receiving continued instruction.
In addition, the Massachusetts Education Equity Partnership recommends non-tech approaches such as …
[c]reat[ing] and regularly distribut[ing] multilingual toolkits in digital and paper form for every grade level and major subject area to families, at least until remote learning structures are up and running.
At-risk students who had recently dropped out or are seriously behind in credits would be hurt the most by school closures. “It is critically important to keep them engaged so they don’t fall backwards and into the dropout cycle again,” said Caprice Young, national superintendent for Learn4Life. “We know that even small interruptions to their momentum can derail their educational progress.” The student caseloads for teachers are manageable and personalized to support that, and made easier to connect with students.
Nothing is more important than keeping at-risk students stable, engaged and progressing toward a diploma. Losing them to another potential dropout crisis is another epidemic cities and states must make every effort to avoid. As closures continue, more schools will need to explore new methods in teaching. One size, as we’re seeing, does not fit all in education. But flexibility is certainly critical in times of crisis.
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