A crisis—less organic but no less virulent than the coronavirus pandemic—has been raging through the United States for years. Between 1999 and 2016, the rate of drug-related mortality grew 225 percent, due mostly to opioid overdose deaths.
Editor’s note: This blog post was first published by Partnership Schools.
Over the last several weeks, educators accomplished the mammoth task of setting up remote learning for the remainder of the COVID-19 pandemic. As time passes, school on Zoom will become the new normal. It is important in this in-between moment to bring our attention to something we probably have not thought enough about lately.
COVID-19 has delivered countless challenges for essential workers, from nurses and doctors risking their lives due to shortages of PPE to grocery clerks maintaining calm amid hordes of panicked shoppers.
I used to leave my phone at the front of the classroom in case of emergencies at home. Of course, I didn’t advertise its place there, but also of course, the students found it and would snag it during community time. They couldn’t access the contents—a teacher knows to keep everything locked down—but they could access the camera, and they would snap whole reels of pictures.
The world has changed. Our understanding of what matters most is evolving to meet new realities. This is as true in education as anywhere. Since “school as usual” isn’t an option, how can we chart a course forward, particularly for our youngest learners in kindergarten and first and second grades? How can we continue to cultivate the critical foundation for a lifetime of learning?
On this week’s podcast, Mike Petrilli, Robert Pondiscio, and David Griffith debate how much we can expect districts to do du
Editor’s note: This blog post was first published by Partnership Schools. We recently shared this captivating clip of Our Lady Queen of Angels’s Kindergartener Iliana C. teaching her mom number bonds and sentences.
Over the past few weeks, schools have closed, living rooms have transformed into classrooms, and kitchen tables have become desks. Many parents who typically receive an update on their child’s daily school progress by asking the question, “How was school today?” have been flung into the role of teacher, as districts have moved to various versions of remote learning.
In these uncertain days, with many brick-and-mortar schools shuttered indefinitely, one of Idaho’s leaders in online education has moved in a deliberate and intelligent fashion to transition its brick-and-mortar-based students to online learning.
To throw all or even most of our Covid-19 recovery efforts into remote learning is “shoe bomber” planning: responding to the last attack instead of anticipating the next one. The old normal will be back, and in some places sooner than we think. So let’s think about what that will look like, and whether we will be ready for the foreseeable and dramatic learning loss school districts will face. Plans to make up for lost time require urgency and focus, but should avoid complexity and stay well within the talents and capacity of existing staff.
On this week’s podcast, Diane Tavenner, co-founder and CEO of Summit Public Schools, joins Mike Petrilli and Da
No sooner had Michigan closed its public schools than the state Department of Education announced that no distance learning time would count toward the required 180 days of instruction.
Even before the recent coronavirus pandemic, nearly all educators reported going online to obtain instructional materials. Such resources promise to make our instruction better and lives easier.
“Build back better” has become the mantra of post-disaster reconstruction, since the United Nations’ 2006 report, “Key Propositions for Building Back Better.” It points out that disasters can be leveraged as opportunities for change and improvement.
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act will support millions of workers and industries hard-hit by COVID-19. About $13 billion from the bill will make it to K–12 schools across the country for uses such as classroom cleaning and teacher training. This is a good thing.
Editor’s note: This blog post was first published by Partnership Schools.
With more states and districts foreclosing upon the possibility of in-person learning through the end of the school year, the next few months will tell us a lot about whether our sector can muster the will and skill to overcome the contractual, logistical, and budgetary hurdles required to sufficiently meet the current challenge.
The COVID-19 pandemic is first and foremost a healthcare crisis. But it also causes an identity crisis for schools. The next year and a half will require our education system to constantly reinvent itself in response to rapidly changing needs, and school system leaders will need grace, high expectations, and new mental models for what school can become to best serve students and families.
Given his track record of studying and analyzing the real world of classroom-based instruction, Doug Lemov may not be the person you’d expect to be paving the way forward on online learning. But if you view Lemov’s work through the lens of the entrepreneurial, “find a way” spirit that sparked the modern education reform movement, it makes a little more sense.
The debate on how schools will provide special education in the near term has generated its fair share of extreme arguments.
The education reform world is beset by many constant refrains. “Give schools more money,” for example, “recruit more highly-trained teachers,” or “schools need more autonomy.” But what do these things actually mean when put into practice? If reform is as easy as that, then why hasn’t someone done it already?
On this week’s podcast, Robin Lake, director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE), joins Mike Petrilli and David Griffi
On this week’s podcast, Mike Petrilli and Checker Finn discuss Betsy DeVos’s quick and laudable U-turn on distance learning and
I have spent the week having flashbacks to a Friday in 2001 when I sobbed in my classroom. It was the middle of March and I was leaving my teaching job to accompany my future husband on his Navy orders to San Diego. There is plenty to debate about my personal decision to leave mid-year, but that’s far from the point of this piece.
Parents who will be homeschooling (temporarily) while schools are closed because of COVID-19 can only do so much to keep kids learning, so do your parents a solid and use this time to find subjects that get you excited! There’s only so much Netflix you can watch before you get a funny taste in the back of your mouth.
Why are some schools and districts crashing to provide their pupils with online learning and/or “lesson packets” during this period of social isolation, while others have essentially just shut their doors and turned off the electricity, leaving kids and families to fend for themselves—and inviting the coronavirus version of “summer learning loss?”
“This is unprecedented,” said Eva Moskowitz “We’re not used to planning for a pandemic.”
As society becomes more immersed in the digital age—including during the current coronavirus crisis—students are increasingly utilizing technology for schoolwor
In a recent article in The Bulwark, promoting your
