Scenes From The COVID Disaster
As I write Covid-19 continues its reign as the longest nightmare. Our national failure to take this crisis seriously, and to remain steadfast in addressing the broad consequences of the pandemic are now contributing to political and social unrest, as well as increasing supply shortages and growing inflation. Every major issue can be blamed on the pandemic - for example increased gun violence, increased urban violence, heightened discussions on school curriculums, the lack of infrastructure development, political stagnation, mental illness, the changing workforce, housing shortages, high rents, food shortages, altered economies, and an energy crisis. Largely due to disinformation campaigns and vaccination fears, the numbers of unvaccinated support the increasing numbers of Covid-19 mutations. New strains of the virus are not following existing scientific principles, and newer mutations are proving more infectious. Covid-19 can easily become a common and deadly virus for years to come. And this is worrisome especially in the area of education. "When Covid-19 began to sweep across the country in March 2020, schools in every state closed their doors. Remote instruction effectively became a national policy for the rest of that spring. |
A few months later, however, school districts began to make different decisions about whether to reopen. Across much of the South and the Great Plains as well as some pockets of the Northeast, schools resumed in-person classes in the fall of 2020. Schools that opened employed masking and some used partitions and social distance between students. Yet, across much of the Northeast, Midwest and West Coast, school buildings stayed closed and classes remained online for months. These differences created a set huge experiments, 1) testing the impact of social distancing, 2) testing masking, and 3) testing how well remote learning worked during the pandemic. There is no question that social distancing worked. In fact, many researchers feel that the distances between students should have been increased. Older and more crowded schools could not maintain the suggested and mandated distances. The jury is out on masking. Correct types of masks and properly worn masks did work, but how many students wore them and under what circumstances are not clear. Violations of masking policies were supported by parents and in some cases by school officials. In red states masking in schools and in public settings was prematurely ended by Republican governors and legislatures. A nation partially masked and unmasked led to a failed policy. In terms of remote learning, academic researchers have since been studying the subjects on K-12 and higher education levels, and they have come to a consistent conclusion: Remote learning was a failure." David Leonhardt, ‘Not good for learning’ was a New York Times editorial on May 5, 2022. Part of the rejection of remote learning was having unsupervised children at home alone. Another was a rejection of technology and its costs. But for most, remote learning requires discipline that many parents did not believe their children have. Educators acknowledge that the greatest challenge of online learning is providing the same type of quality experience to every student that they receive in a face to face setting. Remote learning, in PK-12 settings, appears to work best with fewer, under 30 children, rather than larger classes. What social scientists are continuing to determine are the long term effects of remote learning. In the northeast, we see both immediate academic and behavioral problems. Remote learning, however, did not harm everyone to the same degree. To the contrary, it further exposed geographical, racial, economic, social and gender differences throughout the region. The only common factor that all remote students experienced was the lack of socialization with peers. In many wealthier, whiter and suburban school districts, remote students were far more advantaged than poorer, darker and urban school children. Students who lacked strong internet coverage had to rely on cell phones for hotspots and inevitably this caused financial problems for families. This was compounded as some students did not know how to use their technology properly, some parents could not help their children, and in some cases either the parents or the students did not want to turn on cameras. In the Heartland and the South, abandoning or not using remote learning was not helpful. In some cases parents were fearful of sending children to school when situations might have contributed to outbreaks or less than perfect transferal of information. And throughout the nation, due to these unevenly employed practices we know that PK-12 and college students are at least two years behind. As we enter into the third year of the pandemic, one must wonder what academic policies will we employ and will they be successful? Can PK-12 education ever regain the trust of the public for teaching the right things? And can we teach the public enough about this virus so that they can make informed decisions to remain safe? |
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