|
|
|
The views expressed on this page are
solely
those of the author and do not
necessarily represent the views of County
News Online
|
 |
Education Dive Column
Lessons In Leadership: Administrators' advice for addressing 5 coronavirus challenges
The pandemic left superintendents and principals grappling with an
online learning transition, meal distribution logistics and more.
Here's how they're coping.
Roger Riddell
April 7, 2020
America's public education system was largely caught off guard as
schools were forced by the sudden onset of the novel coronavirus
pandemic to shut their doors and transition to distance learning over
the past two months.
With the number of states keeping schools closed through the academic
year rising as the projected length of quarantines and stay-at-home
orders grow, many administrators continue to grapple with a number of
challenges and unanswered questions: How will students in need of meal
assistance receive food? What should count in regard to assignments?
How can students lacking internet access, those with disabilities, and
English learners continue to be served appropriately? Are milestone
events like graduation and prom lost?
We reached out to superintendents and principals from several districts
nationwide to find out how they're addressing these issues and more.
Consider students' basic needs first
When the order came to shut schools down in Ohio, Middletown City
School District Superintendent Marlon Styles said the first concern
wasn't whether staff could come up with educational activities for
students. It was whether students' basic needs could be met.
“It absolutely did shake us up,” Style said. “Our concern in a
high-poverty urban environment was not having the daily contact and
interaction with our students inside the walls of our schools.”
The district has roughly 6,400 students, with a 100% free and
reduced-price lunch rate, Styles said. “For us, the first thing on that
list was not to make sure e-learning was being taken care of. It was
making sure our kids’ basic human needs are being met. Food was a big
deal of that.”
Middletown's food service and transportation departments are working,
along with volunteers, to distribute an average of 4,500 meal bags
containing a breakfast and lunch from 30 locations across the city,
Monday through Friday. For health and safety reasons, they've had to
scale back to two volunteers at each location. And while he's working
with health officials to keep the operation flowing, he said he's
losing more sleep every night as the potential for a call to halt due
to safety concerns grows.
"That is a tough call for any leader or educator to have to shut down
that type of service," he said. "It’s a blessing right now that the
health officials are considering it an essential service."
In Nashville, Hunters Lane High School Executive Principal Susan
Kessler feels similar pressure. Her community was already reeling from
tornadoes that destroyed homes and upended lives in March. That "double
whammy" has created a trying time for a city where families want to
rebuild but now can't because "the whole world is shut down."
As a principal, Kessler said, “I’m able to just focus on how we’re
going to help kids, because I don’t have the weight of those [larger]
decisions [like shuttering or reopening schools] like superintendents
do.”
On the meal service front, she said, the district “is offering, in
addition to food boxes, two grab-and-go meals a day at select
locations” to keep everybody under 18 eating. They’ve also been
connecting with families on an individual basis to identify needs.
Bottom of Form
Grappling with equity and access
The past decade has seen many districts nationwide adopt a variety of
tech-enhanced learning models with 1:1 device programs. But a
transition to fully online remote learning is easier said than done,
given that these models weren't designed for that — nor were many
teachers trained in distance learning.
"You can’t switch an entire way of work overnight and expect that
everybody can do it," Kessler said, noting that much of the assignments
students are doing is really review work to try to keep them engaged
and fresh-minded. "The business of teaching and learning is not
something where you can say, ‘Now you can do this at the kitchen table
and it’ll be the same experience,’ because it’s not."
What "counts" and to what extent is up for debate in districts
nationwide, especially when you factor in that even with these programs
considered, many students from low-income families also lack home
devices or internet access.
"The equity gap that exists in this country between the haves and
have-nots is on center stage right now," Styles said. "We’ve got kids
across this country and here in Middletown who go home and don’t have
access to Wi-Fi and maybe not even a device in their home. But right
now across the country, we’re celebrating e-learning, virtual learning,
whatever kind of learning you want to call it. It’s not an equitable
model. I think it’s time we stand up and do something about it as a
country."
While internet providers like Spectrum are offering families 60 days of
free Wi-Fi, Styles said the demand is so high in Middletown, where 18%
of students lack home internet access, that the backlog is about two to
two-and-a-half weeks to get the service, which is now around mid-April.
The same goes for mobile hotspots: With lots of people wanting to
purchase them, the demand is higher than the supply, creating a
logistical problem with inventory and pushing service out multiple
weeks.
Access issues can be similarly amplified in rural districts where
infrastructure for reliable broadband access still isn't always
completely built out in the community. In Fall Creek, Wisconsin,
Superintendent Joe Sanfelippo said his district felt "relatively
comfortable" because schools were spent some time ahead of shutdown
doing a "remote learning" practice run in classrooms, identifying needs
students had and troubleshooting issues. But while 90% of students in
his district are now connected through home Wi-Fi or district-issue hot
spots, the remaining 10% echoes a pain point felt by many districts in
this transition.
With these needs in the spotlight, Styles added he’d like to see
pressure remain on figuring out how to provide residential internet
access for all students, not just during the pandemic, so they have the
same opportunities.
Professional development and communication are critical
In Pennsylvania's Parkland School District, Superintendent Richard
Sniscak has dealt with many of the same remote learning challenges. He
said the key to making the transition smoother has been remaining
cognizant of teachers' varying levels of professional development, and
to ease into it with plenty of communication between district and
school officials, educators and families.
Up until spring break, which begins Thursday, Parkland educators have
focused primarily on enrichment activities. After the break, regular
planned instruction will begin, taking into consideration that family
dynamics and challenges are different now.
"[Distance learning] professional development to date for us had been
sporadic or limited at best, because we weren’t teaching in an online
environment," Sniscak said. "We were using technology to support
education, more or less."
The school day structure now has two meeting times built in for
grade-level or content-area teachers to meet. It can be every day if
they want, but participating at least once a week is mandatory for
pacing and ensuring that everyone’s communicating the same message.
Daily PD is also available.
“There are so many moving parts in this transition. No one person can
possibly think of all the situations and hoops you have to jump through
to make this work in a manageable, digestible form for students and
families,” he added, noting also the importance of remaining connected
to other superintendents in the state, as well as the state
superintendent and governor's offices in fulfilling continuity of
education requirements.
A year of lost milestones
The loss of milestone events, particular those for high school seniors,
is one of the most heartbreaking consequences of the pandemic. Sniscak
said his district is holding out hope that prom can be rescheduled and
take place in line with social distancing guidelines in place at the
time. Kessler, however, said she has already had to cancel the event at
her school in Nashville due to the logistics of catering, venues and
the timetable for when graduates start college.
Graduation remains the challenge. Plans range from trying to reschedule
it (which can be more difficult when a larger venue like an arena is
used) to holding it in a smaller venue over several nights (making
compliance with social distancing guidelines and crowd sizes more
navigable) to holding the ceremony online.
"My heart goes out to the members of the class of 2020," Styles said.
"They’ve worked so hard their whole lives to have that magic moment
where they walk across the stage."
As for determining graduation requirements, many states have passed
laws (like Ohio's amended House Bill 197) increasing local control and
allowing for flexibility during the pandemic.
"We will be as considerate as we need to be on an individual basis and
make sure we’re being as fair as we possibly can," Styles said, adding
that it's important to remember that it's not students' fault their
school year was disrupted.
Be mindful of the stress on families
Administrators also urge educators to be mindful not to add to an
already stressful situation when making assignments, given that many
parents are also dealing with job loss and questions of how to pay the
bills and meet their families' needs in addition to being asked to
serve as a direct guide in their children's learning.
"We need to focus on caring about our kids and our teachers and our
families first, and teaching them second," Kessler said. "Teaching and
learning will be able to bounce back from this situation. What we don’t
want to do is add to the stress and the pressure families are already
facing."
You can't ignore the challenges families, as well as you personally,
are facing, and it's normal to need time to adjust, she said. “Life was
hard before this event happened. Now it’s incredibly difficult.”
|
|
|
|
