Make Schools More Human [NYTimes.com]

If a measure of a society is how well it takes care of its young, the past nine months are a damning indictment of our nation.

Parents and teachers have been working overtime under impossible circumstances., and states have prioritized keeping gyms and restaurants open over keeping schools open. A result is that about 48 percent of all students are still in full-time virtual instruction (another 18 percent are in hybrid), according to Burbio, a company that tracks school calendars. These rates are higher among poor students and students of color. This is shameful — private schools holding classes under tents on spacious campuses while poor students are sitting outside McDonalds to get internet access.

There is little doubt that going to school is, on average, better for students. They are frequently tuning out of virtual learning. In higher poverty communities, older students are working to help make ends meet or have simply disappeared from the school rolls. What parents have seen streamed into their living rooms often reflects uninspired curriculums and pedagogy. Students think much of what they are learning is irrelevant and disconnected from their identities and the world around them.

These are not new problems — they are just newly visible because of the pandemic, and in some cases exacerbated by it.

It’s looking as though all schools should be able to open fully in the fall. The pandemic — and the pause in institutionalized schooling — has helped us to see what should change when that happens.

The first lesson that the pandemic has revealed is the limits of one-size-fits-all schooling.

To read more, go to: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/1...schools-vaccine.html