This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.

Since school buildings reopened after COVID closures, I’ve heard teachers say, again and again, that the older elementary children in their classrooms are just not the same.

I lead a small network of schools, and many of our current fourth graders remain dependent on adults’ opinions and find it hard to move from one problem to the next without reassurance. Our fifth graders can solve a basic math problem but often struggle to explain how to answer a word problem. Across fourth, fifth, and sixth grades, we’re seeing students have trouble with sharing, taking turns, and working with others — symptoms of the developmental milestones many children missed in recent years.

What exactly did they miss?

As an early childhood specialist who taught kindergarten through second grade for 12 years, I remember watching the progression of cognitive and social development throughout the early elementary school years.

At the beginning of kindergarten, my students would bunch together, crowding at the door, massing around me, all asking questions or wanting to show me the boo-boo on their finger. Sometimes, it seemed like they didn’t even notice that they weren’t the only child in the room. They had to learn how to exist in a large group.

Once they learned how to manage in a group, we began the work on interpersonal relationships, like how to share, respond to a question, and show empathy. Kindergarteners frequently respond to questions with unrelated statements of fact that are of interest to them. For example, if I were to ask the class, “What do you notice about the main character in this story?” they might say, “My uncle is getting a puppy this weekend” or “I had pancakes for breakfast.” All year, they progressed toward understanding that their perspective wasn’t the only view of the world.

My first graders did understand that there were other people and perspectives. This made them good at working with partners. They wanted to please the adults by following the rules at school, but their good intentions could fall by the wayside if they wanted something badly enough. Because they knew the rules but could not help but break them sometimes, first graders would sometimes lie. “No, I didn’t do it!” was a frequent refrain.

For first graders, the playground was a magical place full of fairies, knights, and superheroes, because all you needed was the right stick or flower or a little scarf tied around your neck to transform. These types of imaginary games are part of developing complex representational thought, which helps our minds visualize characters in novels, understand the symbols that stand in for equations in algebra, and think through a variety of outcomes so we can make strategic life decisions.

My second graders were terrified of making mistakes and froze up when what they were trying to draw didn’t keep up with their underdeveloped fine motor skills. They wanted a lot of reassurance. They wanted to be able to do the things the big kids did, but they weren’t quite sure how. They thrived on routine and working together to tackle complicated tasks, whether it was creating a class newspaper or garden, or running the school post office. Second grade was always my favorite because of that incredible industriousness.

Isolated at home during the pandemic, early elementary school students missed out on complex, make-believe play and had grown out of it by the time we all got back. I worry that this might be getting in the way of tasks that require symbolic reasoning. We see, for example, that our fifth graders can answer a factual question about something they’ve read but struggle to make reasonable inferences.

Many grades have had to go back a few years to teach students some of the more basic concepts. We have adopted a social-emotional curriculum that teaches children to recognize and name their feelings, how to calm themselves down, and how to explain to another person the impact of their actions on them.

There is so much to study about the impact of those two COVID years on learning that I have no doubt it will be the subject of Ph.D. dissertations for decades. But in the meantime, schools and educators are tasked with catching students up on what they missed. The New York Times recently published an article with a tool where you could type in your local school district and see how far behind it was in math and reading compared to the pre-pandemic years.

I believe in assessments. It is crucial to understand what your students know and still need to learn in order to teach them well. But it’s also important to remember that there is much more to child development than learning multiplication tables or the fundamentals of reading. Even as we gauge academic progress and gaps, we must acknowledge the other skills that so many of our students need to catch up on as well.

In our rush as adults to be over this pandemic, let’s not deprive our students of the time they need to explore who they are in relation to their peers. In turn, hard-working teachers and school leaders need grace as they try to figure out how to give every kid what they need and deserve at this unprecedented moment.

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

Related:
The pandemic is over–but American schools still aren’t the same
“Ambitious growth” is needed to accelerate learning recovery
For more news on COVID-related recovery, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership hub

Key points:

• COVID learning loss is still real–here’s how districts are leveraging tutoring strategies
• Transforming summer school with high-dosage tutoring
• 5 ways virtual tutoring reinforces our after-school program
• For more news on tutoring, see eSN’s Educational Leadership page

The benefits of high-dosage tutoring can’t be ignored. Research shows that tutoring is one of the most effective ways to increase academic achievement, including among students from lower socio-economic households–one of the groups disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

High-dosage tutoring is a crucial strategy for student advancement regardless of a student’s abilities or where they may struggle academically.

In fact, high-dosage tutoring is a main component of the Biden-Harris Administration’s Improving Student Achievement Agenda for 2024, which focuses on accelerating academic performance for every child in school. The initiative will adopt three evidence-based strategies that improve student learning: increasing student attendance; providing high-dosage tutoring; and increasing summer learning and extended or after-school learning time.

Here are 5 things to know about high-dosage tutoring:

1. Since the pandemic, students have struggled markedly in math, particularly algebra. According to NAEP Mathematics Assessment data, eighth-graders’ algebra scores were eight points lower in 2022 than in 2019. According to the Nation’s Report Card, the average eighth-grade mathematics score was lower than all previous assessment years—going back to 2003. As a gateway content area, algebra prepares students to tackle advanced study in calculus, physics, and other subjects—yet it often is a sticking point for many middle and high school students. Without a solid understanding of algebra, many students find that they get stuck in their math studies. Here are 5 ways to help students struggling with algebra learning.

2. Policymakers must take action to support states and districts in implementing high-dosage tutoring to ensure opportunities for student success. The pandemic left students, on average, five months behind in math and four months behind in reading by the end of the 2021-22 school year, with even more significant losses for students in majority-Black or low-income schools. This gap shows an increased inequality in educational outcomes across racial and socioeconomic lines. Thankfully, extensive research points toward one incredibly effective option in recovering learning loss: high-dosage tutoring. Learn more about how to implement high-dosage tutoring programs in schools and districts.

3. To truly help students build deep understanding, intervention requires the right time, place, people, and curriculum. As educators continue to work to accelerate learning for students following the pandemic, many are turning to tutoring to provide support. Tutoring is one of the most effective math interventions available for students, but the quality of tutoring varies widely. Here are 6 key steps to ensure tutoring, including high-dosage tutoring, is as effective as possible for students.

4. When this North Dakota school district analyzed student achievement data from multiple measures and through the lens of student groups, district administrators saw an immediate need to provide additional reading intervention to help students recover from the effects of the pandemic. Yet, due to staffing shortages, leaders knew they could not provide the level of personalized support each student needed. Thanks to a data-driven approach to tutoring, the district has been able to help students increase their growth and confidence in reading. Here are five strategies the district implemented to create an effective high-impact tutoring program.

5. In a review of research on high-dosage tutoring as an intervention strategy, from K-12 assessment and research organization NWEA, authors looked at the evidence on high-dosage tutoring and highlighted the benefits of using this strategy, especially in supporting at-risk students. The report also noted several “non-negotiable” factors that lead to high-dosage tutoring being used effectively to accelerate academic growth. Key takeaways from the report include: At-risk students continue to need support, especially now as the share of at-risk students has increased post pandemic; high-dosage tutoring programs can produce large gains in reading and math test scores for at-risk students (if implemented appropriately); high-dosage tutoring is effective for building foundational skills in elementary grades, and can aid struggling middle and high school students; and as part of implementation planning, districts must address barriers that hinder student access to HDT by ensuring an equitable selection criteria and offering holistic supports for student learning. Read the full report here.

Key points:

• Younger students aren’t on pace with learning expectations post-pandemic
• See article: The pandemic is over–but American schools still aren’t the same
• See article: Unfinished learning concerns still plague educators
• For more news on learning loss, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership page

Children who were in early childhood learning programs during the pandemic are struggling to keep up with grade-level learning in math and English, according to School Readiness for Young Students Post-Pandemic, a new report from Curriculum Associates that examines nationwide data quantifying the latent academic impact of disrupted access to early childhood care and education for the nation’s youngest learners.

This report is one of the first to gather and analyze nationally representative data from more than five million Grades K–2 students, thanks to their i-Ready® Diagnostic for Reading and for Mathematics.

“While learning disruptions are well-known and documented for school-age students due to the pandemic, less is known regarding the impact on children who were in early childhood or pre-K settings in 2020 and 2021. Those children, who were ages 1 to 4 at the start of the pandemic, are coming to school less prepared and lagging behind expectations with signs of a slow recovery,” said Dr. Kristen Huff, vice president of assessment and research at Curriculum Associates. “These data show that post-pandemic recovery is still an uphill battle for millions of students nationwide, reinforcing the challenges our educators face in the classroom every day.”

Some of the key findings include:

• Students appear less prepared at school entry, with greater proportions of students entering below grade level. Some grades demonstrate modest recovery. 
  • Grade K students show latent, albeit small decreases in school readiness from pre- to post-pandemic, with nearly identical trends from 2019 to 2021, but show small declines in years since.
  • Average test scores dropped 2.8 points and 9.1 points for Grade 1 and Grade 2 students, respectively, from pre-pandemic to 2021. Grade 1 scores continue to decline heading into 2023, while Grade 2 scores show modest signs of recovery.
• Trends in mathematics performance and readiness at school entry show little indication of returning to a pre-pandemic level.
  • Grade K students again demonstrate a delayed impact of pandemic disruptions for mathematics, with comparable trends from fall 2019 to fall 2021, but show small declines in achievement in fall 2022 and 2023.
  • By comparison, students in Grades 1 and 2 have suffered more pronounced declines with less evidence of recovery, with average scale scores decreasing by 4.3 and 5.7 points, respectively, from 2019 to 2023.

While the pandemic was disruptive to all early childhood care and services, the report shows the impact of this disruption was not equally felt across communities. Many minoritized communities relied on continued access to public pre-K programs and thus lost services entirely with pandemic closures. These findings echo the emerging trends described in the latest edition of Curriculum Associates’ State of Student Learning research. 

“In analyzing these data by various demographics, such as grade, race, and income level, we recognize a familiar phenomenon: the pandemic exacerbated educational socioeconomic inequities,” said Tyrone Holmes, chief inclusion officer at Curriculum Associates. “The good news is that these data can help guide decision makers in how to best allocate resources and support the students most in need.”

“In an equitable world, every educator would have the support, tools, and data to help every student achieve their potential,” continued Huff. “Our students have faced tremendous hardship, and the road ahead will not be easy. We owe it to them to be ambitious and change the course of learning now.”

School Readiness for Young Students Post-Pandemic is the seventh in a series of research reports on the effects of unfinished learning conducted by Curriculum Associates. More information on Curriculum Associates’ research on unfinished learning may be found here. 

This press release originally appeared online.

Key points:

• Occupational therapy addresses many more skills than most people realize
• See article: Finding the learning loss data needed to drive learning recovery
• See article: When it comes to learning loss, don’t reinvent the wheel
• For more news on learning loss, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership page

Over three years since the pandemic’s onset, students’ social, emotional, and academic development have clearly suffered. Research shows that the average student lost approximately one-third of a school year to the pandemic, leading to academic setbacks and missed opportunities for building skills fostered in school settings, such as learning to form routines and study habits, solve problems, and follow directions.

As students suffer broadly from these gaps in development, schools across the country need creative solutions to provide all students with extra support during this challenging time.

Occupational therapy (OT) is well-equipped to address this need, but the field is commonly overlooked or misunderstood. Occupational therapists (OTs) are health professionals who support clients with developing or regaining physical, sensory, or cognitive skills used in everyday life including executive functioning skills and skills for independent living. OTs are trained to be holistic, big-picture thinkers, enabling them to meet clients where they are and assist them in achieving their individual goals. However, a general lack of public awareness of the nuances of OT means that its broad benefits often go unrealized, especially regarding its potential in schools.

By fostering a greater understanding of OT as a highly specialized yet expansive field, and by supporting OTs in leadership positions, we can ensure we are maximizing their potential benefits and help students reach their growth objectives.

Perhaps the most common misconception about the field is that school-based OTs focus solely on practice areas like handwriting and sensory processing. The reality is that OTs can assist people in many areas depending on clients’ needs and environments. While one client may want to pursue a skill like handwriting, another may be more interested in developing self-advocacy, decision-making, or goal setting skills. As a result of their comprehensive training, OTs are adaptable and versatile in their approach to supporting a portfolio of clients with varying needs.

The range of individuals who can benefit from OT services is also larger than commonly believed. Most people perceive OTs as only helping younger children, but they are also effective in supporting individuals of all ages, including teenagers transitioning to adulthood and adults in their 20s and 30s. At Ivy Street, OTs offer programming for various age groups, including an integrated model of OT support in both the residences and classrooms for students ages 13-21 and a “Skills for Life” program which supports clients ages 16 and older in their home communities. Although students and participants have different goals, OTs work with the same guiding mission: to help clients become more independent and achieve their own definitions of success.

Given the many different hats that OTs can wear, they are uniquely positioned to support students in getting back on track with their goals coming out of the pandemic. OTs can assist students with skills they may be struggling to build or regain during this time – especially skills that affect overarching performance like forming study habits, maintaining focus, or staying organized. Mastering these types of skills can have far-reaching benefits for students both academically and personally. Having effective study habits, for example, may help a student improve their grades, but on a broader scale, having this skill also helps the student gain greater independence in their daily routine and build up their self-confidence.

To be broadly accepted as practitioners who can provide such a breadth of assistance, OTs themselves must have a seat at the table alongside educational and regulatory leaders in decision-making processes. Their presence here is vital to ensuring their voices and their clients’ needs are best represented. For example, a school committee without OT representation may not be aware of the benefits OT promises for both neurodivergent and neurotypical students, leading the committee to potentially neglect the field when considering supports to help all students recover skills lost during the pandemic. When given opportunities to stand as equals with educational and regulatory leaders, OTs can help to fill gaps in understanding by clarifying what kinds of OT services are available and advocating for OT as a broad practice to ensure that students can access the full scope of OT work.

As educational and regulatory leaders seek solutions for guiding students through this phase of pandemic recovery, we have only scratched the surface of what OTs have to offer. However, over the course of my 14 years at Ivy Street, I’ve seen OT services grow to help more and more students as they work towards their personal, academic, and post-secondary goals. This gives me hope that other schools can broaden access to OT services for their students, too.

By encouraging greater understanding of OTs’ full scope of practice in the mainstream, and by pushing for OTs to occupy positions needed to advocate for their work amongst educational and regulatory bodies, we can maximize the benefits of OT work to meet this moment and ensure all students have access to the tools and supports they need to thrive.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.

It was just after 2:30 p.m. on a recent Wednesday, and the school stage hadn’t yet transformed into a reading room.

Christopher VanderKuyl, an assistant principal in Chicago’s west suburbs, hurriedly dragged brown folding chairs across the wood floor. He made a mental note to figure out who’d rearranged the furniture.

“They can’t do that,” VanderKuyl lamented to his co-teacher, Megan Endre. “We’re using this as a classroom!”

A year ago, school would have been over around this time, and the students at Columbus East Elementary would be walking out the door. But this year, a group of fifth graders were instead sitting on the school’s stage, reading aloud about the life of Rosa Parks as they worked on reading fluency and comprehension. Similar activities were taking place in nearly every corner of the school: In another classroom, students rolled dice to practice two-digit multiplication and huddled close to their teacher to review their work. 

What’s happening at Columbus East is one of the rare efforts nationally to give students more instructional time in an attempt to make up for what they lost during the pandemic. Here in Cicero School District 99, students are getting an extra 30 minutes of reading or math instruction every day, which adds up to around three additional weeks of school. School leaders hope that will be enough time to teach students key skills they missed and boost test scores.

“We do a lot of good things for our students, we have many, many resources, but our students need more,” said Aldo Calderin, the district’s superintendent. “There are challenges, I’m not going to sit here and say that there’s not. But I know that we’re doing right by our kids.”

The district is about a month into the extra academic lessons, and staff say they’re still working out the kinks. The initiative has added new instructional challenges for Cicero teachers, who were already busy putting a new reading curriculum in place and helping students cope with the ongoing fallout of the pandemic.

Still, Cicero stands out for making a longer school day a reality. While many schools used COVID relief funding to beef up summer school or add optional after-school tutoring, far fewer added extra time to the school day or year.

In Cicero, a new teachers union contract, extra pay for teachers, and school board support helped make the change happen. Elsewhere, efforts to add instructional time have faced pushback from school board members and teachers who thought the added time would be too costly and disruptive.

Thomas Kane, a Harvard education professor who has studied learning loss during the pandemic, said “it’s great to see” districts like Cicero adding instructional time.

“It obviously depends, though, on how that time is used, especially if it’s coming at the end of the day, when kids or teachers might be tired,” Kane said. “But honestly at this point, more instructional time is what’s needed to help students catch up.”

How Cicero students got a longer school day

Cicero 99, which runs through junior high, serves around 9,200 students in a working-class, mostly Latino suburb of Chicago. About three-quarters of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch and more than half of students are learning English.

School leaders floated the idea to lengthen Cicero 99’s school day before COVID hit, but the proposal took on greater urgency when educators saw how the pandemic set students back in reading and math.

The year before the pandemic, 22% of students in the district met or exceeded Illinois’ English language arts standards, while 16% cleared that bar in math. By spring 2021, after students spent nearly a year learning remotely, 10% met state standards in English and 5% met them in math. 

At Columbus East, staff recall students who hid under bed covers or pointed their cameras at ceiling fans during remote learning. Others had trouble hearing over blaring TVs, barking dogs, and whirring blenders.

Kane’s research into district-level learning loss found that Cicero students in third to eighth grades lost the equivalent of a third of a year in reading from spring 2019 to 2022, and a little less than half a year in math. The losses were similar to those in other high-poverty Illinois districts, Kane said, but still “substantial.”

“There is a sense of urgency,” said Donata Heppner, the principal at Columbus East, who’s part of the district team that planned for the extended day. “If we don’t grow more than expected, we’re never going to catch up.”

So last year, Calderin, with the school board’s support, negotiated a new contract with the teachers union that included the longer school day.

“At the beginning, we were: No, no, no, no, no,” said Marisa Mills, the president of Cicero’s teachers union and a seventh grade English language arts teacher at Unity Junior High. “And then we really started to get down to the nitty gritty, and started to talk about: Well, what if we did do this?”

Teachers got on board after the district agreed that the extra time would be used only for instruction, Mills said, and that students wouldn’t be tethered to a device during that time. Teachers also got a “very fair” bump in compensation: A 10% raise, and a one-time $5,000 bonus for this school year, paid for with COVID relief dollars. The deal, which runs through 2026, got the support of 70% of teachers.

It helped, Calderin said, that the extra time was well-received by families. Many students’ parents work multiple jobs and struggle to arrange after-school care for their children — an issue somewhat alleviated by a longer day.

Here’s how the longer day works: The district gave students pretests and used those to group students with similar abilities. Students spent the first month of the school year practicing walking their routes to their extended-day groups and getting to know their new teachers.

Now students spend two weeks in a reading group, then two weeks in a math group, or vice versa, and then get reshuffled based on how they’re doing. The district provided lessons and activities for teachers that tie in with the district’s usual curriculum. 

But there’s no additional staff working the extended day. So it takes everyone, from paraprofessionals to social workers to principals, to make it work.

On that recent Wednesday at Columbus East, VanderKuyl and Endre circulated among 16 fifth graders as they read. This group spent all of second grade learning remotely and now many struggle to write their letters in a straight line or pay attention when a teacher is talking. 

VanderKuyl stopped to help one student pronounce “prejudice,” while Endre urged a distracted student poking her pen in the air to follow along.

“Alright, who would like to share their summary out loud?” Endre asked. 

She pressed her students to elaborate — “Who’s the man you’re talking about?” — and checked to make sure they got the details right: “It wasn’t a school bus right? It was a public bus.” Her goal this year is to boost students’ confidence and help more students read at a fifth grade level on their own.

It’s about “building that independence in reading for them,” Endre said. “Maybe not necessarily ‘Oh, I can read a whole fifth-grade level text myself.’ But can I read and understand a paragraph?”

Longer school day is not without challenges

While it may seem simple, adding 30 minutes to the school day presents plenty of instructional challenges. 

Not every adult is a math or reading specialist, so some staff need extra practice and training. The extended-day groups are smaller than students’ usual classes, but are still large enough that it can be challenging for teachers to provide one-on-one attention. Some students are hungry and tired at the end of the day and miss going home earlier.

“My brain is too over-capacitated!” said one fourth grader with dark hair and white-rimmed glasses at nearby Sherlock Elementary.

And some students struggle with the frequent regrouping. Columbus East, for example, has a program for students with emotional disabilities who typically learn in the same classroom all day. Some have found it challenging to be in a new environment with different peers and without their usual teacher.

On that recent Wednesday, a student sitting at the back table in Arlen Villeda’s fifth grade math group sobbed as she struggled with the extended-day lesson. At first, the student loved the extra math lessons, Villeda said later, but as the classes got harder, the student’s frustration started to mount.

“I hate my life!” she cried. “Everyone is done!”

Villeda tried to keep moving forward with the four students seated in front of her, as a classroom aide nudged the crying student to take a break. 

Villeda has tried strategies shared by the student’s usual teacher — like walking the student to the familiar calming corner in her classroom when she gets overwhelmed — but Villeda says it can be challenging to know exactly how to help. For some students, she said, “consistency really makes a big difference.”

“Like with anything, we know that change is going to become easier as time goes on,” she said. “But I honestly feel like this is still an adjustment period for us — for the teachers and for the students.”

For now, Heppner, Columbus East’s principal, and others are revisiting how the extended day is going and making changes when needed. Going forward, for example, teachers will have more say over how students are grouped. And teachers can ditch activities that were “a total bomb,” as Heppner put it. 

Mills, the union president, said she knows some teachers, especially those who don’t specialize in reading and math, are struggling with extra preparation work. But already she’s seeing glimmers of progress. She feels like she can do more with her seventh graders in the smaller extended-day groups, and some have made strides in their reading.

“It’s going to be a little nuts for the first year, for sure,” Mills said. “But if this is something we really want to do for our students, that’s what it’s going to have to be.”

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

Related: Unfinished learning concerns still plague educators

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.

On a recent Friday at Gary Comer Middle School in Chicago, you had to squint to see signs of the pandemic that upended American education just a few years ago.

Only a handful of students wore face masks, and even then, some put them on to cover up pimples, staff said. The hand sanitizer stations outside every classroom mostly went unused, and some were empty. Students stopped to hug in the hallway and ate lunch side by side in the cafeteria. 

“I don’t think it’s a big deal as much as it was before,” said 12-year-old Evelyn Harris, an eighth grader at Comer, whose lasting memory of pandemic schooling is that online classes were easier, so she got better grades. “The pandemic didn’t really affect me in a big way.”

But inside Nikhil Bhatia’s classroom, the evidence was on the whiteboard, where the math teacher was shading in slices of a pie to illustrate how to find a common denominator. That day, his seventh graders were working to add and subtract fractions — a skill students usually learn in fourth grade.

Maybe you learned this before, Bhatia began. “Or, during the pandemic, you might have been on Zoom,” — a few students laughed as he dragged out the words — “put your screen on black, went to go play a couple video games. Snap if that sounds familiar?”

Clicking fingers filled the room. “That’s OK!” Bhatia responded. “That’s why we’re going to do the review.”

As the new school year begins at Comer and elsewhere, many students and educators say school is feeling more normal than it has in over three years. COVID health precautions have all but vanished. There’s less social awkwardness. Students say they’re over the novelty of seeing their classmates in person.

But beneath the surface, profound pandemic-era consequences persist. More students are missing school, and educators are scrambling to keep kids engaged in class. Many students remain behind academically, leaving teachers like Bhatia to fill in gaps even while trying to move students forward. Rebuilding students’ shaken confidence in their abilities is especially important right now.

“It’s OK that you don’t know this,” Bhatia tells his students. “It’s normal right now.”

Nationally, many students remain far behind in math and reading where they would have been if not for the pandemic. There have been especially steep learning drops at schools that taught virtually for most of the 2020-21 school year, as schools did across Chicago and within the Noble charter network, which includes Comer. It’s an issue that’s even more pressing for older students, who have less time to fill in those holes.

At Comer, 28% of eighth graders met or exceeded Illinois math standards the year before the pandemic, not far off from the state’s average of 33%. But by spring 2022, that had fallen to just 2%, compared with 23% for the state. 

In reading, meanwhile, 9% of Comer eighth graders met or exceeded state standards pre-pandemic, and that dipped to 4% in spring 2022, when the state’s average was 30%. 

The school made gains they’re proud of last school year, with 10% of eighth graders hitting the state’s bar for math and 22% hitting it for reading, though school leaders say they know there is still work to be done.

“If you don’t have some foundational skills and basic skills, it will be almost impossible to keep up with the curriculum as the kids get older,” said Mary Avalos, a research professor of teaching and learning at the University of Miami, who has studied how COVID affected middle school teachers. “That’s a big issue that needs to be addressed.”

How teachers are addressing pandemic learning gaps

Most of Bhatia’s students missed key skills in fourth and fifth grades — the years that school was remote, then interrupted by waves of COVID — but they mastered more advanced concepts in sixth grade last year.

That’s left Bhatia, like many teachers across the country, with the tricky task of coming up with mini lessons to fill in those elementary gaps, without spending so much time on prior concepts that students fall behind in middle school.

On a day like Friday, that meant to get students ready to add negative fractions, a seventh grade skill, Bhatia first had to teach a short lesson on adding fractions, a fourth grade skill. At first, some students mistakenly thought they should use the technique for dividing fractions they learned last year.

“They’ll say: ‘Oh is this keep, change, flip’?” Bhatia said. “The gap isn’t exactly what you would expect it to be.” 

This kind of teaching happened “once in a while” pre-pandemic, Bhatia said, but “now it’s like day by day I have to be really critical in thinking about: ‘OK what might be the gap that surfaces today?’”

Aubria Myers, who teaches sixth grade English at Comer, sees ways the familiar rhythms of school are just now returning, four months after federal health officials declared an official end to the COVID-19 emergency.

“This year, for me, feels the most normal,” Myers said. Students are saying: “Oh wait, what’s the homework again, can I get another copy?” she said. Last year when she mentioned homework, “they were like: ‘What is that?’”

On that recent Friday, Myers led an activity in her multicultural literature class that would have been impossible two years ago when students had to stay seated in pods of color-coded desks. 

Her sixth graders huddled close to one another as they tried to hop across the classroom, an exercise designed to give her fidgety students a chance to move around, while exemplifying the communication and teamwork skills that would be at the center of Seedfolks, the novel they were about to read in class.

Still, Myers had chosen the book, with its short chapters and lines full of metaphors and irony, to meet the needs of this crop of sixth graders, who spent all of third grade learning online. Many, Myers knows, never logged on. They have shorter attention spans and doubts about their reading skills but love class discussions, she said.

“They remember that time in their life when they were stuck talking to only people in their house,” Myers said. “They’re in class wanting to engage with each other.”

Myers has tried to prevent her students from getting discouraged by their learning gaps. At the start of this school year, for example, she’s pointing out spelling and punctuation errors, but not docking points yet. She wants to make sure her students first have time to learn some of the key skills they missed in earlier grades.

“We have kids who don’t understand how to put a period somewhere in your sentence, or how to put spaces between their words,” Myers said. “I see these very beautifully strung together ideas, these really well thought-out explanations, but they’re missing some of those key mechanics.”

Student mental health and engagement still top of mind

Comer has responded to students’ post-pandemic needs in other ways, too. The school expanded its team of social workers and other staff who work with students to resolve conflicts and address mental health needs, a trend that’s been observed nationwide.

The school has long felt the effects of neighborhood gun violence and student trauma, but staff say having more adults focused on those issues has helped students open up and seek help. Now, more students are requesting verbal mediations to head off physical fights, staff say.

“If you follow us through the building, you’ll see,” said Stephanie Williams, a former reading teacher who now directs Comer’s social and emotional learning team. “Kids will seek you out, or find you, and let you know: ‘Hey, I need this.’”

And this is the second year the school has scheduled all core classes earlier in the week, so that students can spend part of Friday practicing math and reading skills on the computer, and the rest of the day taking two special electives. It’s a strategy meant to keep students engaged — and showing up to school.

The school offers classes that pique students’ interests, such as the history of hip hop, hair braiding, and creative writing. Brandon Hall, a seventh grader at Comer, blended his first smoothie in a “foodies” class and bonded with his basketball coach through chess. He came to see similarities between making plays on the court and moving pawns across the board.

“I learned a lot from him,” he said.

On “Freedom Fridays,” attendance is higher and student conflicts are rarer, school officials say. That’s been important as the school, like many others, has seen higher chronic absenteeism rates over the last two years. At Comer, 1 in 3 sixth graders missed 18 or more days of school last year. Before the pandemic, that number sat closer to 1 in 5.

The approach runs counter to the calls some education experts have made for schools to double down on academics and add more instructional time — not take it away. 

A recent report by the Center on Reinventing Public Education, for example, spells out the numerous ways students are still struggling, and calls for “a greater urgency to address learning gaps before students graduate.” Harvard education researcher Thomas Kane noted that few districts have lengthened the school day or year and warned that, “The academic recovery effort following the pandemic has been undersized from the beginning.”

But JuDonne Hemingway, the principal of Comer, said devoting time to enrichment activities during the school day is worth it to ensure all students have access to them. These classes, she added, are helping students develop interests they may pursue in college or as part of a career.

“They’re not just random experiences for kids,” Hemingway said. “We think they are just as important as any traditional academic class.”

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization covering public education.

For more news on COVID in schools, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership page.

Key points:

• Students who follow ambitious yet attainable pathways to grade-level proficiency that go beyond typical learning trajectory can recover learning
• Learning loss is still profoundly felt even as schools move back to a “post-pandemic normal”
• See related article: Finding the learning loss data needed to drive learning recovery

A new report from Curriculum Associates demonstrates what happens when educators set ambitious targets for students–and what happens when they meet them. The report comes at a time when students continue to struggle academically in the wake of the pandemic and as efforts turn to learning recovery.

Findings from Pathways to Success: How Stretch Growth Goals Support Learning Recovery are based on data from more than 2.4 million students who completed the i-Ready Diagnostic for Reading and more than 3 million students who completed the i-Ready Diagnostic for Mathematics in Grades K–7 in 2021–2022 and in Grades 1–8 in 2022–2023. The report evaluates trends in growth patterns and grade-level placements for students who may require the most support to get to grade-level or develop essential prerequisite skills for later grades.

“So much of the news we’re seeing regarding student growth since the COVID-19 pandemic has showcased the historic lows in student learning,” said Rob Waldron, CEO of Curriculum Associates. “While these findings are concerning, students are able to accelerate their learning and begin to catch up when high expectations and personalized supports—like Stretch Growth—are utilized by schools. It’s not too late for us to help our students recover from learning loss and turn around the national narrative—but we cannot wait any longer.”

Curriculum Associates has pioneered the concept of Stretch Growth to create individualized student learning targets intended to provide ambitious yet attainable pathways to grade-level proficiency that go beyond the typical learning trajectory.

“By implementing Stretch Growth goals and setting high expectations, we have found that students are able to close learning gaps, particularly in the earlier grades,” said Kristen Huff, vice president of assessment and research at Curriculum Associates. “We found more success in students reaching grade level and staying at grade level when learning gaps were addressed early on. However, that’s not to say introducing Stretch Growth goals to older students won’t yield results. Even the practice of working toward Stretch Growth goals, when not fully achieving them, can inspire students to be ambitious and motivated in their learning.”

Key findings:

• For students who began Year 1 two or more grade levels below their chronological grade, there were at least three times the percentage reaching grade-level placement after two years of Stretch Growth compared to Typical Growth.
• For Grade 2 students who began Year 1 two or more grade levels behind in Reading, we saw only 31 percent place on grade level at the end of Grade 3 after Typical Growth, and a full 25 percent of those students remained two or more grade levels behind.  But for these same students, meeting Stretch Growth led to 89 percent achieving grade level.
• For Grade 4 students who began two or more grade levels behind in Mathematics, a smaller percentage of students reached grade level at the end of Grade 5 when meeting Typical Growth targets (15%) compared to students who met Stretch Growth targets (75%). 
• Students who met Stretch Growth for even one year, rather than two years consecutively, still demonstrated higher proportions (1.5 times) of reaching grade level than those who only met Typical Growth. 
• Stretch Growth proved particularly impactful in elementary years (i.e., Grades K–5), with at least 70 percent of students reaching grade level in Mathematics after meeting their Stretch Growth targets for two years. 
• In Grades 6–8, though there was a smaller proportion of students reaching grade level in Mathematics after meeting their Stretch Growth targets for two years, compared to elementary students, we still see nearly 50 percent or more reach grade level. 
• Up to 22 percent of elementary school students reached grade-level placement after two years of Typical Growth in Mathematics.
• After two years of Typical Growth, only a small percentage (i.e., six percent or less) of middle-grade mathematics students achieved grade-level placement.

“The time is ripe to implement meaningful, evidence-based, and scalable interventions to accelerate student learning,” said Emily McCann, senior vice president of educator community at Curriculum Associates. “We have an opportunity to revolutionize long-term learning across the nation by embedding Stretch Growth and setting high expectations as a practice to address learning gaps. Supporting teachers with the right data-driven tools to create individualized learning pathways for all students is the key to accelerated student learning.”

Pathways to Success: How Stretch Growth Goals Support Learning Recovery is one of a series of reports from Curriculum Associates on Stretch Growth impact and implementation. It precedes the forthcoming Curriculum Associates reports for Reading and Mathematics from the 2022–2023 school year.

Related: Progress toward academic recovery stalled in 2022-23

This press release originally appeared online.

Key points:

• As schools continue to emerge from COVID-related learning delays, student achievement remains worrisome
• Parents have cited tutoring and tech-based resources as two ways to help students catch up
• See related article: Finding the learning loss data needed to drive learning recovery

Concerns over unfinished learning continue to occupy educators’ minds, with only teacher shortages and burnout ranked higher, according to a national survey conducted by The Harris Poll and commissioned by Lexia, a part of Cambium Learning Group.

Just 43 percent of parents strongly agree that their child’s school has done a good job addressing unfinished learning from the 2021-22 school year, according to the survey.

For educators, teacher shortages and burnout are the only issues that loom larger than unfinished learning and other curriculum concerns. In Lexia’s 2023 nationwide survey of educators, almost half (45 percent) of respondents cited unfinished learning and curriculum issues like grade level appropriate topics as sources of concern for the 2023-24 school year.

In addition, multiple respondents added comments about their struggle to meet the wide range of learning needs for all the students in their classroom.

Examples of those comments include:

• “[S]tudents beginning way below grade level.”
• “Not enough time to teach required curriculum.”
• “Students[‘] needs outweigh adult ability to support.”

“Results from the 2022 NAEP and the 2023 NWEA assessments reinforce the picture we’ve obtained from these two surveys,” said Lexia President Nick Gaehde. NAEP scores of fourth and eighth graders revealed a decline from 2019, with 69 percent of fourth graders and two-thirds of eighth graders reading below proficiency.

Additionally, NWEA’s data showed that the general pace of students’ learning slowed rather than accelerated during the past school year. “That means unfinished learning resulting from the 2020 pandemic is still a concern,” added Gaehde. “In fact, it may have been exacerbated.”

Gaehde continued, “Everyone’s looking for solutions, and although our surveys found that 47 percent of parents and 73 percent of Lexia’s educators feel more one-on-one time for students with teachers would help students be at or above grade level during the 2023-24 school year, the teacher shortage makes that solution unfeasible in many areas of the country.”

However, parents and educators agree on another solution that is more feasible for many districts – using educational technology to support teachers’ efforts. When asked what their schools did well during the 2022-23 school year, Lexia’s educators most often cited technology investments for classroom learning, with over two-thirds (69 percent) of respondents selecting that survey option. Parents have a great deal of confidence in teachers’ technological capabilities, with 88 percent of them believing that teachers at their children’s schools are properly trained to use technology in the classroom.

The Lexia survey also questioned educators about the product features that supported literacy instruction. The most frequently cited was personalization for each student, which was chosen by 76 percent of educators. Progress monitoring tools came a close second, being cited by three-quarters (75 percent) of respondents. Over two-thirds of respondents (69 percent) wanted features that were based on the science of reading as well as features that were flexible or adaptable. Rounding out the top five was data-driven action plans, a feature that was chosen by 58 percent of respondents.

Other survey findings include:

• 55 percent of parents in the Lexia/Harris Poll survey say their child had put in extra time through tutors, extra classroom work or summer school to fully make up for the unfinished learning from the previous school year.
• 35 percent of parents think their child’s school could improve on investing in reading-specific technology resources to help students outside the classroom when thinking about their child’s current reading and language abilities.
• 46 percent of educators say more training and professional development opportunities are a good way to retain teachers.
• 41 percent of educators who primarily taught 9-12 said they had concerns about ChatGPT while only 19 percent of educators who primarily taught 6-8 said they had concerns about the artificial intelligence technology.

This press release originally appeared online.

Related: 5 ways to help students struggling with algebra due to learning loss

Key points:

• Achievement gains are still not quite back to pre-pandemic levels
• The average student needs roughly an additional 4.1 months of school to catch up to pre-COVID levels in reading and 4.5 months in math
• See related article: Finding the learning loss data needed to drive learning recovery

While students grew academically in the 2022-23 school year, achievement gains fell short of pre-pandemic trends in most grades, with the exception of the youngest students who bucked this trend and made above average achievement gains, according to a new report from nonprofit K-12 assessment and research organization NWEA. 

The report is the latest in NWEA’s efforts to track the impact of pandemic disruptions on academic gains and achievement levels for U.S. students using data from the 2022-23 academic year. This analysis provides the most current evidence to help guide recovery efforts and resource allocations in support of schools. While the pandemic is now deemed over, the impacts on students based on two markers, achievement in reading and mathematics, are still apparent.

Using data from 6.7 million U.S. public school students currently in grades 3 – 8, the study examined academic gains in the 2022-23 school year relative to pre-pandemic years. It also tracked the gap in achievement between the COVID year student group compared to their pre-pandemic peers.

Key findings from the study:

• The gap in achievement levels between the COVID cohort and their pre-pandemic peers did not shrink in 2022-23, and in some grades widened slightly.
• With these latest numbers, it’s estimated that most students would now need, on average, an additional 4.5 months of mathematics instruction and 4.1 months of reading instruction to recover in these two subjects.
• All groups showed sluggish achievement gains, but traditionally marginalized students (Black, Hispanic), remain furthest from recovery.

“COVID-19 may no longer be an emergency, but we are very much still dealing with the fallout from the crisis. These data reiterate that recovery will not be linear, easy, or quick and we cannot take our foot off the gas pedal,” said Dr. Karyn Lewis, co-author of the study and director of the Center for School and Student Progress at NWEA. “Disappointing as these results may be, it’s important not to lose sight of the fact that things would likely be so much worse without the enduring work of educators and schools to support students in this moment.”

To help contextualize the scale of the gaps, the report estimated the amount of additional learning that will be required to catch students up to pre-pandemic achievement levels. It stated that the average student would need support and interventions equivalent to an additional 4.1 months of school to catch up to pre-COVID levels in reading and 4.5 months in math. This amount of additional schooling cannot be compressed into a single year or achieved in a short-term intervention but rather will require sustained effort over several years. For traditionally marginalized students, the road ahead is even longer. These estimates are only to return students to pre-pandemic status quo, which does nothing to address the achievement disparities that pre-date the pandemic.

“Pandemic disruptions have been persistent and unprecedented, and, not surprisingly, so have their impacts on student achievement. School and district leaders have been doing a heroic job in identifying local needs and deploying evidence-based strategies to address them. But scaling interventions takes significant time and resources, and we know the hard work of educators often takes years to show up in test results,” said Lindsay Dworkin, SVP of Policy and Government Affairs at NWEA. “One year from the expiration of the federal education relief funds, which have supported so much of their vital efforts thus far, policymakers and leaders throughout the education ecosystem must renew their commitment to recovery. Our students deserve the sustained resources and urgency necessary to ensure they have the opportunity to reach their full potential.”

That urgency for sustained resources is reiterated in a series of recommendations for policy makers and education leaders noted in an NWEA policy brief, released alongside the new research. Recommendations include:

• Using local data to guide recovery and investing in what works. States and districts can set up processes and tools that provide capacity to schools when gathering data and tracking the implementation of interventions.
• Expanding instructional time by deploying evidence-based interventions and programs to the students who still need additional support. Interventions and programs must be scaled to the size of the challenge, and students in need of additional support may require multiple interventions to fully recover from the pandemic’s impacts. State and district leaders can work with schools to develop policies and practices that ensure schools are able to implement interventions efficiently and effectively.
• Communicating the importance of academic recovery, sharing timely and relevant information with families. States, districts and schools can provide families with timely information about their child’s progress and achievement compared to grade-level standards and resources that families can use to support learning recovery at home.

This press release originally appeared online.

Related:
7 strategies to counter student learning loss
3 recommendations from research on COVID learning loss

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for a free weekly newsletter to keep up with how public education is changing.

Just as COVID hit some communities much harder than others, schools across the U.S. suffered disparate academic losses in the wake of the pandemic.

But new research points to a surprising finding: Students within the same district seemed to experience similar academic setbacks, regardless of their background. In the average district, white and more affluent students lost about the same amount of ground in reading and math as Black and Hispanic students and students from low-income families.

To researchers, that suggests that factors at the school district and community level — like whether students received quality remote instruction and whether communities experienced a strict lockdown — were bigger causes of test score declines than what was going on in students’ homes.

“Where children lived during the pandemic mattered more to their academic progress than their family background, income, or internet speed,” a team of researchers wrote in a new report.

The report offers some insight into why school districts experienced a wide range of academic losses during the pandemic. Citing pre-pandemic evidence that learning loss can persist for years without major interventions beyond normal instruction, it also points to the need for more intensive academic recovery efforts in some places. Those findings come as many schools are under pressure to reach more students with extra help like tutoring, and school leaders are trying to figure out the best ways to spend the limited COVID relief funding they have left.

But the report doesn’t get much closer to providing an answer to a key question that has evaded researchers: Why did school districts that stayed remote for similar lengths of time experience very different academic losses?

Thomas Kane, a Harvard professor of education and economics who co-authored the study, says that’s likely because researchers haven’t found a way to reliably measure factors that may have had a big impact, such as the quality of instruction students received.

“It’s like the suspect that we couldn’t find and question,” he said.

The team included researchers from Harvard, Stanford, Dartmouth, and Johns Hopkins universities, as well as the testing group NWEA. Together, they looked at data from 7,800 school districts in 40 states, focusing on reading and math scores from state and federal tests for students in third to eighth grades.

Then the team looked to build on earlier research released last fall that found academic losses were steeper in districts that served larger shares of Black and Hispanic students and students from low-income families, and in districts that stayed remote or offered a mix of in-person and virtual instruction for longer.

This time, the researchers looked at several more factors that they thought could have had an effect on student’s math and reading scores during the pandemic.

These included whether students had access to the internet and a device at home; school staffing levels; whether residents had trust in their local institutions, like schools; employment rates; COVID death rates; anxiety and depression rates; and the degree to which COVID caused social and economic disruptions in a community. (To identify those disruptions, the research team looked at how often people did activities such as shop for groceries, eat at a restaurant, or socialize with people outside their home, using a combination of cell phone, Google, and Facebook survey data.)

The team found that student test scores fell more, especially in math, in places where families saw their daily routines more significantly restricted — a finding that held true even in places where schools closed only for a short time. Math losses also were greater in counties that had higher death rates from COVID.

Meanwhile, learning losses associated with remote instruction were smaller in places that reported greater trust in their local institutions, perhaps because parents supported their local school district’s pandemic decision-making.

Math learning losses stemming from virtual learning were bigger in places where adults reported higher levels of anxiety and depression, and in communities that had higher employment rates. In those cases, researchers wrote, parents may not have been as able to support their kids when they were learning from home.

Still, the additional factors explain only a “little bit” of why academic losses varied so much in places that stayed remote longer, Kane said. And they don’t explain why high-poverty school districts that serve more students of color lost more academic ground when they stayed remote for longer.

That may be because researchers haven’t yet found a way to measure some of the most important factors. The team wasn’t able to look at community COVID hospitalization rates, for example. They also couldn’t take into account the quality of remote instruction students received, or what policies districts set for student attendance and engagement during remote learning.

Remote instruction varied widely, especially early in the pandemic. Some schools required students to attend classes on live video for several hours a day, while others gave students more independent work.

In some places, teachers received little training on how to teach students virtually. In other places, teachers had to juggle students who were both at home and in front of them — a setup that often left parents and students more dissatisfied with the instructional quality.

“In some schools remote instruction was a watered-down version of in-person instruction,” Kane said. “In other places, there was just much less of an expectation that classes would be covering the usual grade-level standards online. We just don’t have a direct measure of the quality of remote/hybrid instruction and the level of expectations.”

The researchers also found evidence that in the decade leading up to the pandemic, when districts saw big dips in test scores — perhaps because there was a strong flu season, or a weak teaching team that year — their students tended not to recover as they progressed through later grades.

That suggests, according to the researchers, that it will be difficult for students to recover from the pandemic unless their schools take “extraordinary” measures, like expanding summer school and tutoring many more students. Chalkbeat previously reported that in many of the nation’s largest districts, fewer than 1 in 10 students got any kind of tutoring earlier this school year.

“When there is a disruption, it’s not like they know how to hurry up,” Kane said. “They will proceed with their lesson plans and instruction. It’s easy to resume learning — it’s very hard to accelerate it.”

Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

Related:
Finding the learning loss data needed to drive learning recovery
New school year shows continued signs of academic rebounding

The National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) Report Card on learning loss was a sobering but not unexpected reckoning for how deeply and broadly the pandemic impacted student learning and achievement. 

NAEP state-level findings of drops in math and reading scores were followed by the release of the Education Recovery Scorecard, which leveraged NAEP data to offer the first comparable view of district level learning loss during the pandemic. This one-two punch confirms that COVID-19 learning loss was extensive and, in some cases, worse than expected. Recommendations on how to move forward are not in short supply, and for many, data lies at the heart of transitioning from learning loss to learning recovery. 

Funding, policy, and learning decisions without data is a recipe for disaster – particularly given estimates that it will take hundreds of billions of dollars to offset the impact of learning loss. But we also need the right data and the right approach to interpreting this data, to initiate a successful learning recovery process.  

Holistic learning loss data only goes so far

During my tenure as South Dakota Secretary of Education, I witnessed firsthand the importance of data to support and enhance all aspects of student, teacher, and institutional performance. With roughly 150 school districts, statewide data held value, but the diversity of education experiences across urban and rural areas underscored the need for individual student data as well. In 2019, 40 percent of South Dakota students attended rural public schools, which meant different student-teacher ratios and access to digital learning. Despite assumptions, however, standardized test scores in rural areas often kept pace or outpaced those in more populated areas. 

State and district-level learning loss data is critical. But learning recovery requires analysis of individual student-level data. That’s why attention is being paid to a dozen states that have been specifically tracking COVID learning loss all the way down to individual students. All told, the data from these states represented approximately 15 million students who participated in state assessment programs.  The individual state analyses used students’ entire available testing histories in all tested grades and subjects. In this approach, students are compared to themselves. 

This statistical approach is used to predict how students would have scored on assessments absent the pandemic. By comparing those results to the expected scores and assessing how students performed versus how they were expected to perform, one can arrive at a student-specific measure of learning loss. The intended value is to reveal the strengths and struggles by school, grade, subject, student group, and individual students. That’s the level of information education leaders, and teachers need to make instructional decisions and allocate resources for learning recovery and acceleration. 

Student-level data will help guide learning recovery 

Regardless of how states responded to the pandemic, this look at student-level data revealed commonalities that mirror the national findings, as well as anomalies that should be heeded when making learning recovery investments. 

Core data trends mirrored state and district-level findings. 

In some cases, individual student-level findings tracked closely with expected results. For example, students who received mostly or all virtual instruction tended to experience greater learning loss than those who primarily received in-person instruction. Chris Neale, Missouri Assistant Commissioner of Education, shared earlier this year that Missouri education leaders found “striking results” confirming the value of direct student contact with teachers relative to virtual instruction. The negative impact of virtual learning was more pronounced in Black and Hispanic student populations, which were more likely to use virtual instruction. 

Data outliers challenged conventional wisdom. 

The importance of individual student-level data was underscored by findings that did not follow perceived learning loss variations. Dr. Jeni Corn of the North Carolina Office of Learning Recovery and Acceleration said, “We used the data to unpack and identify promising practices – ‘positive outliers of the pandemic’ is the language we use. Despite the chaos of the pandemic, learning was happening. Teachers were connecting with their students.” 

Dr. Corn explained there were some interesting anomalies. Notably, students with disabilities and English language learners outperformed compared to the general population as it relates to learning loss. These populations have built-in supports, which Dr. Corn suspects made a difference, “We think it was [a result of] the direct, targeted services for those learners that we could activate as soon as the pandemic hit.” 

These compelling findings are made possible by using all available assessment data, not a sample, and comparing students against themselves instead of a different set of test takers from years earlier. The results provide districts and states with valuable data for teachers as they return to the classroom to make decisions on targeted interventions for individual students. 

Looking beyond recovery

The federal government has poured billions of dollars into learning recovery, and states are already being asked to account for how that money was spent. Did students get back on track? Did they make up what was lost? Did they even accelerate beyond pre-pandemic expectations?

This is an opportunity to rethink, innovate and transform education so that academic progress accelerates as the pandemic’s educational effects wane.  Equipped with a trove of valuable learning loss data, states can understand their own unique and evolving challenges. They can more effectively prioritize interventions, continuously analyze and improve learning strategies and show how they used once-in-a-lifetime funding to impact all students positively. 

Related:
Understanding historical trends and patterns in student data

Post-pandemic academic achievement is showing encouraging signs of improvement, although not evenly across school years, according to NWEA, a nonprofit, research and educational services organization serving K-12 students.

The new research findings are based on fall 2022 assessment data from nearly 7 million US students in grades 3-8.

The new report is part of NWEA’s ongoing research effort to examine how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted student achievement in reading and math.

Key findings include:

• Students lost less ground during summer 2022 compared to pre-pandemic trends (“summer slide” wasn’t as steep).
• Academic rebounding in reading and math continued in fall 2022; however, rebounding is not even across school years and summers, especially in reading.
• The youngest students in the sample (current 3^rd graders who were kindergarteners when the pandemic began) have the largest reading declines and showed the least rebounding.
• Even with continued rebounding, student achievement remains lower than a typical year and full recovery is likely still several years away.

“We can now confidently say that Spring 2021 is when we bottomed out. That was the point where the gaps between test scores during the pandemic relative to historical trends were at their widest,” said Dr. Karyn Lewis, director of the Center for School and Student Progress at NWEA and co-author of the new report along with Dr. Megan Kuhfeld. “Since that time, we’ve seen those gaps start to shrink, which is good news and indicates we’re on the path to recovery. But there is still a long road ahead of us and achievement levels continue to be below pre-pandemic norms.”

Fall data is helpful to educators as a checkpoint to realign instructional plans and for district leaders to understand where more intervention efforts may be needed and for which students.

“This is a great moment for school leaders to look for opportunities to give classroom teachers the flexibility they need to serve students with varying degrees of proficiency, like flexible schedules and adding staff that can support dynamic student grouping,” said Dr. Chase Nordengren, principal research lead for Effective Instructional Strategies at NWEA. “This will be no easy task as school leaders continue to juggle challenges like staffing shortages and balancing academic recovery with student mental health. They deserve our support and understanding as they focus their efforts on meeting the needs of students who need it the most.”

One concerning finding is the impact on reading levels of third graders, who were kindergarteners at the onset of the pandemic and have seen the largest impact in reading and the least improvement.

“Teaching kids to read with good accuracy in English takes several years. We have a complex language where one letter pattern can stand for different sounds, such as COW and SNOW, and where similar sounds can be spelled different ways, such as WAIT and WEIGHT. It should not be surprising that when good systematic teaching about this complex code was challenged for a year or more, our current third graders turn out to be struggling,” said Dr. Cindy Jiban, principal academic lead, focusing on early learning at NWEA. “First, we need to ensure that we are offering strong, evidence-based code instruction beyond the grades where those skills used to be actively taught. Phonics and fluency instruction need to extend, to meet students’ needs regardless of grade. Second, we need to acknowledge and allow for the time it takes students to move toward fluent reading of a complex language, even when our instruction is excellent.”

Mathematics also continues to be a focus, as throughout the pandemic, the subject saw greater declines.

“I’m heartened to see mathematics rebounding given how far behind students fell and it speaks volumes of our educators as they continue to find ways to increase time with mathematics in school,” said Dr. Tammy Baumann, VP of Academic Services focused on mathematics at NWEA. “But families are in a unique position to offer incredible help. It is imperative that students develop a positive math identity at a young age. Adults at home can help by referring to children as young mathematicians and engaging them in intentional opportunities where they have positive experiences with mathematics.”

Related:
Mastery learning can help close pandemic learning gaps
District leaders outline top 3 COVID relief funding priorities

In this episode of Innovations in Education, hosted by Kevin Hogan:

• New research offers major insights into post-pandemic learning
• In post-COVID schools, let’s redouble efforts to support students
• Meet the 2022 K-12 Hero Awards winners!

Related:
Future strategies for today’s schools
How to ease three district pain points

The other day, my friend’s high school daughter complained, “It’s not fair!” “What’s not fair?” her mother asked. “Everyone is cheating!” her daughter replied. “They started doing it during COVID, and now it’s a habit.” Unfortunately, academic dishonesty is just one example of the many negative consequences of the COVID pandemic.

In hindsight, we have ample evidence that remote learning during COVID increased hardships for PK-12 students, both academically and non-academically. Some students lacked necessary resources. In one study, even after all students were provided with a laptop computer, internet access, and headphones, low-income students’ school attendance and engagement were consistently less frequent than their higher-income peers (An, 2021). Food insecurity also increased during COVID, partly due to the hiatus of school breakfast, lunch, and take-home snack pack programs (Parekh et al., 2021). And worst of all, children at home during COVID were twice as likely to experience physical abuse and three times likely to experience emotional abuse during the pandemic than in prior years (Park & Walsh, 2022).

Without a doubt, remote learning during COVID was distressing for students, with 71 percent of parents in one study reporting that the pandemic had “taken a toll on their child’s mental health” (Abramson, 2022, para. 2).

It was a stressful time for teachers, too. One study found that teachers experienced higher burnout rates, depression, and anxiety as a result of the rapid transition to remote learning and its extended duration, which led to feelings of isolation, lower work commitment, and higher teacher turnover (Gutentag & Asterhan, 2022).

All of these factors contributed to a substantial decline in student learning during COVID. One year into the pandemic, Kwakye and Kibort-Crocker (2021) reported that 23 percent of low-income students received a failing grade during the pandemic compared to 8 percent of average- and high-income students. After two years, federal achievement data revealed significant drops in third-grade students’ overall math and reading scores across the United States (Camera, 2022).

So now, we’re all back at school, but things have changed. In addition to lingering fears of COVID, the national trend toward disrespect for authority has increased student discipline issues, and the rash of school shootings in recent years has rendered school safety a huge concern (Kurtz, 2022; Oshin, 2022).

Moreover, controversial curricular reform efforts in social studies, science, and health have exacerbated the re-opening of schools, with community feelings of distrust, protests at school board meetings, and parents pulling children from public schools in favor of private and home school options (Sparks, 2022).

Related:
4 tips to build a strong classroom culture this year
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In response, today’s school leaders have no choice but to view post-COVID as an opportunity for schools to redouble their efforts to support students. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, a pyramid-shaped model that represents human motivation from a student’s most basic needs (the base of the pyramid) to their greatest potential (the pyramid’s peak), offers a useful framework (Wahome, 2022) (see Figure 1).

Figure 1

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Physiological Needs. First and foremost, post-COVID schools must work harder than ever to ensure that all students have the resources and support they need. Community resources, private donations, and grants can be sought to supplement school funding for things like laptops, software, and hot spots. Non-perishable food drives, fresh produce markets, and the availability of personal hygiene products for students who need them can be organized by parent clubs or community groups. Social and public health services such as counseling, parent education, dental exams, and flu shots can be provided on-site (Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, 2022).

Safety, Protection, and Security. Ensuring students’ physical and emotional safety runs a close second. Post-COVID schools must do all they can to protect students from harm and hostility, both in-person and in cyberspace. School security systems, school resource officers, background checks, and other safety measures must take top priority. School facilities must be free of toxins and hazards, student behavior policies must hold students to high standards, and school staff members and volunteers should receive annual training as mandated reporters of child abuse and neglect as well as sex-based discrimination and harassment. 

Belongingness and Love. Today’s schools also must go out of their way to facilitate students’ feelings of belongingness. School colors, mascots, and participation in extracurricular activities provide a starting point, but more than ever before, post-COVID students need opportunities to communicate, collaborate, and problem solve with their peers. Additionally, advisor-advisee programs built into the school day can foster close relationships between advisors and small groups of students (AMLE, 2022). Parent and community volunteers can be recruited to assist with homework and tutoring. Partnerships with local churches and other civic groups can provide students with positive role models, mentors, and social-emotional support.

Esteem. Only after students’ physiological, safety, and belonging needs are met should schools begin thinking about teaching and learning. Post-COVID is a grand opportunity to re-think the traditional academic structure of schools. Today’s students would benefit from smaller class sizes, two teachers per classroom, and extended instructional time for reading, math, and writing instruction. Today’s students no longer need to memorize information; they need to understand concepts. Students no longer need to learn isolated facts; they need to practice the skills needed to apply them. Re-thinking what, why, and how students are taught is what teachers and school leaders do best; and in today’s post-COVID world, doing things differently is essential.

Self-Actualization. Once students reach the peak of the Maslow’s Hierarchy pyramid, they are finally in a position to blossom and thrive. But only with a solid foundation of support and resources beneath them can students achieve their full potential. To help students get there, today’s school leaders must work to develop a post-COVID vision for teaching and learning that not only supports students academically but also addresses students’ non-academic and social-emotional needs. Once that happens, my friend’s conversation with her high school daughter might sound something like this: “It’s not fair!” “What’s not fair?” “Everyone is working so hard! They started doing it following COVID, and now it’s a habit!”

The eSchool News K-12 Hero Awards recognize the dedicated efforts of education professionals across K-12 departments, including IT, curriculum, instruction and administration. 

Sponsored this year by JAR Systems and SAP Concur, the program received an influx of inspiring nominations that highlight the innovation and selflessness of educators in schools and districts across the nation.

Listed here is the second group of the program’s finalists. The first group of finalists was featured on eSchool News last week–find them here!

Jump to: Jim Perry, Jones County Public Schools, Juliann Koehn, Cory Matsumiya, Kim Kaspar, Kirk Langer, Laura Johnson, Mark Hess, Michele Bledsoe, Mira Campbell, Neal Kellogg, Scott Mitchum, Shawn Braxton, Spartanburg School District One, Steven Langford, Tiffany Brinkley, Twin Rivers Unified School District.

Nominee: Jim Perry, Stapleton School
Nominated by: EmpowerU, Inc. 

Jim Perry came to education as a second career and has brought such dedication and fresh perspective to his staff, students, and district at large.

Jim wanted to support student well-being and resilience in the face of the disruption and set-back in social-emotional learning that COVID created. Jim embraced EmpowerU immediately. He took the self-regulation and resilience framework and adopted it at a school-wide level. As classroom teachers led classrooms through turn-key lessons and helped students apply what they learned to their goals and challenges, Jim took it even further by having assemblies to showcase the learnings happening in each classroom.

He believes in EmpowerU so much that he helped to present to the larger Baldwin County Public Schools district on the benefits and major changes that he is seeing in his staff and students. His enthusiasm for creating a safe social emotional learning environment is very admirable and his students are so lucky.

Jim is a vibrant a leader like Jim Perry, and Stapleton is thriving under his leadership. We love Jim Perry!

Nominee: Jones County Public Schools
Nominated by: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH)            

Jones County Public Schools: Forward-Thinking K-12 Heroes of the Pandemic

Jones County Public Schools in North Carolina has a unique pandemic story. It all started in September 2018. After Hurricane Florence devastated the community and destroyed one of the district’s schools, Jones County Public Schools set out to rebuild its school infrastructure, which now includes a brand-new, high-tech, solar-powered K-12 campus. To complement its forward-thinking vision, the district sought a blended curriculum solution that offered a full suite of digital resources accessible from a single platform. District leaders formed the Jones Curriculum Council (JCC), a committee of teachers tasked with researching and evaluating top-tier curriculum solutions. HMH’s connected solutions scored highest on the JCC’s rubric. The district formed a partnership with HMH—purchasing HMH Into Math, HMH Into Reading, HMH Into Literature, and Waggle programs, along with professional services, which are all accessed via Ed, HMH’s learning platform.

As Jones County leaders will tell you, this dynamic, one-stop-shop of connected solutions and professional learning services positioned the district well to face the unique challenges presented by COVID-19 and the 2020-2021 school year. HMH’s blended curriculum enabled the district to navigate the shift to remote and hybrid better than most districts.

Every day during the pandemic, Jones County educators provided synchronous instruction to in-person and virtual students daily, a task that would be difficult, if not impossible, without a genuinely digital-first solution. Each class was recorded for parents to review anytime, and in-person students collaborated and engaged with their virtual peers.

It was the innovative thinking of JCPS leadership that set the district up for success. Following that initial decision to focus on digital and with the start of the pandemic and beyond, Jones County principals, teachers, and students all embraced “a new normal.” With HMH’s blended curriculum and data tools, teachers in Jones County were able to streamline instruction and personalize learning for each student, without having to purchase extra materials or sign in on multiple platforms.

HMH and JCPS developed a safe plan to capture the Jones Country experience on video and spoke with some teachers and students using HMH connected solutions during COVID-19. The footage acquired was edited into a series videos demonstrating the power and benefits of HMH’s digital-first, connected solutions in a hybrid learning environment.

Nominee: Juliann Koehn, Epic Charter Schools    
Nominated by: EmpowerU, Inc. 

Epic Charter Schools offers online learning to more than 30,000 students in the state of Oklahoma. For years, the school had been searching for ways to reverse the pattern of disengagement, build motivation to complete schoolwork and get students over that finish line at graduation.

With no school counseling team — and teachers weary from other new programs and systems — EPIC needed a partner it could trust to serve Tier 2 students.

Juliann Koehn, Social and Emotional Learning Specialist at Epic, worked to bring EmpowerU to the district and enrolled over 400 students in the program during the 2021-22 school year.

Over 91 percent of Epic students who completed EmpowerU saw a positive impact on well-being, academic engagement, and outcomes, and Juliann is committed to bringing those same results to as many students as possible.

Juliann is passionate about the need to equip students with the tools to be successful and sees the potential in each of them. She works tirelessly to educate others about the importance of programs like EmpowerU to help students become more confident, self-directed, and reach their goals both in and out of the classroom.

In the first few weeks of the 2022-23 school year Juliann has rolled out EmpowerU to over 550 Epic students and counting!

Nominee: Cory Matsumiya, Kamehameha Schools           
Nominated by: SAP Concur         

Kamehameha Schools, headquartered in Honolulu, HI, is the largest private school network in the nation, with a sole mission to educate native Hawaiian children. 

Cory Matsumiya, Assistant Controller, has been with Kamehameha Schools for 15 years.  Cory was the original “owner” of SAP Concur and the primary champion for getting the solution implemented. 

It’s with great pleasure that SAP Concur nominates Kamehameha Schools and Cory Matsumiya for the eSchool News K-12 Hero Awards. 

Cory, part of a team of 3, which he refers to as the “3 Musketeers,” implemented SAP Concur in 2015 in an effort to drive efficiencies, control spending, and optimize visibility for an organization with 4,000+ employees.  Cory exudes an innovative and forward-thinking mindset when it comes to doing the right thing for the organization.  He embraces opportunities to make his team more efficient by automating and streamlining processes, is always eager to find ways to improve current processes, and is more than willing to share his experiences with others to help them do better.  We are grateful for our partnership with Cory and Kamehameha Schools!

Nominee: Kim Kaspar, MSW, Aurora Public Schools’ AWARE Program                     
Nominated by: Hazel Health       

Hazel Health (Hazel) nominates Kim Kaspar in honor of her dedication to ensuring her students receive care based on what’s best for them, not what’s easiest for adults. Providing access to mental health care has been a priority for Aurora Public Schools’ AWARE Team even before the pandemic. However, as districts nationwide experienced a shortage of qualified health care professionals, the pandemic’s impact on students’ mental health created an unprecedented need to expand access to care quickly. Based on this need, Aurora Public Schools was in the implementation stage when the Director of Mental Health and Counseling unexpectedly had to take a leave of absence.

Understanding the importance of expanding care in the wake of the pandemic, Ms. Kaspar stepped up to move the work forward. Ms. Kasapar not only ensured the partnership was successful but pushed Hazel to innovate its services to align with Colorado state policy. In Colorado, students 12 or older do not need consent from a parent or guardian to access mental health services. Ms. Kaspar understood that students might not be comfortable getting permission to receive the care they critically needed and pushed Hazel to align its services within the district accordingly.

To ensure the partnership’s success, Ms. Kaspar took the Hazel team from school to school across 30 sites to present to the staff responsible for student care. She helped overcome objections and foster collaboration between the schools and the Hazel team. One aspect of the partnership in particular that she highlighted was the ability for Hazel to transition student care to long-term providers as needed. She said, “I hate for kids with mental health challenges to tell their stories to different adults.” She values that Hazel makes the experience seamless for students—whom she puts first at every turn. Now, Hazel sees consistent utilization of its services across the district, primarily due to Ms. Kaspar’s efforts.

Nominee: Kirk Langer, Lincoln Public Schools      
Nominated by: Lightspeed Systems         

Kirk is responsible for keeping the students and faculty of Lincoln Public Schools connected and engaged through technology to ensure that learning isn’t disrupted. Kirk leads a team of 65 experts, and under his guidance they have accomplished feats such as the procurement of 3,680 brand new MacBook Airs for certified staff, and organizing extensive cybersecurity trainings for staff to keep the district and its students safe. His passion and dedication to bettering his district through the use of technology is commendable and makes him a worthy recipient of this award.

Nominee: Laura Johnson, Apex Learning Virtual School   
Nominated by: Edmentum           

Before schools shut down due to the global pandemic, most students had little to no experience with digital learning or online school. Many schools found themselves having to adapt to a virtual setting to survive. As a certified teacher through Edmentum’s Apex Learning Virtual School (ALVS), Laura Johnson is dedicated to ensuring every student thrives in a virtual environment. The pandemic tasked her to meet an influx of students who faced new sets of challenges, while maintaining high standards and helping students cope with new learning environments.

For 14 years, Laura Johnson has taught a variety of subjects, including social studies, psychology, and music and art appreciation–all virtually within ALVS. She started as a part-time teacher while she was still at a brick-and-mortar school, where she drove 38 miles each way to teach. Eventually, Laura became the first full-time teacher with ALVS, and she now connects with students all over the globe.

While ALVS has provided rigorous and engaging online curriculum to students in grades 6-12 for many years, the pandemic made ALVS see a sudden influx of 5,000 new virtual students. As one of the school’s experienced teachers, Laura volunteered her expertise and contributed immensely by stepping in to assist with interviewing, hiring, and training 125 new part-time teachers to meet the demand.

Laura was also heavily involved in the ALVS/Eastern Shore of Maryland Educational Consortium partnership where she and other educators provided instruction to more than 400 students to meet state standards, and ensured lessons complied with management’s outlines. She supported getting this new grant program off the ground, delivering quality digital instruction and modeling new ways of teaching, and connecting with students for the state. This program will continue this year with the same group of motivated educators thanks to the successful contributions of Laura.

Laura’s mantra for being a virtual teacher is “you need to care.” During the pandemic, she faced new challenges, such as students being reluctantly thrust into a digital program out of necessity, and not out of motivation or opportunity. However, Laura went out of her way to make connections with these students. Through phone calls that allowed her to get to know them and discover what motivates them, she took the extra steps like providing individualized feedback on assessments and checking not just for completion, but for understanding. For all assignments, Laura responds with affirmative feedback with “glow or grow” information, meaning what students need to be aware of for future assignments or shares what they did great.

Laura shared that some students who joined her office hours or who reached out to schedule time to speak with her did not really need help academically; instead, they just wanted to talk and have someone listen to them. As a parent, Laura knows the value of a teacher who truly cares about each individual student and that is exactly how she chooses to impact students’ lives and educational journeys—by making those connections, whether students are 38 miles or 1,038 miles away.

Nominee: Mark Hess, Mary Helen Guest Elementary School
Nominated by: Epson

Mark Hess has served in a variety of roles since he was hired in 1993 by Walled Lake Consolidated School District in Walled Lake, Michigan. Prior to COVID-19, Hess was the executive manager of instruction, technology, and data analysis and was one of the key developers of the district’s initiative to revamp its instructional units to focus on the latest research on high-yield teaching strategies, power standards, and embedding technology in each unit. When everyone had to shift to remote and hybrid learning in 2020, Hess’ initiative helped schools and staff feel well-prepared to make the transition because many already had confidence when using technology and openness toward instructional technology. In addition, the district already had computers and document cameras for teachers, who took them home to assist in presenting content during remote teaching.

For the 2020-21 school year, Hess’ district position was dissolved following new district leadership, so he returned to the school building as the principal of Mary Helen Guest Elementary School. As the school leader, Hess learned new ways to support his teachers with the ups and downs of the constantly changing school year. This included finding opportunities to offer effective and efficient professional development and encourage teachers to share best practices with each other. Additionally, investing in the best-in-class technologies has always been a priority for Hess. This includes Epson BrightLink Interactive Displays and Document Cameras for every teaching space. Classrooms throughout the district are outfitted equitably with technology and have an adequate infrastructure teachers need for engaging learning environments.

The 2021-22 school year presented new opportunities for Hess as the elementary school was renovated over the summer and every learning space was updated to active learning environments. Hess ensured teachers were prepared and informed about ways to utilize their new classrooms. Teachers were very appreciative to have more flexibility and are seeing an increase in student engagement and participation. Hess has led staff and teachers to create a safe, motivating, and positive learning environment for students. Hess did not use the pandemic as an excuse to stop innovating and instead, stayed creative to ensure the best learning environment for every student.

Nominee: Michele Bledsoe, Puyallup School District
Nominated by: Hazel Health       

Hazel Health (Hazel) nominates Michele Bledsoe in honor of her deep understanding of the youth health crisis and her ability to build the cross-functional buy-in that ensures her students have equitable access to mental health care. Before the pandemic, the Puyallup School District was experiencing capacity challenges in meeting the needs of its students when it came to providing timely mental health care. The pandemic exacerbated those challenges making the requirement more critical. Because Puyallup is a diverse learning community, finding a partner that could provide culturally competent health care was a top priority.

Ms. Bledsoe, director of Equity & Social Emotional Wellness, K-12 Counselors, MV and Truancy, had the vision to be an early adopter of Hazel. She believed in a world where every student in the Puyallup School District had access to timely, quality health care regardless of their family’s ability to cover the cost of care. And she put in the work to make it a reality. Ms. Bledsoe did the deep research required of a trailblazer to get buy-in from her board and teams across the district. She also had the foresight to understand that leveraging ESSER funds to expand access to student mental healthcare was fundamental to overcoming the impacts of the pandemic.

Thanks to her dedication, every student in the district—more than 22,000—now has access to evidence-based mental health care. Students can receive care in school or at home in minutes to days versus the national average of months. Since Hazel specializes in delivering culturally competent care, the professionals providing care reflect the district’s diversity, which means students and families receive care and support from professionals who understand and value their experiences. Positive word of mouth from families with students who have accessed care is driving the second-highest utilization rate of services out of all our partnerships nationwide. Further, the partnership helped to expand the capacity of overloaded staff dedicated to supporting students’ mental health.

Ms. Bledsoe quickly understood that sustainability is essential and laid the groundwork early for transitioning the work to more sustainable funding sources to ensure students throughout the district can continue to access quality healthcare once ESSER funding runs out. Thanks to Ms. Bledsoe, stakeholders across the Puyallup learning community are positively impacted—but most importantly, students now have access to the care they need to have their best opportunity to thrive.

Nominee: Mira Campbell, FH Miller Jr. PS
Nominated by: Tools for Schools, Inc.     

Mira Campbell has taken on legendary status amongst the Book Creator team. There are very few teachers out there who continually push the capabilities of our tool like Mira does.

Her work is innovative and pushes boundaries–and she’s great at sharing her knowledge with others!

The story behind this nomination comes from a project that Mira ran during the pandemic. They started the project in the classroom, switched seamlessly to remote learning and then finished the project with an in-person celebration that melts the heart!

This was a creative writing project that was differentiated for the various skills, interests, and learning styles of her students, allowing every student to be successful. Mira worked with the class teacher to introduce writing techniques, and then used a writing prompt to generate story ideas. After brainstorming ideas together, they drafted stories in Google Docs before creating fully fleshed multimedia publications in Book Creator.

Mira took advantage of the full suite of tools in Book Creator to allow students to create in the media that worked for them–some kids dictated their books using speech to text; others used drawing and emojis to bring their stories to life. With real-time collaboration in Book Creator, the teachers were able to keep in touch with students and post feedback in their books.

In January 2021, whilst still in lockdown, Mira arranged a class reading over Zoom. They invited the principals to join, and the students got the thrill of sharing their work with a wider audience.

Mira then had students use Flipgrid to record reflections on the book creation process–what they learned, strategies they employed for writing, and a question for Debbie Ridpath Ohi (the author of the writing prompt). These video reflections were embedded at the end of their books. What’s more, Mira reached out to Debbie and she gave her own feedback on the books and answered the questions!

At this point, most people would wrap up the project, but not Mira. Mira used the PDF export feature in Book Creator and worked with a local printing company to print physical copies of their books, which she presented to students in a big reveal once they were back in the classroom! The video she put together of that moment may be the best thing we’ve ever seen Book Creator used for.

Mira is a hero for a number of reasons:

1. She cares about her students and goes out of her way to make projects that work for them on their own individual levels.
2. She works collaboratively with the teachers around her to get the most out of everybody.
3. She generously shares what she has learnt with other teachers.
4. She knows Book Creator inside out and goes above and beyond in the way she uses it in her classroom.
5. She goes the extra mile to give students the best learning experience they could hope for.

Nominee: Neal Kellogg, Oklahoma City Public Schools
Nominated by: TutorMe              

Originally an elementary school music teacher and site lead technology educator, Neal Kellogg is the Director of Educational Technology Services for Oklahoma City Public Schools (OKCPS)—serving 34,000 K–12 students across 33 elementary schools, 12 middle schools, 8 high schools, 4 alternative schools, and 6 charter schools.

Under Neal’s direction, technology at OKCPS is evolving to a more personalized, engaging, and interactive experience, focusing on personal responsibility for self-directed professional learning. A shy student in high school, Neal credits the positive impact his band teacher had on him when he was growing up, which helps guide him today in his role.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Neal prioritized communication first and foremost with students, families, and teachers at OKCPS—the second-largest district in Oklahoma—to ensure learning continued. The pandemic pushed OKCPS to move quick, making it crucial the district kept everyone informed about the direction the district went, along with ongoing changes to better support students.

In March 2020, Neal oversaw the district roll out a one-to-one device program and implement a new learning management system (LMS). While these initiatives can take two years or more to fully scale, the district’s program was up and running by August—just in time for the 2020–2021 school year. During this time, Neal worked with his team to implement solutions to help teachers—including TutorMe, an online tutoring solution–to provide students additional academic support and complement the work teachers were already doing. Neal worked with other leaders throughout the district to help OKCPS adopt, modernize, and move forward in a short period of time.

Throughout the pandemic, Neal’s confident and calm leadership inspired his teammates, while demonstrating natural leadership skills. Neal’s leadership helped guide his team and kept heads above water. Throughout all the change, Neal also fostered a healthy work-life balance throughout the district—recognizing the importance of supporting teachers’ mental health.

Nominee: Scott Mitchum, USD 112 Central Plains             
Nominated by: Bluum    

USD 112 Central Plains Technology Director Scott Mitchum hails from a family of teachers and a tradition of helping people. Throughout childhood, Scott had a passion for learning, reading, and devouring encyclopedias.

Accepting a golf scholarship to attend college, Scott briefly studied law before receiving a master’s degree in library science. After serving as a librarian for 26 years, Scott taught himself computer programming before eventually accepting a position at two junior colleges teaching the subject.

Today, Scott finds himself as the technology director of two districts in Kansas. During the early days of the pandemic, Scott was aware of immediate shortages of N95 masks for emergency care workers and sought out a way to lend a hand. Through teaching his students 3D printing techniques, he realized he could use the printers to manufacture masks, so he and a colleague discovered a mask prototype to model from a doctor YouTube.

After learning of a hospital nearby in Hoisington that had a shortage of masks, Scott began creating masks with 5-6 printers running 24/7, switching out polylactic acid (PLA) in the middle of the night. Each mask took seven hours to print.

He continued to tweak the printers to include weather stripping around the outside to make it air-tight and a HEPA filter from a vacuum cleaner. Scott produced approximately 140 masks and 100 face shields that were used primarily for surgery. Even though the hospital offered to pay him, he politely declined.

Nominee: Shawn Braxton, Cleveland Metropolitan School District             
Nominated by: Bluum    

Shawn Braxton is the Executive Director of Learning Technology and Training Services for the Cleveland Metropolitan School District. Shawn has been an integral part of standardizing technology across all 97 schools within the district. Most recently, he created a comprehensive plan to place a Clevertouch interactive flat panel in every classroom that lacked one. Although this project just launched over the summer, 1,081 Clevertouch panels have already been installed in classrooms that currently had only projectors. By the end of the 2022-23 school year, every classroom will have an interactive flat panel. Shawn is constantly investigating the future of classroom technology and how it could improve student learning and classroom instruction.

Shawn also played an enormous role in the creation of the district’s first-ever Tech Fest. Tech Fest was a two-day event in August that allowed students, parents, and the community to visit one of two locations within the district and interact with the district’s new technology. This event was also an opportunity for students to engage with educators outside of the classroom, build excitement around the upcoming school year, and have their devices fixed or replaced.

Shawn is a visionary when it comes education technology and how it can change and shape the minds of students. He is a catalyst for his district and is constantly on the cutting edge for new and inventive ways for students and teachers to utilize technology in the classroom.

Nominee: Spartanburg School District One
Nominated by: Promethean        

Spartanburg School District One spans three cities in rural upstate South Carolina, where nearly half of 5,000 students come from lower-income families. This also means students have limited access to technology and devices at home. Furthermore, less than 22 percent of residents in the district hold a bachelor’s degree or higher.

These combined factors have prompted the administrators of Spartanburg School District One to take action to ensure students are equipped for life beyond high school. To achieve that goal, administrators are tasked with exposing students to computers and devices and providing them with the tools and skills needed to be successful post-graduation. However, while many students have limited resources, the district is also tasked with utilizing a limited amount of school funding, which is derived from taxes on businesses within the district, while much of the local workforce commutes to larger cities outside of the tax area.

This has prompted Spartanburg School District One administrators to get creative and be strategic as to how funding is used in order to enable engagement and facilitate movement within the classroom. Dr. Jimmy Pryor, Assistant Superintendent, Accountability and Technical Services at Spartanburg School District One, determined an interactive panel would enhance learning, facilitate mobility, and increase engagement for students and simultaneously streamline lesson delivery for teachers. To find the right fit, Dr. Pryor launched a pilot program where educators tested a variety of interactive displays. As a result, Promethean’s ActivPanel was not only the preferred choice but an easy choice for educators.

It didn’t take much convincing for Dr. Pryor to secure an ActivPanel for every classroom within Spartanburg One. The superintendent and school board quickly gave the green light to invest in the new interactive panels. Within the first six months of using the ActivPanel, teachers recognized the increase in student and teacher mobility and student engagement. They also recognized the enthusiasm the panels provide for teachers to deliver quality instruction and felt motivated to expand on their professional development to learn more about the ActivPanel’s capabilities.

With four blue ribbon schools, four schools awarded “Palmetto’s Finest” by the South Carolina Association of School Administrators, and three statewide top performing high schools, administrators are looking forward to delivering on the promise of post-graduation success for students, too. Administrators district-wide anticipate seeing positive outcomes and improvement as it relates to state-mandated, end-of-course tests, all of which contribute to students’ growth and development throughout their Spartanburg tenure and beyond.

Nominee: Steven Langford, Beaverton School District
Nominated by: Lightspeed Systems

Steven Langford is the CIO of Beaverton School District in Oregon and the President of CoSN, a widely known and well-respected organization within the K-12 edtech world. Under Steven’s guidance, Beaverton has created a path of innovation and improvement for other districts to follow.

In addition to this, Steven gladly shares his advice and wisdom on how to implement new programs/systems/projects successfully. Beaverton successfully rolled out district-wide multi-factor authorization, which is a crucial component to cybersecurity, and something that is not easily done.

Steven’s continued approach to innovation in the technology department in his district is inspirational and makes him a worthy recipient of this award.     

Nominee: Tiffany Brinkley, EdOptions Academy
Nominated by: Edmentum           

For many educators, making the switch to teaching virtually presented challenges. Connecting with students virtually was new to many educators and required an untapped skill set. At a time when human connection was limited but needed, Tiffany Brinkley improved the overall student experience with virtual learning by making personal connections and accommodating students’ needs. As a result, she positively influenced student results on high-stakes exams, all while mentoring new teachers.

Our nominee, Tiffany Brinkley, has been an educator for 10 years, with 5 of those being in an online setting through Edmentum’s EdOptions Academy. Tiffany has taught various math courses ranging from 6th grade math through AP Calculus.

When a student enrolls in one of Tiffany’s classes, she always first reaches out to make a personal connection because she knows this is the key to student success. Instead of beginning the conversation with academics, she asks about their summer, interests, or hobbies. To continue to keep students involved and engaged, she sends out monthly questionnaires on fun topics. These questions and her interest in their answers allow students to feel more comfortable in a virtual setting.

Although she had taught virtually before, Tiffany noticed an increased need for student engagement during the pandemic as students sought out help and connection. Pre-pandemic, Tiffany knew there were students who needed extra support, but now those who didn’t typically reach out before were requesting time to meet with her. So, she decided she would make it easier for students by allowing them to decide their meeting time with her, rather than adhering to a standard set of office hours. She finds this flexibility beneficial for her students and it allows her to better connect them.

In 2021, she made a huge impact on a project working to better prepare students for high-stakes state exams. In the previous year before Tiffany joined, the program did not have any students pass the math exam. By delivering instruction during live Zoom sessions and providing extra support with a study program she helped to develop, Tiffany was able to raise students’ passing rate from zero to 15 percent overall on the state exam for Algebra 1.

Because of her stellar contributions, Tiffany was awarded National Teacher of the Year from Edmentum in 2022. She was recognized for her performance as an educator and her dedication to being one of three mentors training and onboarding other math teachers who were hired to meet demands during the pandemic. While helping other educators navigate how to be an effective teacher, Tiffany was described as “the glue that holds us all together” because no matter what challenges arise, she quickly and calmly finds a solution.

By building connections with students and her fellow EOA teachers, Tiffany improved students’ experience in a virtual setting, giving them the resources, opportunities, support, and flexibility they needed to adapt and overcome the adversity faced during the pandemic.

Nominee: Twin Rivers Unified School District
Nominated by: EmpowerU, Inc. 

Twin Rivers has been intentionally and strategically focused on increasing educator and student mental health on a comprehensive level.

District leaders like Christine Flock and Travis Burke understand the critical need to support educator well-being as paramount to improving student engagement, motivation, and outcomes. Their thoughtful selection of partnerships that are collaborative drive them to create programs that go beyond “check the box” solutions and result in integrated programs that drive outcomes. They work across departments to fully leverage the power and impact of the EmpowerU solution, understanding how each piece fits together to drive whole child success.

School districts continue to prioritize expanding summer learning and enrichment offerings, adding specialist staff such as mental health personnel and reading specialists, and investing in high-quality instructional materials and curriculum, according to a survey administered by AASA, The School Superintendents Association.

The School District Spending of American Rescue Plan report is part of a multi-series survey focused on how district leaders across the country are utilizing American Rescue Plan (ARP) funds in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and, in particular, address student learning recovery.

This survey also sought information about what issues districts are experiencing in spending ARP funding and how they would change their spending decisions if they had more time to drawdown federal COVID-relief funds.

“Superintendents know best how to maximize the academic impact of the funding. It costs nothing for Congress to give districts additional time to extend the additional resources they have in place—reading specialists, tutoring programs, enrichment offerings and social-emotional supports—for students for an additional two years,” said Daniel A. Domenech, AASA executive director. “We call on Congress to extend this arbitrary deadline and enable students to get the additional time with these professionals and programs they need to recover from the pandemic.”

Districts’ ARP spending priorities have remained consistent from the 2021-2022 school year to the 2022-2023 school year. Improving instructional practices, expanding learning opportunities and learning time, hiring staff and addressing the social-emotional needs of students remain top priorities of public school system leaders, regardless of state, district size or locale.

Three top priorities:

• District leaders continue to report they are using ARP funding for long-term system changes that will prioritize a shift in expanding whole child supports, including social, emotional, mental, and physical health and development of their students.

• Their second long-term priority in 2022 is also the same as 2021: engaging high school students who have fallen off the track to graduate and who need additional supports to navigate the transition to college and career.

• The report also details how spending on districts’ third long-term priority –renovating school facilities and improving ventilation—continues to be hampered by the lack of federal guidance on whether districts will be able to extend the timeline for these projects, which have been stymied by supply-chain issues, worker shortages and inflation. Forty-eight percent indicate the 2024 deadline presents an obstacle to completing these critical projects.

Superintendents also predicted what areas they would be forced to cut in September 2024 when the deadline for spending ARP funding occurs. Fifty-seven percent reported they will decrease, or end, summer learning and enrichment offerings currently being provided to students. Fifty-three percent reported they will have to end contracts with specialist staff, such as counselors, social workers and reading specialists, to support student needs. Forty-four percent reported they will have to stop compensating staff for working additional hours for the extended school year/day programming they offer.

Approximately half (49%) of respondents reported that a later deadline to spend ARP funding would allow them to retain recently hired staff and extend recently added programs and supports for students that are making a big difference, both in learning recovery efforts and in addressing the social-emotional needs of students.

Click here to read part three of the AASA ARP Funding survey. Hundreds of superintendents responded to the survey, which was issued in July.

eSchool Media is pleased to announce the three winners of the eSchool News  K-12 Hero Awards: Dr. Ann Hughes, Director of Student Intervention for Sanger ISD in Texas; Kim Leblanc, Chief Technology Officer for Calcasieu Parish School Board in Louisiana; and Daniel Olivas, Network Analyst at Austin Independent School District in Texas.

Winners were chosen for their commitment to education during and in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, their creativity and innovation in helping all students continue learning while ensuring students felt safe, empowered, and engaged.

The K-12 Hero Awards Program, sponsored this year by JAR Systems and SAP Concur, recognizes the dedicated efforts of education professionals across K-12 departments, including IT, curriculum, instruction and administration. 

Nominations were judged by a panel of education experts, including Laura Ascione, eSchool News editorial director, Kevin Hogan, eSchool News editor-at-large, and Eileen Belastock, CETL, Belastock Consulting.

Here’s a look at each winner: 

Dr. Ann Hughes, Director of Student Intervention, Sanger ISD, nominated by Ripple Effects

Ann’s students struggle with myriad challenges, including issues such as depression, hyperactivity disorders, and anger. Troubled students frequently come to Linda Tutt from other districts in the state as a last resort. In short, Ann’s program is the last hope to get these kids on the right track.

Ann has limited resources, both from a funding and personnel perspective. However, she meets those challenges holistically and creatively. She stops students each day to engage in meaningful conversations about their lives. She taps into programs like Ripple Effects for Teens, which has modules that address a wide range of issues including mental health, personal trauma, and academic challenges. Ann has designated individual rooms throughout campus dedicated to giving students space to regroup. There’s a Movement Room to work off excess energy and a Chill Out Room for relaxation. Music, yoga, and dance are other key elements she incorporates to reach her students.

To fill the gaps in funding and personnel resources, Ann has spearheaded community partnerships with local churches and charities, which provide counseling support not available at school. These collaborations have resulted in students honing their agriculture skills at community gardens and learning how to run a business via a nonprofit grocery store.

Kim Leblanc, Chief Technology Officer, Calcasieu Parish School Board, nominated by Bluum

Conventional wisdom would say that economically-disadvantaged schools across the country would need to think twice before making a major investment in technology. However, not all districts in that predicament have a technology director like Kim Leblanc. Calcasieu Parish School Board serves 29,500 students across 60 schools. It is a 100 percent CEP district, which means that every student is eligible for free lunch based on the economic poverty data submitted to the federal government.

Calcasieu Parish School Board Chief Technology Officer Kim Leblanc has developed a system for providing the type of technology in classrooms that one would only expect at affluent schools. Under Kim’s leaderhsip, Calcasieu Parish conducted a thorough needs assessment before purchasing more than $4.1 million in technology and technology professional development with federal funds under Title I and Title IV to implement the technology within the existing curriculum. The investment included 400 3D printers and the professional development necessary to advance STEAM education, most of which came at no cost to the district. It also is developing a STEM bus with fun technological gadgets to enhance student learning.

Calcasieu Parish’s Training Tech Center, led by Kim, was already instrumental in introducing new technology to its classrooms, including robotics and a computing device for each student and teacher. Armed with a philosophy to “make it happen in the classroom,” Calcasieu Parish and Kim are committed to preparing students for STEAM careers, illustrated by its investments in student design competitions, summer tech camps and the STEM bus. The students are already utilizing the 3D printers in classrooms to solve real-world challenges and develop 3D designing skills within projects.

Daniel Olivas, Network Analyst, Austin Independent School District, nominated by Identity Automation

The pandemic has accelerated the transition to remote and hybrid learning, and it made school districts the number one target for cyberattacks. As the fifth largest school district in Texas, Austin Independent School District was no exception. Guided by the motto “AISD Anywhere,” the district used the pandemic as an opportunity to provide over 100,000 students, teachers, staff, parents, and other users with secure access to classroom tools from any Wi-Fi network.

As Network Analyst at Austin ISD, Daniel Olivas led the implementation of an identity-centric zero trust security strategy that ensured this access was not only user-friendly, but secure. Unlike traditional, perimeter-focused approaches to security, Austin ISD’s zero-trust approach assumes all network traffic is untrusted until an identity has been verified–a critical step to securing a digital ecosystem that can be accessed from anywhere.

To tie Austin ISD’s digital ecosystem together and orient it around digital identities, Olivas leveraged the district’s long-time Identity and Access Management (IAM) platform, RapidIdentity, to grant individuals access to needed applications, while connecting data from those applications back to the correct digital identity. Acting as the new perimeter of Austin ISD’s digital environment, RapidIdentity has helped Austin ISD bolster security and become a leader in K-12 authentication and zero trust.

In the coming weeks, Hero Awards nominations will be highlighted on eSchoolNews.com. Winners and finalists will be featured on the site throughout Fall 2022, and on the eSchool News podcast Innovations in Education, hosted by Hogan.

The winners and all program finalists will also be published in a custom K-12 Hero Awards ebook at the program’s conclusion, which will be available for download.

Related:
eSN K-12 Hero Awards Program nominee: Spotlight on Green Bay Area Public School District
eSN K-12 Hero Awards Program nominee: Spotlight on FLVS

NWEA, a nonprofit, research and educational services organization serving K-12 students, has released new research highlighting the latest data on achievement during the pandemic.

Key findings from this third school year impacted by COVID-19 suggest early signs of rebounding offering some hope. However, results also underscore that recovery is still years away and there is a need for sustained urgency in addressing interrupted learning.

The study is the latest in a series of research from NWEA focused on tracking the impact of the pandemic on learning. It used data from over 8.3 million students who took the MAP Growth assessment in reading and math during the COVID-impacted years (spanning 2018-19 to 2021-22) and compared these data to an equivalent sized sample of students who tested before the pandemic (spanning 2015-16 to 2018-19). Key takeaways from this latest data bring both hope and concern.

Early signs of hope:

• Initial signs of academic rebounding were evident in 2021-22 with academic gains (fall to spring) that paralleled pre-pandemic trends, especially in math and among younger students.
  
• Academic growth rebounded to parallel pre-pandemic trends across school-poverty levels; however, students in low-poverty schools have less ground to make-up and thus will likely recover faster.

Continued concern:

• Despite initial signs of rebounding, student achievement is still lower than where we’d expect it to be if the pandemic did not happen. Furthermore, if improvements continue at the rate we saw this year, the timeline for a full recovery is years away and will likely extend past the availability of federal recovery funds.
  
• Achievement was lower for all student groups in spring 2022 (compared to pre-pandemic levels); with historically marginalized students and students in high-poverty schools remaining disproportionately impacted.

“These signs of rebounding are especially heartening during another challenging school year of more variants, staff shortages, and a host of uncertainties. We think that speaks volumes to the tremendous effort put forth by our schools to support students,” said Dr. Karyn Lewis, Director of the Center for School and Student Progress at NWEA, and the co-author with Dr. Megan Kuhfeld on this research study. “Any signs of hope are reasons to celebrate, and we must take that moment to do so, and then push forward with renewed energy and a sense of urgency because we’re just at the initial steps of addressing the tremendous impact of this pandemic on our students.”

NWEA’s researchers point out that this data is a national view of the continued impacts of the pandemic, which provides a broad “where are trends heading” perspective. But they urge that local context is just as, if not more, important. They note that even within districts, impacts are not equal between schools. That level of nuance should be evaluated when looking at recovery efforts and long-term planning so that schools can “right-size” their efforts to most effectively help all students move toward better outcomes.

While schools work tirelessly to support the growth of students, they cannot do this alone. Over the past two years, NWEA has collaborated with colleagues from across the policy and civil rights community to offer recommendations to support pandemic recovery, and we continue that push going into the next school year.

“We urge policymakers and education leaders to use data and have strong data systems that provide continuous feedback on interventions to inform recovery,” said Lindsay Dworkin, SVP of Policy and Communications at NWEA. “Beyond investing in research-based interventions that are targeted at students most impacted by the pandemic, education leaders will need the resources, support, and flexibility necessary to expand instructional time for students as well as provide more professional learning opportunities to their teachers.”

As the world emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic and prepares for its first post-pandemic school year, the results of a new Khan Academy survey of teachers offers hope for a brighter future and, at the same time, reaffirms education’s deep commitment to staying laser-focused on recovery.

The findings show: 

• Nine out of 10 teachers say they’ve been able to identify learning gaps that need to be addressed. 
• 84% of teachers believe mastery learning can help address learning loss from the pandemic.

We wholeheartedly agree. Mastery learning ensures each student has the opportunity and incentive to master a concept before they stop working on it. It’s the philosophical core of Khan Academy, and decades of research shows that mastery learning works. 

The nationally representative survey of teachers shows that the majority of teachers are using mastery learning or would like to. For example:

• 53% of teachers use mastery learning in their classrooms. 
• An additional 35% would like to use mastery learning.

While this news is encouraging, the survey also shows the profound impact of the pandemic: 

• More than 80% of teachers say that when introduced to new concepts, their students need more help than they would have needed before the pandemic.
• Only 59% of teachers say their students mastered the content they needed to last school year.

Mental health and behavioral support were also prominent threads. After a tumultuous two years, teachers identify student mental health needs and a lack of behavioral support as major barriers in the classroom.

Mastery learning can fill in the learning gaps 

We believe mastery learning can accelerate pandemic recovery. Sal Khan, our founder, is a longtime advocate for mastery. Unlike traditional learning, students in mastery-learning classrooms are not pushed ahead in lockstep, which can cause the accumulation of knowledge gaps. (Sal calls these “Swiss cheese gaps.”) 

Last year, in the wake of pandemic school closures, several large school districts, including Los Angeles Unified, turned to elements of mastery learning to address lost learning time. Six superintendents published a high-profile op-ed advocating for the widespread adoption of competency-based learning, which shares many of the same tenets. 

“It’s terrific to see so much enthusiasm for mastery learning,” Sal says. “Mastery can play a critical role in recovery. It allows teachers to personalize learning so that each student can progress through their grade level while also addressing the areas where they may need extra help.” 

Mastery learning allows students to progress at a pace that’s right for them under the watchful eye of expert teachers who make decisions about instruction. 

In our survey, teachers say they think the elements of mastery learning are important for closing learning gaps. For example, they’d like more flexibility so they can spend additional time on a concept if it’s needed (for example, less rigid pacing guides). They’d also like to allow students to retake tests. 

Teachers say the best way to identify learning gaps is to work individually with students during class. What’s more, they say the best way to encourage students to catch up is through one-on-one instruction. 

Freeing up teachers’ time 

Teachers also consistently report that they do not have enough time to do the work they want to do: 

• More than six out of 10 teachers feel they don’t spend enough time providing feedback to students.
• Teachers would like to spend, on average, an additional 3.6 hours providing feedback every week. 

Lack of time is the most commonly reported barrier to mastery learning. “We think technology can help with the time bind,” Khan Academy chief learning officer Kristen DiCerbo says. “Teachers don’t have time to have those individual conversations with every student on every skill. They can look to edtech tools to do the heavy lifting of supporting unfinished learning so they can focus on the grade-level learning.” 

A snapshot of math and science

YouGov conducted a survey of more than 600 teachers for Khan Academy between May 16 and May 31, 2022. The online survey was weighted to reflect the overall population of K-12 teachers. 

Subgroups in math and science were identified. Among those, results show teachers feel less confident that they’re able to identify learning gaps in science: 

• 76% of science teachers have been able to identify student learning gaps in science.
• 97% of math teachers have been able to identify student learning gaps in math.

The findings released today are the first time Khan Academy has surveyed a nationally representative population of teachers to gauge sentiment around mastery learning. The survey also shows which steps teachers think will be the most impactful for helping kids make up for lost learning time.

“Overall, I’m heartened by the findings,” Sal says. “The results show teachers believe in mastery learning and think it’s an important solution for pandemic learning gaps. While we have a lot of work to do, we’re hopeful about what’s ahead.”

Kristen DiCerbo, Khan Academy’s chief learning officer, offers teacher tips for mastery learning:

Focus on learning skills – Be clear what skills students need to learn. Standards are too broad for day to day work. Break them down into skills for a lesson. Focus students on the goal of mastering these skills (as opposed to just getting high scores), and provide understanding of why these skills are important. Research shows that learners who have goals related to learning as opposed to goals related to achieving high scores in relation to others have better learning outcomes.

Understand what students know – have multiple low stakes opportunities for students to show what they know. Use these assignments as ways to identify areas that need more work, as opposed to activities that will pull down a learner’s final grade if they are not successful.

Encourage multiple attempts on assignments – Allowing multiple attempts on assignments helps ensure learners are reinforced for continuing to learn and improve and not penalized for taking longer to learn a particular skill or not getting it right on the first try.

Provide feedback and support to learners who are struggling – Doing an assignment over and over without help probably isn’t going to lead to different results. Instead, provide feedback on what was incorrect on the first try, alternative instruction and explanations, and additional opportunities to practice prerequisite skills the student may be missing. Use technology to do this at an individual level so each student can get faster feedback and more targeted support.

Methodology: All survey figures, unless otherwise stated, are from YouGov Plc. Total sample size 639 teachers. Fieldwork was undertaken between May 16 – May 31, 2022. The survey was carried out online. The figures have been weighted and are representative of US teachers in kindergarten through 12th grade. If you’d like to see the full survey findings, please email WEKhanAcademy@we-worldwide.com to receive a PowerPoint report.

The eSchool News K-12 Hero Awards program, sponsored by JAR Systems and SAP Concur, has returned for 2022 and recognizes the dedicated efforts of education professionals across K-12 departments, including IT, curriculum, instruction and administration.  The nomination period runs from June 27 – September 1, 2022.

“The great education beta test brought on by the pandemic has resulted in discoveries and innovations across education — from distance learning and closing the digital divide, to addressing the need for diversity, equity, and inclusion in schools, and so much more,” said Kevin Hogan, eSN’s editor-at-large. “I’d like to encourage everyone to participate in this year’s Hero Awards, so your real-life challenges and successes can be celebrated and shared with the education community.”

As nominations come in from across the country, let’s take a look at last year’s winners and the amazing efforts they put in to keep learning accessible for students, teachers, and staff during an unprecedented global pandemic.

San Diego Unified School District

San Diego Unified School District‘s Instructional Technology Department was nicknamed the “First Responders” due to its proactive approach to COVID-19. From showing teachers how innovative technology could help improve learning outcomes to ramping up workshops geared toward preparing educators to teach online, this small but mighty team of six went above and beyond to make an impact during unprecedented times.

“Because of everything we did learn during our shutdown and our online learning, our district is transitioning to a one-to-one district, where students will get a device in second grade,” said Julie Garcia, the district’s Director of Instructional Technology, in a podcast with Hogan. That’s their device for second through fifth grade, then another device for six through eight and another device in ninth grade for ninth through 12th. So we’ll continue a lot of these strategies that we learned.”

The district also learned a lot about student-centered learning.

“So a big shift was, ‘If I’m sitting on Zoom and I’m going to talk at you for an hour, I am not going to have your engagement.’ So teachers had to explore different ways of releasing, releasing that responsibility to the students. And you don’t just say, ‘Okay, you’re in charge now, right?’ That comes down to lesson design and it comes down to using appropriate tools. So that was a big shift that we are continuing to work on, especially as we come back into the classroom.

“We learned so much about checking in on understanding about students, empowering themselves to be in charge of their own learning students, creating goals for themselves. So I personally feel like our takeaways are–how can we put learning in the hands of students, how can we connect students better with their peers and with the teacher?”

Brevard Public Schools

In the thick of the pandemic, on an evening in October 2020, Florida’s Brevard Public Schools began experiencing the onset of a ransomware attack. IT Director Barrett Puschus immediately called his team to action, waking many of them up, so they could shut down the district’s entire system. After identifying that the attack was enabled by phishing, Puschus worked across the district of 74,000 students and nearly 10,000 staff to tighten security protocols and prevent another incident.

Part of learning how to manage and avoid cyber threats is talking about them, Puschus told eSchool News.

“As far as talking about it, I believe we can’t succeed in isolation and we shouldn’t fail in isolation. So this is kind of a tale of both. We were notified of the event and we jumped on it and we kicked him out. We got him out before the ransom happened, but it really opened our eyes to our vulnerability—how easy it was for them to get in.”

Getting out in front of a threat in time is key.

“They were in our system for probably 45-60 days before we knew anything. Thankfully we found out about it and got them out ahead of time. We weren’t one of the stories where we were ransomed and had to restore from backups or anything like that. Thank goodness.”

Navajo Preparatory School

When COVID-19 forced Navajo Preparatory School to shut its doors in March 2020, the entire technology department quickly mobilized to ensure learning continuity in a completely virtual environment. This proved especially challenging as its student population spans the whole Navajo reservation, including some of the most rural areas of New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona.

In traveling to students’ homes to disperse Wi-Fi hotspots, faculty quickly became aware of the challenges students faced. To support students, NPS would use school buses equipped with Wi-Fi to run weekly routes to deliver a week’s worth of dry food as well as art supplies, books, laptops, and other educational materials.

“Our campus network extended all the way into Arizona and three other states. So all the students had their hotspots and their laptops at home, of course. And you know, the kids really helped a lot. They really did all they could to try to meet us halfway, to try to get through it, to finish up that school year,” said Sean C. Bekis, the school’s Network Administrator, in a conversation with eSN.

“Some kids were going on top of their houses just to get a cellular signal with those hotspots, just to download emails, just to upload their homework. Or they would drive out to the dirt road where the highway actually is to try to find that signal where they could send an email or download a message or whatever they needed to do for school. We still had some students where we had to send out flash drives like back to the old Sneakernet days. There were just some situations where we couldn’t push software.”

Many of these pandemic fixes became permanent, Bekis said.

“We’ve installed video conference equipment in all of our teacher’s classrooms on campus. So they’re all able to pull up how HD video—there are microphones, arrays, nice speakers. So the students that are remote can hear and see the classroom, you know, just like if they’re, if they’re there, so all that stuff’s all ready to go. And I’m pretty sure we’re still going to keep it. We gave out all the same hot to the students that they had last year. So they have them available for all the remote stuff. Even if they’re on-campus or if they’re a residential student here, we still made sure they have it available to communities just in case for this year. But I think going forward we’ll probably for sure still have that, make it available for them, so that they’re always connected now.”