COVID-19 Policy Update #169
COVID-19 Policy Update
THURSDAY 12/17
TOP THREE
COVID Testing in Schools: The Rockefeller Foundation released a testing plan for schools: A Resetting of America's Response to COVID-19. It also proposes 14 executive actions for the current and incoming administrations. Testing all U.S. public K-12 public schools would cost $42.5 billion, or $8.5 billion per month for the remainder of the school year (February-June 2021). The Plan recommends testing students at least once a week and teachers and staff twice a week and reopening in three waves with:
Public elementary schools opening first by February 1;
Public middle schools opening about two weeks later; and
Public high schools opening in March
Shutting Schools Has Hit Poor American Children’s Learning: Via the Economist:
"In Washington, DC, 73% of white children in kindergarten and 45% of black children typically show adequate reading progress. When examined this year, white children showed a modest drop in adequate literacy, to 67%, while black children experienced a much larger one—to 31%."
"Researchers from Brown and Harvard universities examining data from Zearn, an online maths-teaching platform, found that pupils in high-income schools are actually performing 12% better in their coursework than in January 2020. But for low-income schools, scores fell by 17%".
"Standardised exams are far from perfect. They do not measure the learning of impatient children well. More meaningful measures of lost learning, such as wages in adulthood, will not be known for years. Yet tests are not all bad."
"Learning loss is remediable. But it requires the sort of serious investment that only Congress could provide and, so far, the gridlocked House and Senate have not seemed especially interested in providing it.'
Remote Learning Here to Stay: Results from a new RAND survey of district leaders:
About two in ten districts have already adopted, plan to adopt, or are considering adopting virtual school as part of their district portfolio after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic
One in ten have adopted or are planning to adopt a blended or hybrid form of instruction
School district leaders reported that the U.S. Department of Education had the second-least amount of influence on their COVID-19 plans.
Almost half of district leaders have said that they have created a virtual learning community this school year.
Public school district leaders saw a sharp need to address students’ SEL and mental health needs.
FEDERAL
Economic Relief Package:
The Good: Congress will likely pass a short CR running through Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday to create more time for negotiators to resolve disagreements over the $900 billion package. All indications are that leadership wants a deal and is working toward it.
The Bad: One of the areas of disagreement has become the $10 billion broadband funding. Here's what we've been able to piece together from our gov affairs partners:
Democrats walked away from negotiations, having insisted that the funding run through the FCC's E-rate program.
Republicans were spooked when a Democrat staffer talked about this as being permanent, not just a temporary measure.
Republican staff insisted that it not be through E-rate but through a new FCC program, or, if it was through E-rate that there would be several provisions attached.
Democrat staff, and the NEA in particular, refused to agree to that.
Unfortunately, both the Democrat and Republican committee staffs have recommended to their respective leadership that no funds be provided for broadband given the disagreement.
Leadership could ignore this and just use the Bipartisan Coalition's framework for a final bill. Or they could just punt the broadband funds to a later package - delaying by months the help students need today.
Senate commerce Rs and they are a little more optimistic than the house Rs. All of them are very frustrated right now, but looks like leadership is saying they will release language over the weekend, giving commerce some more time to work out a deal. So there could be a chance.
This will likely change hour by hour, day by day - but that's the current sad state of affairs.
Transition:
The Washington Post has launched a Political Appointee Tracker for the incoming Biden administration. Tracks 756 executive branch positions among about 1,250 that require Senate confirmation.
Biden on school reopenings yesterday during a Zoom with 31 Governors: “I know it's going to be controversial for some of you--but I'm going to ask that we're going to be able to open schools at the end of a hundred days."
ED: Rick Hess with An Exit Interview With Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos
COVID-19 RESEARCH
Moderna: The FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee met today to consider the EUA for Moderna's vaccine and recommended its approval with a vote of 20 in favor and one abstention. Dr. James Hildreth was the only member to not vote yes, saying that he was uncomfortable with endorsing the vaccine for everyone over the age of 18 while there was such a limited supply. Moderna's vaccine has several advantages over Pfizer's, namely that it can be stored with a standard refrigerator for up to 30 days, making it easier to transport to rural parts of the country.
COVID:
There were 3,656 deaths yesterday.
CA reported a staggering 53,711 cases today. The highest single-day case count and 50% higher than any single-day case count from any state.
CDC Study on Children Transmission: New study of Mississippi children which found most infections in children are not linked to schools.
IHME: Weekly briefing.
Their reference scenario projects 562,000 cumulative deaths by April 1, 2021. This represents 262,000 additional deaths from December 14 to April 1. Daily deaths are projected to peak at 3,780 on January 6, 2021.
IHME also has an interesting visualization of school closings/openings by state (based on anonymized cell phone records). Red is open, blue is closed.
STATE
Arizona: Op-Ed from Emily Anne Gullickson: "No, these innovative efforts are not an attempt to dismantle public district schools."
"Free and accessible options are a big deal in communities where families cannot afford to send their kids to expensive facilities, access private tutors, are without connectivity, or where students would otherwise be home alone. Many of these new small learning communities have been developed in partnership with public district and public charter schools."
"They help to reconnect students that have become disengaged, target those kids not actively attending virtual school, or provide comfort for students that have been struggling socially and emotionally from the isolation."
"Efforts to attack these creative partnerships and new learning models ignore the deep challenges that educators face and limit solutions for kids with acute needs."
"The threat to public education is resistance to innovation within the system. We must empower the new generation of leaders to meet the demands of this century and the needs of today’s students."
California: Educators for Excellence-Los Angeles with USC survey:
Only 23% of teachers report “all” students attend the entire class online and 48% report “all” students tend to complete assignments
75% of the educators want masks to be mandatory and 63% want to limit class sizes before they return to school.
9 out 10 report students’ lack of quiet learning space at home (92%), lack of access to technology tools (91%), lack of access to highspeed internet (90%), and lack of adult support at home (88%) as serious obstacles to effectively implementing distance learning this school year.
More than five out of 10 teachers rate lack of access to high-speed internet (56%) as a “very serious” obstacle, increasing to 68% for teachers in schools with 67+% students from low-income households.
Florida: The Florida Education Association sent a letter asking Governor DeSantis to prioritize teachers in distributing the vaccine
Illinois:
77,000 children — 37% of eligible students — plan to return for in-person learning.
Labor board denies teachers union’s attempt to halt return to CPS schools
Chicago Teachers Union says "all options" are on the table if it doesn't agree CPS schools are safe to open.
Massachuests: Boston Globe Editorial Board: "Let public health expertise guide school reopenings"
"As evidence mounts that schools can reopen without worsening the coronavirus pandemic — and that keeping them shut has stunted the educations of millions of children — Boston Public Schools superintendent Brenda Cassellius is working to restore more in-person education across the city. For her efforts, she’s received furious pushback from the teachers union. But as long as schools are taking adequate safety precautions — as determined by public health officials — she should continue steadily reopening the school system."
"At the same time, schools have not proved to be major sources of coronavirus transmission. Many charter and parochial schools in Massachusetts have been open for in-person instruction without major incident."
"Unions have to stand up for their members, but not everything belongs on the bargaining table. Whether individual school buildings — or restaurants, or hotels, or offices, or anything else — are safe enough to open during the pandemic is ultimately a public health question. “We don’t let restaurants decide when they want to open or not,” said Marty Martinez, the city’s health and human services chief. (Nor, for that matter, is the public health commission consulted on how to teach reading.) It’s especially strange to insist that standards ought to look exactly the same in every school, when the district’s buildings differ so greatly in age and physical configuration."
Minnesota: Elementary schools can open January 18 for in-person instruction
Texas: A Mesquite teacher saw her virtual students struggling — so she came up with a plan.
"After school every day, she brings a favorite drink from Sonic and snack to a student’s home, and the two chat outside, with the parent’s permission."
"The plan is working even better than Drake had imagined. None of her virtual students are behind on assignments, an almost complete turnaround from just a few weeks ago"
Washington:
Gov. Inslee set a path toward reopening schools, beginning with in-person learning for elementary students in areas where new cases of the coronavirus have dropped below a daily average of 350 cases per 100,000 residents.
Microsoft commits more than $110 million in additional support for nonprofits, workers and schools in Washington state. Including:
Microsoft will provide a technology solution that will enable Washington state schools to better track and report Covid-19 related testing data within their district boundaries.
Microsoft supports prioritizing vaccines for teachers.
INTERNATIONAL
Canada: Ontario students and educators are preparing for possible online learning after holidays.
UK: Most secondary school pupils in England to stay at home until 11 January
ECONOMIC RECOVERY
Unemployment: 1.4 million Americans filed new unemployment claims last week -- the highest level in weeks. Overall, 20.6 million Americans are on unemployment aid as we head into holidays
Developer Aims to Raise $1 Billion for Investing in Minority Communities: Via WSJ: "Mr. Muoto’s Black Impact Fund consists of two separate funds—one targeting $500 million in opportunity-zone investments and another one with a $500 million goal for making investments near designated opportunity zones."
LEARNING PODS
Michael Horn: Posts reflections: Behind The Tradeoffs We Made As We Crafted Our Pod’s Learning Environment"
Learning Pods Helping Students Stay Connected With School: A NC school district has partnered with several rural churches to start learning pods with high-speed Internet connections.
Vancouver Public Schools: Has identified 953 students — 520 elementary, 301 high school and 132 middle school students — for in-person academic pods to help navigate remote learning.
RESOURCES
Assessment Accountability: CCSSO released a statement on assessment and accountability. Excerpt below:
"For this reason, states must have the flexibility from federally approved accountability measures tied to statewide summative assessments in the 2020-21 school year. It is critical for state and local education leaders to continue to lead and focus on the aspects of assessment that are most important today in the midst of this pandemic: measuring the academic progress for as many students as possible; transparently reporting those results to students, families and the public; and using the data to inform decision-making. Today, states are moving forward and exploring how to administer their statewide summative assessment to as many students as possible this spring, or exploring other similar important measures. To be successful, students, families, and educators must know the results of this year’s assessment will only be used to drive supports for students."
A Look Back on 2020: Good blog from Overdeck: Supporting Impact in a Year of Challenge and Innovation
X Mental Health Project: The incredible Obi Felten recently shared Amber, the mental health measurement project she led at X, the moonshot factory. Today she released a report with Shift on opportunities for tech-enabled innovation in student mental health. Shift, conducted a series of user studies in student mental health settings in the UK and US, including interviews with 60 mental health clinicians and 128 students with lived experience of mental health problems. The report highlights the current challenges in student mental health, the role that better data can play in empowering both students and clinicians, and the importance of putting people at the heart of tech innovation. Obi's reflections here.
Homework Help from AOC: Homework Helpers was set up by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to provide tutoring assistance to students.
Now Is the Time to Redefine Learning — Not Recreate Traditional School Online: EdSurge piece by the Institute for Teaching and Leading which presents this helpful framework:
"When we say “stuck at substitution,” some readers may recognize the SAMR model of education technology integration. The SAMR framework describes four different levels of technology use, from Substitution to Augmentation, Modification and Redefinition (SAMR). At its most basic level, education technology can be used to simply substitute: to replace traditional methods of teaching and learning with ones that are digitally mediated, but are still based on the same basic structure and pedagogy."
Zoom School Gets An F, But Some Online Learning Providers Excel: Good overview of MyTechHigh, ASU Prep Digital, and Galileo.
The Skills: New video instruction platform (like MasterClass) that offers sports and wellness courses from some of the biggest athletes in the world including Shaun White, Michael Phelps and Larry Fitzgerald
College Students Report Quality Experience Amid COVID-19: Gallup/Lumina poll:
A third of all currently enrolled students pursuing their bachelor's degree in the fall of 2020 report they have considered stopping their coursework in the past six months.
Among these students, 15% say they considered stopping because the education they were receiving was low quality. However, quality is not a top concern; COVID-19 (51%), emotional stress (42%) and cost of attendance (33%) are the most frequently cited reasons.
How Missing Zoom Classes Could Funnel Kids into the Juvenile Justice System: Via The 74
Losing A Generation: Fall College Enrollment Plummets For 1st-Year Students: Via NPR.
Nonsense: Italian singer Adriano Celentano released a song in the 70s with nonsense lyrics meant to sound like American English, apparently to prove Italians would like any English song. It was a hit, and resulted in this.