Top Three
Accelerate: Incubated and launched at America Achieves and supported by a coalition of partners and funders, Accelerate is leading a national effort to design, launch, improve, and scale high-impact tutoring efforts and to build a community committed to impact and shaping the evidence base for tutoring.
"The Call to Effective Action seeks partnerships interested in joining in this initiative. Partnerships are asked to express their interest through a Letter of Intent."
"Promising respondents will be invited to join the initiative as finalists and will then build and refine their approach through a proposal development phase. Finalists with strong proposals will receive funding and further support to implement their approach and will join an expanding, cutting-edge community of national innovation, research, implementation, development, and collective learning.”
Districts Struggle to Transport Students Amid Ongoing Bus Driver Shortage:
“You just saw it all over the country, there were districts that had to go remote because they didn't have bus drivers. There were districts that reduced service and increased walk boundaries,” said Joanna McFarland, CEO and founder of HopSkipDrive, a school ride service that operates a fleet of cars and SUVs in ten states."
"According to a newly released survey from HopSkipDrive, 88% of survey respondents said the bus driver shortage is the biggest transportation issue they face – a 10% increase from last year. 67% said they saw a direct link between access to transportation and attendance in their district."
“We largely have been using sort of the same one size fits all transit solution of a yellow school bus for over 80 years,” said Emily Anne Gullickson, founder and CEO of A for Arizona."
How COVID-19 Caused a Global Learning Crisis: Via McKinsey
"The length of school closures varied widely across the world. School buildings in middle-income Latin America and South Asia were fully or partially closed the longest—for 75 weeks or more. Those in high-income Europe and Central Asia were fully or partially closed for less time (30 weeks on average), as were those in low-income sub-Saharan Africa (34 weeks on average)."
"On average, students globally are eight months behind where they would have been absent the pandemic, but the impact varies widely, with countries falling into three archetypes:
High-performing systems, with relatively high levels of pre-COVID-19 performance, where students may be about one to five months behind due to the pandemic (for example, North America and Europe, where students are, on average, four months behind).
Low-income prepandemic-challenged systems, with very low levels of pre-COVID-19 learning, where students may be about three to eight months behind due to the pandemic (for example, sub-Saharan Africa, where students are on average six months behind).
Pandemic-affected middle-income systems, with moderate levels of pre-COVID-19 learning, where students may be nine to 15 months behind (for example, Latin America and South Asia, where students are, on average, 12 months behind)."
"Lower levels of learning translate into lower future earnings potential for students and lower economic productivity for nations. By 2040, the economic impact of pandemic-related learning delays could lead to annual losses of $1.6 trillion worldwide, or 0.9 percent of total global GDP."
"Building resilience could mean ensuring protocols are in place for safe and supportive in-person learning, and ensuring plans are in place to provide remote options that support the whole child at the system, school, and student levels in response to future crises. School systems can also benefit by creating the flexibility to change policies and procedures as new data and circumstances arise."
"In high-income countries, digital formative assessments could help determine in real time what students know, where they may have gaps, and what the next step could be for each child."
"Many systems are reemphasizing the importance of caring for the whole child. Integrating social-emotional learning for all students, providing trauma-informed training for teachers and staff, and providing counseling and more intensive support on and off campus for some students could provide supportive schooling environments beyond immediate crisis support."
Federal
White House: Biden administration announces $500 million for energy efficiency in public schools.
White House: Fact sheet:The Biden Administration Accelerates Whole-of-Government Effort to Prevent, Detect, and Treat Long COVID. More via the Washington Post.
Capitol: The Capitol Police have caught the fox.
Growing calls for justice for the fox.
COVID-19 Research
Protection by a Fourth Dose of Pfizer Against Omicron in Israel: New study:
"Rates of confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection and severe Covid-19 were lower after a fourth dose of BNT162b2 vaccine than after only three doses. Protection against confirmed infection appeared short-lived, whereas protection against severe illness did not wane during the study period."
States
California: Masks now optional indoors at San Diego Unified schools.
Colorado: Colorado Springs-area school districts battle teacher shortage.
"In the final quarter of the 2021-2022 school year, districts in the Colorado Springs area and across the state face a different challenge: a shortage of teachers and staff that has some employees and families concerned for the immediate future."
"According to Colorado Department of Education data, Pikes Peak-area school districts have more than 400 vacant teaching jobs, with Academy School District 20 — the region’s largest — showing more than 140 vacancies."
DC: Via Axios, "After a month of masks being optional in northern Virginia and some Maryland schools, COVID case counts have remained low."
Illinois: Gov. Pritzker signs bill giving vaccinated teachers paid COVID-19 time off.
Michigan: One way to address student mental health? Bring the clinic to school, via Chalkbeat.
North Carolina: "Advanced Teaching Roles are providing new avenues for teacher leadership, modernizing outdated school organizational models, empowering school leaders, and improving student achievement. BEST NC released a new policy brief on the state’s Advanced Teaching Roles program".
Ohio: "About 80% of Ohio schools that were eligible for wellness and mental health services funding took advantage of it last school year, and they spent a combined $289 million on that programming, according to the Ohio Department of Education."
International
Brussels: Belgium agrees on ‘ventilation plan’ for public places. All places must have a CO2 monitor.
Resources
Driver Assist: I'd sign up for this.