Top Three
Declining Covid Severity: Via CDC's MMWR.
Learning Loss Was Steepest in School Districts That Stayed Remote Longest: Yahoo News on Emily Oster's new research.
"Her analysis found, for example, that Mississippi has emerged as a surprising leader in recouping gains in reading, while Minnesota has struggled to catch students up. And learning reclamation was uniformly progressing more slowly in math than in reading."
“Districts that had more remote learning during the pandemic have a much longer way to go, and investments in recovery are urgently needed to address learning loss and accelerate student outcomes."
"Some educators have dismissed the idea that the pandemic fostered an educational crisis. “There is no such thing as learning loss,” the University of Connecticut literacy professor Rachael Gabriel wrote in the Washington Post in the spring of 2021, arguing that the pandemic created learning experiences of its own. “We have all learned, every day, unconditionally,” she wrote."
"Mississippi’s success appears to be tied to a return to traditional phonics-based instruction, which other districts are also embracing after years of grappling with the more progressive “balanced literacy” approach. Tennessee, which was not part of Oster’s analysis, has also emerged as a leader in compensating for lost time."
More via Emily's newsletter: Pandemic Test Score Declines
The Lancet COVID-19 Commission: Report
"As of May 31, 2022, there were 6.9 million reported deaths and 17.2 million estimated deaths from COVID-19, as reported by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation."
"This staggering death toll is both a profound tragedy and a massive global failure at multiple levels. Too many governments have failed to adhere to basic norms of institutional rationality and transparency, too many people—often influenced by misinformation—have disrespected and protested against basic public health precautions, and the world's major powers have failed to collaborate to control the pandemic."
10 Failures:
A lack of timely notification of the initial outbreak of COVID-19
Delays in acknowledging that SARS-CoV-2 spreads by aerosols and to implement appropriate public health mitigation measures at national and international levels
An absence of coordination among countries to suppress viral transmission
Government failures to examine evidence and adopt best practices for controlling the pandemic and managing economic and social spillovers from other countries
A lack of global funding for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)
A failure to ensure adequate supplies and equitable distribution of key resources such as PPE, diagnostic tests, drugs, medical devices, and vaccines—particularly for LMICs
A dearth of timely, accurate, systematic data on infections, deaths, viral variants, health system responses, and indirect health consequences
Poor enforcement of appropriate levels of biosafety regulations leading up to the pandemic, raising the possibility of a lab leak
A failure to combat systematic disinformation
The lack of global and national safety nets to protect vulnerable populations
"Three major risks should be kept in mind at this stage. First, future variants might be highly infectious and deadly. Second, people who are currently unvaccinated remain vulnerable to morbidity and mortality and provide opportunities for the virus to circulate freely, increasing the risk of dangerous mutations occurring. Third, the omicron wave has shown that serious economic disruptions can occur even in highly vaccinated populations, as it led to shortages of health and other essential workers, school closures, disruptions to business operations, and prevented the restoration of tourism and international travel."
"School closures have had devastating effects on student learning, mental health, socioemotional outcomes, and lifetime earning potential, such as education backslides, increasing drop-out rates, and increased abuse and neglect. In-person schooling was deprioritised even as other non-essential or less essential community and economic activities continued.School closures also affected the safety of children, increasing their exposure to abuse."
"As the pandemic entered its third year, schools continued to impose stringent restrictions. Although efforts should be made to reduce undue risk of infection to children, it should further be recognised that it is possible to keep schools open without putting students and adults at excessive risk. Because of the lower risk of severe COVID-19 among children, and considering the harms of school closures, in-person learning should be prioritised."
Federal
ED: Announced awards totaling over $7 million to eight statewide organizations under the 2022 Competitive Grants for the Statewide Family Engagement Centers (SFEC) program.
Covid-19 Research
Johns Hopkins is Reducing its COVID Data Tracking: Reports Axios:
"Johns Hopkins University is scaling back how much and how frequently it tracks COVID-19 pandemic metrics due to a slowdown in local data reporting"
"The university's data dashboard — which helped track case numbers, deaths and other metrics — will begin a slowdown on Sept. 21 since there is less reporting data available in the U.S. and around the world, according to university officials."
Crowdsourcing Interventions to Promote Uptake of COVID-19 Booster Vaccines: Study.
"Sanctions were evaluated as potentially most effective but least accepted. Evaluations by expert and general population samples were considerably aligned. Interventions that received the most positive evaluations regarding both effectiveness and acceptability across evaluation groups were: a day off work after getting vaccinated, financial incentives, tax benefits, promotional campaigns, and mobile vaccination teams."
State
Alabama: "Some parents with the Indoor Air Care Advocates (IACA) want to see some upgrades to the current air systems to make the schools safer against COVID-19."
Maine: School Administrative District 41 in Milo has switched to remote learning following a rise in COVID-19 cases just weeks into the new school year.
International
Hong Kong: Hong Kong won’t consider mass school closures even as the number of Covid-19 infections soars citywide, officials said, though they are monitoring outbreaks in specific classes so they can take action if needed.
Economic Recovery
Household Pulse Through June 2022: Gains for Most, but Not All: Via JP Morgan Institute.
Remote Work Hotspots: Via Axios
Resources
California's Age-Appropriate Design Code: What You Need to Know: Via Amelia Vance.
Wildfires, Storms Forcing Schools to Start Virtual Learning Again, Worsening Disruption: Via the AP.
“I think it will be an automatic response in most places to short-term disruptions in schooling,” he said. “It’s going to be the first reaction, whereas, back during the hurricanes, it was: Where can we get these students in another physical location where they can resume their school experience? Now I think it’s going to be: How can we get organized to provide remote learning?”
"Schools in Mora, New Mexico, switched to remote learning last April when the town was evacuated due to a wildfire."
States Take Different Approaches to Establishing Broadband Offices: Via StateTech.
Puppy and Butterflies: It's like a Disney movie.