On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus to be a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). Following the declaration, suspension of in-person classes occurred along with the implementation of various other social distancing measures. As coronavirus numbers have come down, a shift from virtual back to in-person education has been pushed. Different states and districts have approached the issue of reopening schools in a variety of ways, trying to balance both health and educational concerns.
For students in K-12, each grade's material builds on each other, raising concerns about the effectiveness of virtual learning in preparing students for the future. According to the Nation’s Report Card, a congressionally mandated test overseen by the Department of Education, scores in reading, writing, and mathematics declined during the pandemic. Since 2019, the average math score for fourth graders dropped 5 points and the average score for eighth graders dropped 8 points. Both grades experienced a drop of 3 points in reading tests [1].
Peggy Carr, the commissioner for the National Center for Education Statistics, said that “[These scores] are the largest declines in mathematics that we have observed in the entire history of this assessment,” [1]. However, while scores dropped drastically in math, scores in reading and writing may have been less impacted since the student’s home environment often plays a larger role in developing these skills.
These trends are concerning; however, data is otherwise too limited to make the claim that virtual learning is solely responsible for declining test performances. Remote learning looks different from state to state, district to district, and family to family. Carr emphasizes that other factors often play a role in the quality of online learning students receive, such as an unstable home environment or limited access to the internet [1].
Virtual learning does impact, though, the student’s ability to connect with others, from friends to mentors, placing additional mental and emotional strain on the child and family. Over the last few years, a trend of worsening emotional health, increased stress, and a lack of peer connection has occurred along with increasing rates of drug overdose deaths, self-harm, and eating disorders [5]. These trends raise concerns about how social isolation during virtual learning may negatively impact students, especially for those who rely on schools for support and community they can’t find at home.
For example, for students with special needs, the abrupt transition to online learning meant many students lost essential instructional time [5]. For some LGBTQ students, the closing of schools cut them off from community and essential safe spaces. In a survey conducted by EdWeek Research Center asking students if they were experiencing more problems in school after the pandemic, 83 percent of LGBTQ teenagers said they were while only 69 percent of heterosexual high schoolers also said they were [4].
With decreased social distancing, though, comes the concern of further COVID spreading and mutation, like we saw with Omicron last year. While not as lethal as other variants, Omicron’s high transmissibility made it possible for the virus to quickly infect entire units of people, like nursing staff, flight attendants, and teachers [3]. Data through July 28, 2022 shows there have been 14 million child COVID-19 cases, 19% of all cases, with pediatric hospitalizations peaking in January 2022 during the Omicron surge [5].
Another concern is the possibility for school openings to cause spreading among family units and older populations. One study attempted to analyze this potential phenomenon, but could not collect enough data to suggest whether or not school openings are associated with transmissions across different age groups [2]. The study did find, though, that teachers and their significant others in open schools had higher rates of COVID-19 infections than teachers and their partners in closed schools [2].
Despite the concerns surrounding academic test score declines, a variety of factors also influence the necessity of opening schools or continuing virtual education. Virtual learning varies from district to district and from home to home making the process of identifying flaws within the virtual model difficult. Virtual education does, though, place additional strain on already vulnerable students cutting them off from community and vital support services. While the concern about COVID is still very real, a holistic look at students and the role schools play in their lives is essential to understanding the unique demands the pandemic has placed on students and what they need next from their school administrators.
References:
Camera, Lauren. (2022, Oct. 24). Pandemic Prompts Historic Decline in Student Achievement on Nation’s Report Card. U.S. News. https://www.usnews.com/news/education-news/articles/2022-10-24/pandemic-prompts-historic-decline-in-student-achievement-on-nations-report-card#:~:text=An%20overwhelming%20majority%20of%20states,of%20the%20impact%20of%20the
Chernozhukov, V., Kasahara, H., & Schrimpf, P. (2021). The Association of Opening K–12 schools with the spread of covid-19 in the United States: County-level panel data analysis. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(42). https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2103420118
Powell, Alvin. (2022, Oct. 11). Is the pandemic finally over? We asked the experts. Harvard Gazette. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2022/10/is-pandemic-finally-over-we-asked-the-experts/
Will, M. (2022, January 31). When school goes remote, many LGBTQ students lose a safe space. Education Week. https://www.edweek.org/leadership/when-school-go-remote-many-lgbtq-students-lose-a-safe-space/2021/03#:~:text=With%20remote%20learning%2C%20he%20added,build%20to%20survive%2C%20frankly.%E2%80%9D
Williams, Elizabeth, & Drake, Patrick. (2022, Aug. 05). Headed Back to School: A Look at the Ongoing Effects of COVID-19 on CHildren’s Health and Well Being. Kaiser Family Foundation. https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/issue-brief/headed-back-to-school-a-look-at-the-ongoing-effects-of-covid-19-on-childrens-health-and-well-being/