Parents will have to be at their best
Kids will face challenges as their schools reopen
Offering parents advice on what to do about the looming start of the school year feels like suggesting that you stock up on canned tuna as a hurricane comes up the street. The advice probably isn’t proportional to the problem.
With a month to go to the scheduled start of school for most Wisconsin students, the re-opening situation remains difficult to navigate from everybody’s standpoint.
So what are parents to do as uncertainty about what’s ahead remains high, the COVID-19 crisis just hasn’t gone away, and the complexities of navigating what’s best for kids are so formidable?
It’s clear that parents as a whole don’t have clear answers, which makes the decision-making process for school leaders all the more complex.
I saw the results of a national survey that showed how split parents are. Asked when they think it will be safe for kids to go back to school, 27% of parents said August or September, 17% said later in the fall, 14% said in the winter, 15% said the spring, 10% said not at all in this school year, and 18% didn’t know.
When Milwaukee Public Schools asked for input from parents in early July, 46% who responded (a total of about 20,000) said they were “not at all comfortable” with kids returning to buildings this fall and only 16% said they were comfortable.
Among non-MPS schools in Milwaukee, the high level of parental worries about health issues if kids go to school appears to have been a major factor in deciding not to re-open right away in person. Nationwide, there has been a significant shift in recent weeks away from opening schools in person.
You could argue that the situation has gotten clearer for some people because so many schools will not open for face-to-face classes at the start of the year. It’s always easier to pick from a menu with only one item.
But distance learning comes with a lot of problems for a lot of parents. How to handle childcare issues while going to work is a big one for many. For those choosing (or pretty much forced) to stay home from work or to reduce hours because of children’s needs, money pressures are likely to be great.
Another serious issue: How to maintain equilibrium within the walls of a house where everyone has been for so much time since mid-March. And how to deal with the social and
emotional needs of kids — and of adults.
And then there’s the whole subject of learning. Except for a small fraction of parents who do homeschooling along a well-chosen path or who have chosen to enroll kids in well-run virtual schools (not the same thing as homeschooling), distance learning as a replacement for classroom learning is generally not such a hot option.
Evidence has grown that most kids, especially those in lower-income communities, did not make the progress they should have when schools switched to distance learning in March.
Will things be any better this fall? There is some hope. Schools have had time to get ready. Promises have been made widely, including from Milwaukee Public Schools, that all kids will have access to computers at home and decent internet service. Teachers generally have been offered more training in distance learning and have had time to develop plans.
So will distance learning be better? Here’s hoping.
And what about schools that are going to open with a “hybrid” schedule of kids in school maybe two days a week? Is that really going to work? Or schools that plan to transition to such a hybrid schedule if and when things ease up?
These add to things for parents to worry about. But let’s hope there’s hope.
Some thoughts for parents
So back to the question of what a parent should do. With no claim that I have expertise, permit me to offer some thoughts:
Aim to be a good example to your children. If you focus on making the best of challenging situations, the odds improve that the kids will follow suit.
So stay level-headed, as best as possible. The more you bad mouth the situation or the school, the more they’ll pick up on that.
Whatever the circumstances for your child’s schooling, help set reasonable and positive standards for how your child can focus on learning — things like making school work come first, keeping a consistent schedule at home and overseeing whether your child is making progress.
Be a helpful advocate for your child. Insist on good communication from the school and from teachers. Speak up for what your child needs, especially if it involves special education needs and similar matters. To a limited degree — which is to say, be reasonable — remember that squeaky wheels often do get oiled.
Even if it seems you have a menu with only one option, keep in mind options you might have if you think what’s going on is not working for your kid. That might include other schools, but it could include asking for tutoring or extra time from a teacher or taking advantage of community resources.
Realize that flexibility will be an asset in these circumstances. Schools that are nimble and responsive to what is happening will do the best. Same for parents.
Keep looking for ideas — from experts, from friends, from teachers, from anywhere — on how to keep your family environment as healthy as possible, using a broad definition of what “healthy” means.
Something parents already know: The more time your child is at home, the more you need to do a good job as a parent. Keep trying to rise the occasion. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Even if the hurricane seems to be heading your way, stay on duty as a parent as best you can. Someday, your children might even thank you.
Alan J. Borsuk is senior fellow in law and public policy at Marquette Law School. Reach him at alan.borsuk@ marquette.edu.