Viewpoints: More than just money is needed to erase learning losses.
It won’t be quick or cheap to erase pandemic learning losses, but if we just throw money or mandates at schools, we’re missing the point
Education in Arizona was far from perfect before the pandemic.
More than half of third-graders statewide were not proficient readers. There were significant achievement gaps between white students and students of color, between rich students and poor students, and between English language learners and native speakers.
And failing schools weren’t the only ones leaving students behind. A recent Greater Phoenix Leadership analysis found that even A- and B-rated schools in 2019 had significant percentages of students — particularly students of color — who were failing third grade reading.
But the picture wasn’t all doom and gloom. Data compiled by Stanford University show that while many states were stagnant or regressing academically pre-pandemic, Arizona was growing, and in some counties and schools, by nation-leading leaps.
There were gains all over Arizona through 2018, in rural and inner-city schools, among poor students and students of color.
Then the pandemic upended everything.
It’s estimated that while all students have fallen behind nationally, the gaps for poor students and students of color have grown even wider. And it’s unclear whether any of those footholds that Arizona worked so hard to gain before the pandemic remain.
So, how do we get back to where we were (or, even better, rocket ourselves past that place)?
Research before the pandemic was clear on what would produce the most significant academic gains — recruiting and retaining highly effective teachers and dynamic school leaders, and better addressing the many issues that students deal with outside of school.
That was largely the focus of our Moving the Needle series, which evaluated these and other ideas, such as district consolidation and building smaller schools, for their potential to make the most positive progress for students.
But is what we knew then still valid now? That’s the (multi) million-dollar question, particularly with the rise of remote learning and the number of parents who redshirted students this year.
There is wide agreement that erasing pandemic learning losses will be expensive and take years of sustained commitment.
But when it comes to solutions, the conversation nationally has been remarkably one-size-fits-all and mandate driven. There’s a lot of talk about requiring students to attend summer school, lengthening the school day or year, vastly lowering class sizes and pouring heavy resources into tutoring.
All of which could work, but with major caveats.
We knew before the pandemic, for example, that summer school can produce academic gains, but how much varies greatly by grade level and student population. And not all programs are created equal. Drilling on math and reading all day with no fun or hands-on application, ironically, can limit academic gains.
We also found in the Moving the Needle series that drastically lowering class size can make gains — but it’s expensive to do across the board, and even then, those gains can be uneven.
In other words, even solutions that work may not be the best solutions for all schools. If we think this is just a matter of choosing the right silver bullet, we’re missing the point.
If we want to stem pandemic learning losses — and, thankfully, many Arizona education advocates agree on this — our best bet lies in doing two far more fundamental things simultaneously:
Ensure that every school has highly effective teachers and a dynamic principal.
Empower these education experts — who know their students’ needs best, after all — to experiment with the best ways to fill those gaps.
That won’t be cheap or easy. Arizona already had acute teacher and principal shortages before the pandemic, which with all the anger, change and uncertainty has only exacerbated them.
We’ll need to recruit more teachers, which means programs like the Arizona Teachers Academy, which repays tuition if newly minted teachers work in Arizona schools, are probably good investments.
But we’re also going to have to make work a lot better for those who remain. Yes, that includes better pay. But survey after survey has revealed a deep need for other supports, including more aides, therapists and counselors to lighten the load on teachers, and quality mentorship programs, which can help them share and grow their skills during the school day, even while they’re teaching.
That’s going to take multi-year commitments, but it would be worth it.
Because there is no shortage of examples of what happens when we empower teachers to run with ideas that can raise the bar for their students. Witness the academic growth that’s occurred in Santa Cruz County, where districts and charters are sharing resources and vastly boosting their engineering capabilities.
Or the profound change that occurred at Whittier Elementary in Mesa last year, when teachers moved to an inquiry-based model and were so astounded by the results in reading that they began applying its concepts to math.
Schools need the proper resources to do more stuff like this. That includes funding, but it shouldn’t be limited to it.
It could mean partnering with parents and subject matter volunteers to help deliver lessons. It could mean moving students onto more challenging material when they’ve mastered concepts, not necessarily on how many days they spent in third grade. Or any number of evidence-driven ideas.
The point is the pandemic has shaken the foundations of education, highlighting what wasn’t working with a big, red pen. It’s dealt us the very real and sometimes harsh reminder that kids learn in different ways — and that if we want to rocket them forward, we need to personalize how we teach.
That includes laser-focusing on the specific areas where each student has fallen behind. But it shouldn’t be just about that. If we’re smart, we’ll also use the lessons of this pandemic to better engage students, to activate their curiosity and sense of wonder about learning.
Because isn’t that what school is supposed to be about, after all? Not hammering content into their heads, but about learning (and loving) how to learn.