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Education Dive
Survey: Teachers support school closures, worry about students falling behind
Linda Jacobson
April 2, 2020
Dive Brief:
Eighty-four percent of teachers agree with states’ and districts’
decisions to close schools due to COVID-19, but more than half are
concerned students will struggle to learn in a virtual environment and
fall behind academically, according to survey results released Thursday.
Conducted by the Association of American Educators Foundation,
affiliated with a nonunion organization, the online survey focused on
how prepared teachers felt they were to shift their instruction to a
virtual environment. Three-fourths of the respondents — 88% of which
work in traditional public schools — said they felt their readiness to
teach remotely was “at least average,” while 42% said their broader
educational communities were unprepared for closures.
Only a fifth felt their districts had sufficient plans in place for
providing services to students with special needs, while 46% responded
that their district’s plans for supporting special education students
were insufficient.
Dive Insight:
While the survey returned only 700 responses, it’s one of the first
attempts to capture data on how teachers are adjusting to this shift.
Such knowledge will become increasingly important with some experts
suggesting that closures could extend into the 2020-21 school year, or
that at least additional closures will be necessary. The voices of
teachers can help districts determine how to create ongoing support
when all educators teach remotely — during this crisis or a future one.
Another early source on how prepared districts were for such an abrupt
shift is the Center on Reinventing Public Education’s database of
districts' closure response plans. The data addresses questions such as
how teachers are providing instruction online, the state of internet
access for students and how districts are helping parents adjust.
CRPE is also part of a project with the RAND Corp. that will provide
additional data on districts' experiences. "RAND and CRPE are closely
coordinating our efforts to understand how schools and districts are
addressing the new COVID-19 landscape, and we do plan to draw on both
organizations’ findings to inform our data collection for the new
district panel," said Laura Hamilton, who directs RAND’s Center for
Social and Emotional Learning Research. "We’re providing some
assistance with CRPE’s review of district websites, and we’re also
planning to do some teacher and principal surveys that will supplement
the district work."
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