I recall the announcement to school staff with instructions to "pack up everything you'll need from school for the next 2-3 weeks" all too well. For the past few weeks we watched nightly news reports detailing the spread of covid19 across the United States, much less the rest of the world. Initial forecasts created the impression that it would be just a short period of time until school returned to normal, and students seemed thrilled with their newfound freedom from the daily grind of having to do schoolwork. As the virus took an ever-increasing number of victims with preexisting health conditions, many families isolated themselves.
Suddenly church congregations no longer worshiped as one, movie theaters closed, and small businesses shut their doors. Meanwhile large retailers such as Walmart and Menards achieved record sales. In April 2020 our school attempted to instigate remote learning, but lack of public wifi and connectivity frustrated student and parents alike. It was about this time when I sensed upperclassmen taking on full-time jobs, replacing older workers who quit for fear of getting covid19. Why go to school when you could pull down $500+/week? Grades and plans for secondary educations became second-thought.
I might only imagine the concerns which were likely voiced by administrators in off-the-record closed door meetings. The state of public education was quickly falling into disarray without a time-proven plan to navigate to safety. Teachers, many of who never pondered the concept of online learning, were now instructed to pick up from where they left off from in-person learning, a next to impossible task in itself under normal circumstances, Covid19 was anything but normal.
For myself, the transition was easier than most...having completed my Masters Degree in Online Learning four years earlier. I was able to apply many of the methods I learned, but Marian University never mentioned the topic of lack of engagement and social disconnect on the part of students. To this day the issue has yet to be addressed by any school district, and that day of reckoning will need to take place before we regain any sense of "normalcy" once again. For the time being I have doubts as to whether a viable solution can really address all those students who truly need it. And for the sake of clarity, I'm referring to students of all ages throughout our entire country. Unfortunately, in this case, the cure was worse than the disease
