When the Lights are Turned On: Documenting the Impact of COVID-19 on California’s Education Landscape
Summary
The abrupt closure of public schools in March 2020 forced a radical shift to remote learning for close to 6 million California students. The shift to digital platforms between the 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 school years highlighted and exacerbated pre-existing educational inequities.
In CA, there were an estimated 1.8 million students, most of which were Latinx and Black, without digital access at home (Alliance for Excellent Education, 2020). The pandemic’s impact extended beyond academics, affecting students’ social-emotional learning and mental health. Teachers had to navigate unfamiliar computer platforms and faced difficulties with student engagement.
As the pandemic unfolded, the threat of COVID-19 compounded uncertainties. This brief intends to elevate new research by suggesting recommendations for strategic action based on the perspectives of educators across CA who participated in interviews and online surveys. Our hope in sharing this brief widely is that we’ll be able to turn the lights on, to see clearly the deep and profound effects of the virus on our education landscape.
Key Findings
The findings are based upon interviews and statewide survey data from educators (e.g., teachers, principals, school counselors, psychologists) documenting the traumatic impact of COVID-19 on students, families, and communities of color.
Inequities in remote learning conditions were widespread.
“We have a number of students coming back this year that recognized that they didn’t learn much last year in subjects like math, which scaffolds on top of each other. They’re coming back and the fluency is not there for the next level. However, we put them in the next level because of the no harm grading policy two years ago. And then last year the work was there but it wasn’t what it would be in a normal school year, nor did they have that day-to-day practice. So, all of that really upticked the stress levels for a number of students as they were realizing the deficiencies in their own knowledge acquisition.” – District leader
Remediation, student learning acceleration and socialization are universal challenges after lost in-person instructional time.
“How am I supposed to teach this current standard when they (students) don’t even know the other standard and I’m having to teach that first before they can get to this, and now I’m behind. And so, the added stress of just doing that is catching up to them.” – High school Mathematics teacher
Pre-pandemic differences in achievement patterns are accelerating for students of color.
“The student populations that we have worked so hard to support: youth of color, our students in foster care, students living in transitional contexts like those experiencing homelessness, multilingual learners and students with disabilities…All of the students whose identities are the other, I would say, are most impacted by the outcomes of COVID and during COVID because I think those inequities existed before and they just have been highlighted with COVID.” – District leader
Social, emotional and mental health needs of students are far exceeding the capacity of staff.
“I can tell you right now, our suicide rate numbers, assessment numbers are off the chart. I mean, they have increased by say 60-70%, and we’re only in December. I have never seen the number of suicide assessments come in at this rate with the level of support and need from DMH [Department of Mental Health].” – District leader
Little state guidance or support was/is being provided to schools to deal with an unprecedented education crisis.
“When our students started losing their housing, we were doing their housing applications for renters’ relief. And when their parents lost their jobs, we were applying for new jobs for them. When family members passed away, we were trying to figure out how to help parents navigate through what it looked like to get a death certificate, to make arrangements and to try and figure those things out and to get them started on a GoFundMe page.” – Principal
Basic needs are more fundamental to student learning than ever before.
“I went to do a home visit. And then she [student] was holding this little nine-month-old. And the toddler’s pulling on her. And the nine-month-old is crying. And I went to knock on her door to ask her why she hadn’t submitted her work. At that point, the conversation changed. It was, ‘I’ll be back. I’m going to get you some diapers. I’m going to get you some food.’” – Principal
A weak pipeline of educators and staff and ongoing retention challenges are negatively affecting schools.
“There are no teachers in the teaching pools. You can barely get a sub if you ask for one. You have to really, really make real efforts to try and get a sub if someone is absent.” – Teacher
An aggressive state policy response is needed to support racial justice and equity.
“We are hitting a windfall of money in education to fix a problem that isn’t just a one-time problem. These problems have been there for years and will continue to be here even into the next crisis or the next pandemic or whatever comes our way. COVID absolutely has exacerbated it for this one moment in time, but those problems don’t go anywhere.” – School counselor
Policy Recommendations
- Establish a core body of state agencies, the State Board, Administration and Legislative members to set goals, monitor progress and utilize integrated data systems around addressing the educational effects of the pandemic for the short and long-term.
- Identify and analyze essential school level, school system and regional data points to inform how the state moves forward to prioritize the education, health and wellbeing of young people, especially young people of color across the state.
- Create a state roadmap for boosting enrollment and attendance in California’s public schools based on deeper insights from educators, students, caregivers, families, and community members.
- Establish statewide capacity-building efforts that prioritize race-centered approaches to systems of support.
- Start collecting data in a more centralized fashion that captures digital equity indicators (e.g., access to broadband, high speed internet, technology, educator technology infrastructure).
Related Work
