Tricia Mooney
Mooney, Ed.D, is the superintendent of the Hermiston School District, which serves a diverse population of more than 5,600 students in the heart of the Columbia Basin.
In the first days of Oregon’s COVID-19 health crisis, schools across the state went into emergency mode.
We were faced with a million questions that demanded immediate answers as we quickly shifted our instructional methods from the classroom to the computer screen. Which students lacked adequate access to technology? How could we provide high-speed internet to neighborhoods where it didn’t previously exist? Which families had significant language barriers and needed special services to maintain a connection with schools?
These came alongside equally important questions of how to provide meals to students and stay in contact with the most vulnerable among them. Schools play a stabilizing role in many families’ lives, providing support along with an education. Our teachers and staff are more than just faces on a screen. For many students, these are the primary people who take an interest in them every day, celebrating their successes and helping them overcome their obstacles.
As we worked through these issues, our teachers prepared to deliver their lessons remotely. Many with decades of experience in the classroom pivoted in a single week to teaching for the first time on an online platform. They went over and over their class lists, trying to reconnect with each student and rebuild a classroom.
We learned an important lesson: No matter how far our technological advances have come, how many laptops we can deliver to students, how much training we give our teachers, we will never be able to equitably meet the needs of all our students from afar. The achievement gap, which schools have worked tirelessly to close, threatens to burst wide open as disadvantaged students fall out of contact with their teachers and support systems at schools.
The promise of public education is a fair shot at success. We give every student equitable access to opportunities for academic and extracurricular growth and development. We welcome them each morning as equals and help guide them along their individual paths. We hold them accountable as we get to know their strengths and weaknesses. We help them discover who they are and what they are destined to be.
But that promise is not possible if our schools aren’t accessible for every student, especially those in elementary grades. Many of these students are not capable of connecting with their teachers without an adult’s help, so those without support at home will remain disconnected. These are fundamental years that are nearly impossible to make up, and we risk permanently derailing these students’ academic careers if we don’t come up with a plan.
Even though our goals of providing an equitable education and ensuring student safety are the same, every school district serves unique populations and has different needs. The Oregon Department of Education’s guidelines for reopening must empower districts to work with their communities to tailor a plan that fits the student body, staff, and available facilities. It’s going to take local engagement, creativity, and flexibility to get back on track.
It will also take understanding from the state to address districts’ individualized needs. For some, that may be technology assistance, or educator training, or simply space. Oregon’s financial situation will not allow for an infusion of funding, and any additional money made available to deal with this crisis will be taken from other places, further hampering ongoing education efforts. If the ODE and local districts can agree on their basic priorities – healthy students receiving an equitable education – plans can be made that reflect local needs and realities.
For the Hermiston School District, reopening our doors is imperative. Providing transportation to our schools is imperative. Serving a meal and offering a safe place to be during the day is imperative. We will need flexibility and a certain level of autonomy from the state and input and understanding from our community as we work together to make this school year happen.
As a growing district, we’ve become accustomed to making the most of the space available. Every school district will be adjusting to meet these new requirements, including 35-square-feet of space per person in each classroom. But failure isn’t an option, and if we know the requirement we can meet it.
We are developing our reopening plan knowing students on the margins are the ones who need us most. Their well-being, both at present and into the future, is reliant on our ability and willingness to provide all the components of a stable public education.
Education is essential, and we must treat it as such. The negative effect of losing additional classroom time will reverberate through a generation of students. We must find a way to safely bring students and staff back into our schools this fall and begin rebuilding the momentum we’ve lost.
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June 28, 2020 at 08:00PM
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