Alarmingly high number of Spokane students
aren’t engaged in online learning
Spokane Spokesman-Review,
by
Jim Allen
Original Article
Posted By: Ron_lfp,
5/12/2020 11:34:52 AM
Education is continuing, more or less, in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic – more for families with resources, less for those without.
And for an alarmingly high number of students in Spokane and the rest of the nation, genuine learning isn’t happening at all. Despite the efforts of Spokane Public Schools and other districts, many families have simply given up.
The reasons include a lack of internet connections and online expertise as well as poverty, pandemic-related unemployment and homelessness. (snip) Several teachers said last week they suspect as few as 10% of their students are fully engaged in distance learning.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
john56 5/12/2020 11:43:44 AM (No. 408832)
Where I live, the school district where my son goes (and my wife teaches) got prepared quickly. By about March 23 they were live online. Of the 550 or so high school students, they only lost contact with about 20 of them. A nearby school district, much larger but very affluent, did next to nothing until the state came down on them like a load of bricks. A friend of mine whose kids attend those schools tells me that the school started calling like a telephone solicitor to get them back into the groove. In the larger metro areas, I hear as many as 20-25% of the kids were "lost."
5 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
DVC 5/12/2020 11:45:44 AM (No. 408836)
It is a failed experiment.
OTOH, they weren't learning to hate the USA and that 2+2 = 5 some of the time, so maybe it's a breakthrough.
10 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
hurricanegirl 5/12/2020 11:53:56 AM (No. 408853)
I bet it's not just in Spokane. While out driving around, I consistently saw the same bunch of kids out playing in the yard. Those with parents who take the education of their kids seriously made their kids do the work; those who don't give a flip, let the kids off the hook.
9 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
seamusm 5/12/2020 11:55:48 AM (No. 408854)
Parents are forgetting that uneducated children will NEVER be able to leave home. More to the point, at-home schooling is just one more failed educational 'experiment' whose guinea pigs are our children.
5 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
Urgent Fury 5/12/2020 12:13:53 PM (No. 408874)
Yeah the writer kept spelling "United States" wrong.
2 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
MuncsSister 5/12/2020 12:14:30 PM (No. 408876)
This is happening all of the country. You can hate the government school agenda pushers and social engineering all day long while still recognize the tragedy here. Some kids have horrible parents and school is a necessary escape from that. My husband was a teacher briefly and witnessed the ugly reality of child neglect.
Not everyone is cut out for homeschool either. My family isn’t, but we’re doing the best we can. Some children can’t learn on an iPad, they need a classroom of peers and a teacher who is not mom. I cannot imagine being forced to learn with my face glued to screen in my parents dining room as a child. It is not good.
There may be a minority of parents and kids who are excelling with forced homeschool— that’s great. But for a majority this is a failure, no matter what side of the political aisle you fall on.
6 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
ramona 5/12/2020 12:39:46 PM (No. 408902)
Thanks, Poster #6 for recognizing the multiple realities of schooling at home. Thank God my mentally ill, abusive mother wasn't convinced to keep us home. And orchids to parents who do homeschooling well - I know quite a few and admire them tremendously.
Ramona (the Pest)
9 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
msjena 5/12/2020 12:42:55 PM (No. 408909)
Not just Spokane. I would bet the majority of students are treating this like early summer vacation.
4 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
JHHolliday 5/12/2020 1:03:55 PM (No. 408929)
Anybody with half a brain could see this coming. The permanent home-schoolers do well but parents who are suddenly forced to do it can easily be lost. I think we will look back and see that we totally overreacted to this Chinese flu in most areas of the country. NYC, maybe not but Warren Wilhelm duh Blahzio didn't shut the subways down and Fredo's brother filled the nursing homes with infected patients.
8 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
stablemoney 5/12/2020 1:22:32 PM (No. 408961)
Many "students" are not interested in learning, no matter how many books are placed in front of them, teachers, public schools constructed, or computers purchased. I do not believe in compulsory education, or much of anything else that is compulsory. My own view is that we would improve our education outcomes many times by simply making it voluntary.
5 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
bad-hair 5/12/2020 1:26:55 PM (No. 408967)
They don't need to learn. They're EXPERTS at TicTok or whatever enters their small brains. The ones who really want to learn will learn. The rest can buy food somehow.
3 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
Luandir 5/12/2020 1:29:55 PM (No. 408972)
Government in any form is ill-equipped to quickly adapt to changing circumstances. In this case, as their hasty and unplanned approach grinds to a halt, the administrators are not even able to tell how far short the system is falling. Give 'em all a participation trophy and send 'em on to the next grade!
Perversely, it may be the teachers unions, striving to get their members back to work, who pull the kids back into the schools.
4 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
dbdiva 5/12/2020 1:32:45 PM (No. 408978)
In PA our Education Secretary stated that he intends to open our schools in the fall. But "intends" is a fuzzy word and does not mean it will actually happen. I'm sure that goalposts will be moved several times before schools are set to reopen so I'm not convinced it will happen. Thankfully I have no children in school. I expect if schools don't open there will be hordes of POed parents who will finally be working and so unable to stay home and monitor kids schoolwork. We shall see, I guess.
4 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
or gate 5/12/2020 1:34:27 PM (No. 408984)
Hey kids, your education is the most important event in your life.
Everyone can not work for minimum wage selling pot.
No minimum wage is not designed to allow raising a family.
Your job/education is the most important part of your life. Think family will stick around and watch you fail?
3 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
Lala 5/12/2020 2:08:22 PM (No. 409025)
Not much incentive for some students. I heard in my state that school districts can just do pass/fail, and for students concerned about their GPA, a pass is equal to a 4.0.
1 person likes this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
Highlander 5/12/2020 2:08:59 PM (No. 409026)
In addition to what #10 wrote: 49% of students engaged in on-line learning reflects closely with the actual percentage in schools before the lockdown. Until March 13, I worked as a substitute teacher after having retired in 2015. I observed many classes, all grade levels, and there was always a large percentage of “goof-offs” in most classrooms. It seemed to me that genuine students were small in numbers compared to the rest. For example, the teacher I help, was absolutely clear about her objectives for the day, and the class knew them, only a handful would be engaged in complying with their teacher’s instructions, no matter what consequences she threatened. I have sat in classrooms as a co-teacher. The kids didn’t do much better with their teacher as with me, which surprised me. In conclusion, 49% is realistic and logically reflects actual classroom dynamics.
2 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
GO3 5/12/2020 2:44:11 PM (No. 409052)
Agree with #10. Making it voluntary would make the state and the education establishment have a heart attack. Nevertheless, this summer is a perfect opportunity to revoke truancy laws and refund property taxes. Federal funding is based on headcount so that will go down or go away too. People can publish all the articles they want as far as reforming education, but without doing away with coercive laws and fixing the oppressive tax scheme, reform efforts fall in the category of waiting for the DoJ to punish the traitors in the deep state.
1 person likes this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
kono 5/12/2020 3:00:28 PM (No. 409058)
Of the two grade schools with which I work, the one that seemed to underperform during normal times is suddenly the one ahead, because they spent resources and time the past two years installing and integrating remote-learning equipment and techniques (learning zoom for instance) for times of extended absence. (That turns out to be part of why they were trailing the other school.) The other school, which had seemed superior in many ways, got caught unprepared for this and basically ended their school year 3 months early with no way to get back on track remotely. They don't even have the tablets or laptops for their students to bring home, let alone the lesson plans and experience using the remote setup.
1 person likes this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
kono 5/12/2020 3:03:29 PM (No. 409062)
(PS: Both schools I mentioned are in a part of town made up mostly of poor, first-generation immigrant families, for whatever it's worth.)
0 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
Strike3 5/12/2020 7:18:03 PM (No. 409263)
Guess what, Jim. They weren't doing any better before the virus hit and they were warming their chairs every day in the classroom. School officials at all levels are beginning to sound like democrats. We are failing because (reach into the jar and choose an excuse).
0 people like this.
The school superintendent here is still looking for kids that disappeared.
1 person likes this.
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