With students finally settling into a pandemic-altered routine and widespread vaccine access on the horizon, Texas education leaders are turning to their next great challenge: catching up potentially millions of children falling behind in school.
Faced with the possibility of devastating student learning loss, educators across the state are in the early stages of planning for the 2021-22 school year and beyond, starting to devise significant — and likely disruptive — changes to their calendars, curricula and staffing.
Several of Texas’ largest districts already have restructured their upcoming school year, adding multiple weeks of instruction or moving up their start dates to stem the so-called “summer slide.”
The adjustments will impact many of the state’s more than 5 million students, whose academic, behavioral and emotional development have been stunted by the pandemic.
The effort also will test the state’s dedication to equity, the oft-cited-but-frequently-unfulfilled principle that children with the greatest needs should receive the most resources and support. While conclusive data on the pandemic’s impact remains elusive, educators widely agree that Black and Latino children, as well as students from lower-income families and those with disabilities, are more likely to fall behind than their peers.
“We need to use this opportunity to really step back and think about what students need, and then build a system and schedule and structure that helps them get that,” said Bridget Worley, executive director of the education nonprofit Texas Impact Network. “If we start back where we left off, we’re doing them a disservice.”
Since the dawn of the pandemic in Texas, state and local leaders have poured immense amounts of energy and money into assisting students impacted by the public health crisis.
Many educators are working around-the-clock to ensure students can learn in-person or online. Public school districts have spent more than $1 billion on computer devices and wireless Internet hotspots, making a huge dent in the digital divide. Many districts have tweaked their curricula and expanded credit recovery opportunities.
The coming years, however, will require an even bigger investment if education leaders want to minimize students’ learning losses, stem the widening of achievement gaps and address children’s mental health needs.
Education experts say the limitations of virtual instruction and isolation of learning from home have set back online-only students, while families report that the quality of in-person classes pales in comparison to that before the pandemic.
For now, most districts are just beginning to craft long-term plans, including Houston, Fort Bend and Aldine ISDs.
While administrators want to move quickly to deliver much-needed support to struggling students, they face many unanswered questions: When will more children return to campuses? What will their budgets look like next year? How will already-exhausted teachers and staff react if asked to work more? Will parents support major changes to their regular routines?
“We have things we’re discussing every day, and we recognize that things may look different in terms of covering learning loss when the 2021-22 school year begins,” Aldine Chief Communications Officer Sheleah Reed said. “But we have not nailed that down and made a beautiful plan with a nice bow on it.”
Several districts, however, have moved more quickly to unveil significant changes, hopeful that their early planning will jump-start students in 2021-22.
‘Something really bold’
In Dallas ISD, the state’s second-largest district, school board members voted Thursday to give staff and families at each school the option to add 10 weeks of in-person instruction spread across 2021-22 and 2022-23. District administrators are gathering feedback to determine which campuses want to adopt the revised calendar. Attendance will not be mandatory for students and staff at schools making the change.
The idea, which could cost up to $90 million to implement, marks the most ambitious proposal to date among Texas’ largest school districts.
Derek Little, Dallas’ deputy chief of academics, said administrators still are crafting plans for the 10 weeks of support, but they envision smaller classes in a lower-stress environment for children.
“We knew we had to do something really bold to help our students recover from their learning loss and pandemic challenges,” Little said. “The research here is really compelling, that when students have more time in a high-quality learning environment, that extra time makes a difference.”
The Dallas plan mirrors an initiative launched this school year in neighboring Garland ISD, home to about 54,100 students. The district added 17 days of optional instruction into its 2020-21 calendar — eight weekdays spread throughout the normal school year, plus nine weekdays tacked on in June — and plans to offer 21 more optional class days in 2021-22.
About 9,000 students attended the first week of optional classes in October, with some students receiving remedial instruction and others seeking to accelerate their learning, Garland Director of Intervention Lea Ann Schkade said. Launching the change required extensive coordination across all parts of the district, including buy-in from volunteer educators willing to work for $30 per hour, Schkade said.
“It’s worth it because it’s about helping kids and it gives you extra days to work with your most fragile students,” Schkade said. “Now is the right time for this. If we hold off another year, our kids are only going to get further and further behind.”
Several districts in the El Paso region also have tweaked their calendars for 2021-22, starting the year earlier to minimize the so-called “summer slide.” Those districts, including El Paso ISD, will begin classes in early August and end in early June, with three additional weeks off built into the calendar.
Dallas’ experience, however, has illustrated some of the looming challenges for districts planning major changes in the coming years.
District officials expect most students will not attend the extra 10 weeks because their families will opt out or their school community will not adopt the calendar change. Dallas leaders have struggled to get buy-in from some parents, who worry the investment will not pay significant dividends.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to extend time because the time being used now isn’t being used wisely,” said Jessica Granda, whose sixth- and 11th-grade daughters are behind in several courses in Dallas ISD. “There’s not really engagement going on. There’s not a lot of support right now.”
The prospect of asking staff members to work extra hours also worries some employees, who report high rates of burnout. Many educators simultaneously are teaching students in person and online amid the pandemic, stretching them thinner than normal.
Time to invest
In the coming weeks, other Texas school districts likely will unveil their plans for the 2021-22 school year as they finalize calendars and begin their budgeting processes.
In a statement this week, Houston ISD officials said they are “in the initial stages of planning our summer program and strategic planning for the 2021-22 school year.”
“Normally, this process typically occurs during the first few months of a calendar year,” the administrators said. “Like other districts, HISD is prioritizing students who are struggling academically and socially/emotionally, beginning with making district-wide credit recovery available to our 11th and 12th graders in February 2021.”
Northside ISD, the state’s fourth-biggest district and largest in Greater San Antonio, remains in a similar spot.
“We’re certainly thinking about learning loss and how to mitigate those losses,” said Barry Perez, Northside’s executive director of communications. “We haven’t announced anything formally just because those plans are not finalized right now, but details are being ironed out.”
While hurdles remain for installing large-scale changes, the coming months also present a unique opportunity to make a dent in learning gaps.
Texas’ top lawmakers are pledging to keep public school funding steady during the nascent legislative session, a welcome relief after initial projections forecast the possibility of big cuts to education.
In addition, districts serving large percentages of children from lower-income families could see big cash infusions from the second federal stimulus package.
Texas schools are expected to receive about $5 billion under the second federal stimulus package passed late last month, with districts in less affluent areas receiving a greater share of the payout. State officials still are debating when and how to distribute the money, but the funds must be spent on COVID-related costs, including “addressing learning loss.”
Districts are not likely to go on hiring sprees — school leaders must spend all $5 billion by September 2023 — but the funding could open more opportunities to offer tutoring or partner with outside support providers.
“I think they need to invest, obviously, in teacher training, teacher coaching and classroom management, but they also need to invest in proven organizations that provide some of the targeted interventions that children need,” said Jacque Daughtry, executive director of the Houston-based nonprofit Literacy Now. “School districts can’t do it alone. It’s just too much.”
Nicole Jordan, the mother of a first-grader attending online-only classes at Houston ISD’s Walnut Bend Elementary School, said she remains wary of dramatic changes that would upend her family’s normal routine. Still, she remains open to proposals that could help her daughter, Lyric, make up for lost time in a classroom.
“Whatever it is they’re concocting, hopefully, they come to us first as parents,” Jordan said. “If it’s something good, I’m always on board with it. But if I feel like it’s too much, let us have that preference.”
jacob.carpenter@chron.com
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