Michael Yocum, Assistant Superintendent, Educations Services for Oakland Schools, shared the impact of Covid-19 on Oakland Schools and its students. He explained that student education has been severely affected by the pandemic and shared some data of the learning loss in the schools. Using Math class as an example, they based that by the end of this school year, students will have fallen 4 to 12 months behind in their learning, which is equivalent to a whole grade level.
When the schools shut down last spring, they quickly had to pivot to a new way of teaching and address the challenge of access to technology. They worked fast to get the students devices and internet connections to begin remote learning. The problem is that as hard as they worked to do this, there are still about 10% of students that do not have one or both of those things. And, with remote learning you do not have the face-to-face learning that most students really need. Studies have shown that student engagement had fallen significantly, and that interaction is critical for students because it impacts their learning skills and mental health.
Michael also addressed the flexibility in all the districts with different school schedules. Some districts have all their students in class, some have them all remote and the most common is the hybrid model of in-class 2 days a week and remote 3 days a week. With all the new technology, he is not sure if we will ever go back to old school teaching, or if virtual learning will become the new normal.