During this extraordinary moment in history where a virus has spread so far and wide virtually the entire world is shut-in under some form of quarantine, one, we cannot forget the things in life that truly matter: our family (whoever may that may be to you), our friendships, and our sense of joy and human-ness. It is understandable in this moment to submit to feelings of disorientation and despair as much of what we knew, and took for granted like simply being able travel freely, has been abruptly interrupted and home confinement for many, is now a new normal, and will be for the foreseeable future. Without a doubt, these are some strange days and we’ve likely only seen the beginning.
In acknowledging how difficult this moment is for many adults, for those with school-aged children, imagine how truly difficult and confusing this moment is for your child. While many of us have become conditioned to the rat-race of going to work, engaging with co-workers on a cursory, if not friendly, level (and even those we outright disdain), for children, the sense of normalcy present in physically going to school is a different experience than going work is for many adults. Before elaborating, I’ll state flatly: schools are far from perfect places. EVERY school can serve children better; both in terms of academics and in terms of offering emotional and psychological support to young people. I’ll state again: every school can improve. That said, what children love and look forward to, fellowshipping with their friends and other familiar personalities for hours a day, is a phenomena that is impossible given the educative context many students are confined to now through remote learning and home schooling.
Contemporary narratives pertaining to schools and schooling in the post NCLB and the Accountability Age it ushered in, tends to revolve around misguided and minimalistic terms like “proficiency”, “grade levels” and “achievement gaps”. This is not an accident. For 40 years, ideologically driven conservative politicians and the neoliberal corporate class of the “Democratic” party have been operationalizing their political and economic prowess to morph public education into a business to be monetized – and unfortunately, they have been wildly successful in their efforts. The message that public schools are collective marketplace and parents are akin to consumers, though easily understood intuitively by a largely uncritical public, could not be more wrong. Nonetheless, in this COVID19 world, where schools (mis)labled both “high-quality” and “failing” and every school situated within that spectrum are closed, children are spending their school days at home (with some with access to a computer and internet) learning through a screen, or toiling through packets of worksheets alone or with their parent or guardian – not in school.
It’s easy to take things for granted when they’ve always been there. It can be said that our children having a place to go and learn every day, free of charge, has been taken for granted and in many respects, under-appreciated – and not only for the reasons many, reflexively, may suspect. Certainly, schools are places where young people learn the three Rs, and supposedly learn to be critical thinkers, and “good” citizens, but these are things we adults typically view as important. But to our children, our schools are places to see and engage with friends; where they develop as more complete human beings, and in the process, learn more about themselves. Vital lessons children learn along their paths toward becoming their best self, and the joys and pains experienced along the way, are commonly instituted in the schoolhouse. Schools and schooling are about far more than learning and remembering content. Human development takes place at schools, with and among people. Yet because of a global pandemic, our children are left to languish at home and experience schooling alone by pouring over packets or trying to make sense of new content through a computer – both extremely inadequate substitutes.
Interesting enough, the latter has been the goal of some education reformers, specifically tech-savvy eduprenuers who’ve invested heavily in the modern education reform movement as they see instruction through technology as the wave of the future – and the next big money maker in education. The Gates Foundation, Dell Foundation, and Google have longed for the days where paper learning, paper assessments, and even gathering in-person at a central place called schools are jettisoned for much of what we see our children doing now: sitting at home, and learning through a computer, much in the same way working adults attend online universities like University of Phoenix and Walden University. And while adults turning to online college to earn a degree that has too-long eluded them, or take classes for career advancement, it is completely different to confine children to that lonely, solitary mode of learning content. And though it may seem far-fetched to suggest that some Districts will turn to remote-learning as their primary method for delivering instruction in the future when we emerge from quarantine, typically, such drastic changes occur incrementally.
Unfortunately, COVID19 has provided cover and the opportunity for school districts all over the country to, out of necessity, adopt this awful method of schooling. For the tech sector looking to capitalize on this current crisis, providing cheap laptops to districts and students is an infinitesimal investment when compared to the windfall profits they stand to gain in supplanting traditional school districts and their educators. I can hear their talking points now: Through remote learning, students get to work at their own pace… Through remote learning, students can learn in the safety and comfort of their own homes while parents never have to worry about bullying or school shootings… Through remote learning, students have access to their education facilitators around the clock… Through remote learning, taxpayer dollars will be spent more responsibly with money going to instruction, not bureaucracy… Through remote learning…
Unquestionably, this current global tragedy is providing an opening the edu-tech sector has been drooling over for past twenty years. Former Obama Chief of Staff and Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel famously said: “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” This mode of thinking has been a guiding principle instituting calamitous policy decisions from the “justifiable” erosion of personal freedoms through the Patriot Act (2001), disastrous foreign policy decisions like the war in Iraq (2003) – justified by the 9/11 attacks, to the takeover, dismantling, and privatization, of the entire New Orleans school system (2005).
In all instances referenced, both governmental entities, along with the business community have used catastrophe as a pretext to forward their own ideological and economic interests – at the expense of the greater public. What we can be near-certain about regarding schooling in the current COVID19 era, is that somewhere right now, government officials, lobbyists and corporate edu-capitalists are plotting on how to make this, our children “learning through technology”, the new normal. We have to remember the value in children going to school and engaging with other children in their peer group (some of whom are their friends) and other human beings. We cannot forget the schooling process allows for learning experiences outside of simple content but allows for a space for children to discover more about themselves while, learning to appreciate others’ varying perspectives and differences.
As per usual, the parties looking to capitalize on disastrous events target places with little political representation or influence as these areas the easiest places to jam through marginalizing policies and practices. Thus, people of color in urban America, and poor whites in rural America ought to pay close attention to the discourse bandied about by local officials describing their recommendations for our children’s education going forward. In sum, anyone who cares about the wholistic development of children, including the educative process of children, had better #StayWoke in these COVID19 streets as the suggestions for opportunism at of our children’s education expense, is coming.
