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The past few days have brought us stories w/headlines like “How to Help Students Falling Behind in the Pandemic” ( @TheTakeaway, 12/8/20) and “The Empty Gradebook: As Students Struggle w/Remote Learning, Teachers Grapple with F’s” ( @ChalkbeatNY, 12/7/20). (
by Kemala Karmen)
1/15
by Kemala Karmen)1/15
While the @ChalkbeatNY story featured more nuance & less the-sky-is-falling panic than the @TheTakeaway piece, both these stories, & the trend generally, when it comes to reporting on pandemic-era schooling, focus on FAILURE.
2/15
2/15
The phrase “falling behind” is expressed and repeated without examination, as though there were some mutually agreed upon, universal definition of the term. (There isn’t.)
Another ex. "It’s time to admit it: Remote ed. is a failure" ( @washingtonpost, 12/2/20)
3/15
Another ex. "It’s time to admit it: Remote ed. is a failure" ( @washingtonpost, 12/2/20)
3/15
Even when some metric is invoked, like the @NWEA test results that cropped up in many recent pieces, journalists seldom interrogate its general validity, much less how it might have been further warped by peculiarities & irregularities of pandemic-times test administration.
4/15
4/15
What is so infuriating about the “falling behind” narrative is the way that it is so deficit-based. And this is where the inherent racism and classism of centering our @NYCSchools on dubious & arbitrary “standards” (which are measured by standardized tests) comes into play.
5/15
5/15
Rather than recognizing the strengths that children bring with them, especially those that are hard-won by children struggling with adversity who nonetheless display creativity & ingenuity,
6/15
6/15
...we dismiss these strengths if they do not coincide with a limited, culturally specific list of what is prized. This is NOT to say that I don’t value many of the things on that approved list. I will fight you over the merits of the Oxford comma, for example.
7/15
7/15
But I sincerely believe that things work best when you meet people, including children, where they are, offer them lots of ways to demonstrate their knowledge and mastery, and build from there.
8/15
8/15
Focusing on so-called Covid loss ( @NYCMayor & @DOEChancellor) means overlooking what these children weren’t getting in the first place: recognition of their innate talents and potential (among other things).
9/15
9/15
Journalists, pundits, teachers, administrators and parents need to question the “falling behind,” deficit mindset. Re-focusing on what kids *are* learning now (how to pivot, troubleshoot, improvise, self-advocate, etc) could help make lemonade from lemons,
10/15
10/15
... and that could be expanded upon were we to conceptualize remote learning in the more innovative and creative ways that educators & families, particularly those of color, have been begging for.
11/15
11/15
Finally, I can’t help thinking of all the folks who lived through the Holocaust & other wars & genocides. Those people lost a lot, but I am pretty sure that missing a year of HS trig or elementary school social studies was the least of it.
12/15
12/15
Despite gaps in their schooling many of those people did go on to later, and significant, intellectual accomplishment. 13/15
I am in no way suggesting that there aren’t real losses for our children this school year, and that those may be particularly pronounced for students with special needs, children living in unstable households, etc.
14/15
14/15
But the constant harping on ACADEMIC loss, narrowly construed, is overblown and reflective of a sadly limited view of what education can or should be, & this mindset predates the pandemic and harms far too many children. And that pisses me off, in case you couldn’t tell.
15/15
15/15
