Monday, July 13th, 2020
Montegomery County has shared their roadmap to reopening schools with parents directly and I have also received it via the Parent-Teacher-Association (PTA) of BCC encouraging people to not only read but also provide comments. The plan has students going back by grades, with seniors not scheduled to have in presence teaching until after Thanksgiving (as all other grades go back before in four week intervals) and then only two days a week for one half of the grade and two more for the other half, with Wednesdays virtual for all students. For elementary and middle schools this phasing may work. For high school it seems positively insane. For equity reasons no virtual assignments receive letter grades but “pass” and “fail” only. If there is a COVID case in a school it can be expected to close for two weeks minimum and the entire phasing might restart, which may potentially mean seniors will not get to go back to school at all and as a result may not receive letter grades. This could well lead to a situation where students from some schools applied to universities with grades while other have no grades to show, putting them at a disadvantage.
Also, if the last four months of the past school year are anything to go by, it means senior students will not receive any instruction whatsoever but will be expected to self-study using study guides teachers send out on Monday and which need to be turned in completed on Friday. If students are lucky teachers may send YouTube videos for them to watch in lieu of teaching. They can reach teachers by email (if they opt to respond, which some teachers do not) or ask questions during “office hours” when students can call into a Zoom meeting with teachers. To give you a sense of the issues I am including my questions to the Board of Education of Montgomery County generally and BCC specifically, the latter mostly on the IB diploma program.
For BOE generally:
Why are seniors the last ones to return when this is their final year and grades from the school year 2020/2021 will determine their entire academic future?
How will seniors receive grades during virtual/ remote teaching?
Will Seniors receive letter grades for the entire first semester if they do not go back until Thanksgiving or will they receive “pass”/ “fail” grading only? If the latter, how will grading be effected in the event of further school closures (which may well happen before seniors even return to school)?
In the event of repeated school closures, how will you ensure Senior do not up learning remotely for the entire course of the school year?
How will MoCo students generally and BCC students specifically be able to compete with school leaver’s of other counties or States across the USA where schools may either be able to reopen more fully or who choose a different approach; for instance starting with seniors, for college places if they do not have letter grades?
If virtual learning is to continue, will it change from fully self-taught by students to actual instruction through teachers?
How will this instruction be conducted? Will there be live streaming and recording of classes? And how can children ask questions (chat function?) and participate? How do you ensure all teachers understand how the technology works and actually use it?
How do you ensure teachers are responsive to student questions and respond to for example e-mails promptly?
What redress/ recourse mechanisms will parents have if things do not work (e.g. a teacher does not respond to email within a certain time frame, does not understand how to use the technology, does not actually teach online, but rather shares YouTube videos (and not even self recorded ones but general explanatory) for students to watch? All of this is what the juniors experienced during the lat four months of the 2019/2020 schoolyear, so this is a not trivial question.
How will you ensure an appropriate mix of teaching materials (generic videos, books, actual instruction, etc.)?
Do you not believe 9th and 10th graders have a better chance of catching up on any missing content over the next three to four years?
For BCC specifically:
Given the IB DP is a two year program taught and tested to international standards where students are rated alongside students from all over the world, what measures is BCC going to take that BCC students are at par with students in for instance Germany, where students will return without limitations and restrictions to school in the fall?
How will BCC ensure that students will be successful in their HL (towards which students are taught over two years) and SL (the content for all of this being taught during the 2020/2021 SY, with SL classes completely new) subject exams? IS the IB program consider a special program where IB students can return to school for in person classes? If so, how will this impact the number of available subjects?
COVID is having an effect on my neighbors. Over the past four years other than myself only the family one house over ever spend time in their garden. In recent days neighbors have increasingly been socially distancing outside. Tonight, my immediate neighbor seems to have friends over with chairs in set out in the garden. It appears people are rediscovering outside spaces to socialize. While it is kind of weird to be part of everyone’s conversation (currently about hair cuts after they dealt with the topic of postponed weddings and cars), it does make the Hood so much more lively. I will just need to learn to take it as “background humming” rather than listen to the conversations.
Our Braai yesterday had two shower interruptions, which did not stop us from having an enjoyable, albeit tipsy, evening. Testimony to tipsy is the fact that I completely forgot about desert.
The Virus continues its spread with worldwide reported cases today at 12.9 million of which the US has 3.9 million with a death toll of over 137k and it does not look like it will get better anytime soon given the USA continues to be the most incompetent country when it comes to testing and managing the pandemic. Likewise, people seem equally dumb, there is no other expression for the refusal to wear masks and the ongoing protests of people wanting their freedom. It is just frustrating to see. Maryland’s governor and individual municipalities, like Annapolis, have made masks mandatory in public space when social distancing is not an option. From what I see it is largely respected here and a rather mild “mandate” as it is only required inside in public spaces and outside if social distancing is not possible.
While infections keep increasing the administration is trying to force schools to reopen by threatening to withhold federal funds for schools. Or rather take money meant to support poor public schools and provide it to rich private schools, completely in line with everything this administration has done over the past four year to support its friends in wealthy circles. I am wondering if the US people will ever know the extent of cleptocracy.
At the same time Millionaires around the globe are offering to pay more in taxes to cover Corona damages and are calling for governments to take action, pretty much the opposite of what the USA administration is doing. Let’s hope governments in Europe will at least implement what millionaires offer.
This is an offer too good to pass on.