As the world contemplates a new year with the promise of a COVID-19 vaccine and a return to normalcy, we must ensure we don’t simply revert to pre-COVID-19 ways of operating.
Brookings reviews six trends and strategies that, if continued, should help us leapfrog toward a more equitable and relevant learning ecosystem for all young people in 2021 and beyond.
- Improved student agency.
- The game changing role of parents in education.
- New education allies.
- The potential of education technology.
- School emergency preparedness.
- Public support for schools and teachers.
Emiliana Vegas and Rebecca Winthrop, Brookings Institute
2020: A year of turmoil but also hope in education
In this memorial, Education Week remembers some of the dedicated educators lost to their communities and to the field due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While some of them had retired prior to becoming sick, they are still vividly remembered for their deep impact on students’ lives.
Education Week
Educators Lost to the Coronavirus
This is a portrait of two graduating seniors, Luis and Faith, as they planned their futures in the midst of a pandemic. The documentary follows the students from virtual classes through a drive-by graduation to masked arrival at college. It is told largely through their personal video diaries recorded over the course of six months.
Elizabeth Rich & Brooke Saias, Education Week
A Year Interrupted (video)
As the pandemic disrupted life across the entire globe, teachers scrambled to transform their physical classrooms into virtual—or even hybrid—ones, and researchers slowly began to collect insights into what works, and what doesn’t, in online learning environments around the world.
Meanwhile, neuroscientists made a convincing case for keeping handwriting in schools, and after the closure of several coal-fired power plants in Chicago, researchers reported a drop in pediatric emergency room visits and fewer absences in schools, reminding us that questions of educational equity do not begin and end at the schoolhouse door.
Youki Terada and Stephen Merrill, Edutopia
The 10 Most Significant Education Studies of 2020
Assembled by their editorial staff, RAND lists 10 research projects that resonated most with rand.org readers in 2020.
Related to children and/or education:
- #10 Measuring Income Inequality in the United States
- #9 How COVID-19 Is Affecting America’s Schools
- #8 New Findings on Gun Policy in America
- #1 The Public Health and Economic Effects of Reopening
RAND
The Most Popular RAND Research of 2020
The most-read posts this year—from helping schools and nonprofits navigate shutdowns to keeping kids connected from home.
The Wallace Foundation
A Pandemic Time Capsule in 10 Blog Posts
In this 50-minute documentary, 25 reporters and photographers at the Cincinnati Enquirer delved into the private worlds of more than two dozen local people, talking to them repeatedly throughout the months that seemed, almost inexplicably, filled with daily boredom and rampant disruption.
Cincinnati Enquirer
2020: The Year That Revealed Us (video)
Below are the article tags that dominated this past year on the communicator.
arts assessment career-tech civics college-career community coronavirus curriculum early-learning EdChoice equity finance-funding food-nutrition health/wellness leadership legal legislation levy literacy Ohio Report Card re-opening schools remote learning school safety social-emotional social-justice SpecialEd sports STEM-STEAM student-voice tech transportation