L.A. Unified experiments with new tutoring program during pandemic

In Boston, four organizations that serve Black and Latino families formed an alliance to provide low-cost learning pods to students of color. Run out of two churches, the full-day learning pods “serve nearly two dozen kindergarten through sixth-grade students.” The service comes at a crucial time, since pandemic learning is leaving behind students of color who already were at a disadvantage.

A collaboration between Ohio's Wooster City Schools and the College of Wooster has allowed for an enhanced educational experience for many students during the coronavirus pandemic. The partnership not only provides tutoring services to the K-12 students but has also "strengthened the bond between the college and its surrounding community."

In New York City, “regional enrichment centers,” or schools for the children of essential workers, popped up. The centers provided a place where workers, who couldn’t take care of their kids when schools shut down during the pandemic, could send their children to. Nurses, administrators, and officials quickly created a network of these centers. “It was people who were willing to put themselves at risk in order to serve the city. They were just, like, ‘People need us, so we’re here.’” Fourteen thousand families registered to send their children to one of the 93 centers.

Although the pandemic brought many difficulties to school across the globe, some institutions saw it as the time to innovate and rethink learning delivery. Cambridge High School Extension Program, "an alternative school for academically struggling students," decided to start school later in the day, schedule one-on-on sessions for students with their teachers, and distributed computers and Wi-Fi hotspots. The result has been nearly a 50% decrease in the number of chronically absent students, and an increase from 20 to 60% of students achieving honor roll.

Educators at the Lighthouse for Children Child Development Center piloted a 45-minute, weekly, math zoom session for toddlers. Parents attend the zoom lesson, and they are taught by educators. The program can offer some lessons in how to teach toddlers math virtually.

Across the state of New Hampshire, school districts found themselves adjusting to the meet the particular needs of special needs students. Outside tents, remote games, and equipping paraprofessionals with Chromebooks, where just some of the things different school districts implemented.

Teachers in some California dual-language classrooms are coming up with creative ways to help students practice and learn languages during remote-only learning. Across Fresno Unified School District, teachers develop and share lessons, record videos, and have students use educational programs like Flipgrid or Seesaw so students can record themselves speaking Spanish. During some Zoom breakout groups, teachers select a fluent language speaker in the group to model pronunciation for others.

In Denver, learning pods are helping students access virtual classes during a pandemic. At the Adams 12 school district, 4000 students, district-wide, participate in the pod. Similarly, HOPE Online Learning Academy Co-Op launched a learning center. Students can sit in a classroom, access Wi-Fi, and count on the support of an adult. They also distributed 600 computers, 400 webcams from PCs, and 1,077 laptops to enrolled middle and high school students.

Apps that track students’ online activity, door-to-door visits, and receiving input from families on how to reopen schools, are all ways school districts across the country are responding to absenteeism during the pandemic. In one San Antonio district, they were able to locate around 2,900 of the 3,000 students who weren’t showing up to classes.

Two teens from Los Angeles created a tutoring program to help supplement education during the pandemic, called the “Covid NineTeen Project.” The project is entirely teen run, from the creators to the mentors. More than 250 tutors provide service to more than 800 elementary schools across 11 countries. “If we were able to achieve this as teenagers in our community, this is something that you can set up on the local level in your community, as well."