Livro - Restarting and Reinventing School

Restarting and Reinventing School
Learning in the Time of COVID and Beyond

Linda Darling-Hammond, Abby Schachner, and Adam K. Edgerton
in collaboration with Aneesha Badrinarayan, Jessica Cardichon,
Peter W. Cookson Jr., Michael Griffith, Sarah Klevan, Anna Maier,
Monica Martinez, Hanna Melnick, Natalie Truong, and Steve Wojcikiewicz
AUGUST 2020
Restarting and
Reinventing School:
Learning in the Time of
COVID and Beyond
Linda Darling-Hammond, Abby Schachner, and Adam K. Edgerton
in collaboration with Aneesha Badrinarayan, Jessica Cardichon,

Peter W. Cookson Jr., Michael Griffith, Sarah Klevan, Anna Maier,
Monica Martinez, Hanna Melnick, Natalie Truong, and Steve Wojcikiewicz
Acknowledgments
The authors thank our Learning Policy Institute colleagues Roberta Furger, Janel George, Tara
Kini, Melanie Leung, and Patrick Shields for their support, contributions, and thought partnership.
In addition, we thank Erin Chase and Aaron Reeves for their editing and design contributions to
this project and the entire LPI communications team for its invaluable support in developing and
disseminating this report. Without their generosity of time and spirit, this work would not have
been possible.
This research was supported by the S. D. Bechtel Jr. Foundation, the Stuart Foundation, and the W.
Clement and Jessie V. Stone Foundation. Core operating support for the Learning Policy Institute is
provided by the Heising-Simons Foundation, Raikes Foundation, Sandler Foundation, and William
and Flora Hewlett Foundation. We are grateful to them for their generous support. The ideas voiced
here are those of the authors and not those of our funders.
External Reviewers
This report benefited from the insights and expertise of the following external reviewers: David
Garcia, Associate Professor with Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College and Director of the Arizona
Education Policy Initiative (AEPI) at Arizona State University; Mark Greenberg, Edna Peterson
Bennett Endowed Chair in Prevention Research at Penn State University’s College of Health and
Human Development and Board Member Emeritus of the Collaborative for Academic, Social,
and Emotional Learning (CASEL); Michael Magee, Chief Executive Officer of Chiefs for Change;
and Lorrie Shepard, Distinguished Professor and Dean Emerita in the School of Education at the
University of Colorado Boulder. We thank them for the care and attention they gave the report.
The appropriate citation for this report is: Darling-Hammond, L., Schachner, A., & Edgerton, A. K.
(with Badrinarayan, A., Cardichon, J., Cookson, P. W., Jr., Griffith, M., Klevan, S., Maier, A.,
Martinez, M., Melnick, H., Truong, N., Wojcikiewicz, S.). (2020). Restarting and reinventing school:
Learning in the time of COVID and beyond. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
This report can be found online at

http://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/restarting-reinventing-school-covid.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International
License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.
Report originally published August 25, 2020 | Document last revised September 14, 2020
Revisions are noted here: http://learningpolicyinstitute.org/rrsltcb-update
ii LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Table of Contents
Executive Summary.................................................................................................................................. v
Introduction................................................................................................................................................1
Priority 1: Close the Digital Divide..........................................................................................................5
Priority 2: Strengthen Distance and Blended Learning.................................................................... 10
Priority 3: Assess What Students Need.............................................................................................. 21
Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning...................................................... 33
Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships.................................................................. 46
Priority 6: Emphasize Authentic, Culturally Responsive Learning................................................... 59
Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time...................................................................................... 70
Priority 8: Establish Community Schools and Wraparound Supports............................................ 80
Priority 9: Prepare Educators for Reinventing Schools .................................................................... 88
Priority 10: Leverage More Adequate and Equitable School Funding............................................ 98
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................108
About the Authors................................................................................................................................109
List of Figures and Tables

Figure 1 A Framework for Restarting and Reinventing School.....................................................3
Figure 1.1 Percentage of Students Without High-Speed Internet by Race and Ethnicity...............5
Figure 2.1 Wyoming’s Framework for Digital Learning................................................................. 16
Figure 2.2 Additional Terms for “Attendance” During Distance Learning.................................... 19
Figure 3.1 Sample Questions for Stakeholder Engagement........................................................ 23
Figure 4.1 Strategies for Explicitly Addressing Social and Emotional Learning at
Every Grade Level....................................................................................................... 36
Figure 4.2 Ways That Social and Emotional Learning Can Be Integrated Throughout
the School Day............................................................................................................ 38
Figure 5.1 Coordination Between Schools and Extended Learning Programs Is
Critical to Limiting the Spread of COVID-19................................................................ 51
Table 7.1 Examples of Federal Funding Streams Through ESSA That Can Support
Summer Programs...................................................................................................... 77
Figure 9.1 Example A/B Schedule............................................................................................... 93
Figure 9.2 North Carolina Achievement Trends (NAEP 8th-Grade Mathematics Scores)........... 95
Figure 10.1 Public School Elementary and Secondary Teachers.................................................. 99
Figure 10.2 Relationship Between State Productivity Growth and Increase in College
Attainment From 1979 to 2012...............................................................................100
Figure 10.3 Education Week Equity Scores.................................................................................106
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iv LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School
Executive Summary
Across the United States, state education agencies and school districts face daunting challenges and
difficult decisions for restarting schools as the COVID-19 pandemic continues. As state and district
leaders prepare for what schooling will look like in 2020 and beyond, there is an opportunity to
identify evidence-based policies and practices that will enable them to seize this moment to rethink
school in ways that can transform learning opportunities for students and teachers alike.
Our current system took shape almost exactly a century ago, when school designs and funding were
established to implement mass education on an assembly-line model organized to prepare students
for their “places in life”—judgments that were enacted within contexts of deep-seated racial, ethnic,
economic, and cultural prejudices. In a historical moment when we have more knowledge about
human development and learning, when society and the economy demand a more challenging set
of skills, and when—at least in our rhetoric—there is a greater social commitment to equitable
education, it is time to use the huge disruptions caused by this pandemic to reinvent our systems
of education. The question is: How we can harness these understandings as we necessarily redesign
school? How can we transform what has not been working for children and for our society into a
more equitable and empowering future?
This report provides an overarching framework that focuses on how policymakers as well as
educators can support equitable, effective teaching and learning regardless of the medium
through which that takes place. This framework provides research, state and local examples, and
policy recommendations in 10 key areas that speak both to transforming learning and to closing
opportunity and achievement gaps. It illustrates how policymakers and educators can:
1. Close the digital divide

2. Strengthen distance and blended learning
3. Assess what students need
4. Ensure supports for social and emotional learning
5. Redesign schools for stronger relationships
6. Emphasize authentic, culturally responsive learning
7. Provide expanded learning time
8. Establish community schools and wraparound supports
9. Prepare educators for reinventing school
10. Leverage more adequate and equitable school funding
Each of these 10 policy priorities will help schools reinvent themselves around principles of equity,
authentic learning, and stronger relationships, and they require shifts from policymakers and
educators alike.
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Priority 1: Close the Digital Divide
The digital divide parallels the educational divide, and unless it is closed now, it will result in an
ever-widening learning gap. Universal broadband and device access is the absolute minimum for
ensuring that every child can continue learning throughout the 2020–21 school year, and the
costs of closing the divide are small relative to the overall investments being made to address the
pandemic. To accomplish this, policymakers and educators can:
1. Prioritize federal efforts to close the digital divide. To stem learning loss, every student,
no matter her or his living situation, needs access to an adequate computing device and
internet connectivity. Given the major economic downturn and state revenue declines
accompanying pandemic-related shutdowns, federal recovery funds to education are
needed to supplement state budgets for this purpose. Less than half of 1% of what the
federal government has already spent on the recovery is needed to close the digital divide
for schoolchildren.
2. Expand broadband access through state and city initiatives. States and cities can follow
the lead of pioneers that have significantly expanded broadband access through progressive
regulation and leveraging of public and private funding streams.
3. Organize access to devices and connectivity. Once every home has the potential for
internet access, many students will still need Wi-Fi and a device adequate to support
schoolwork in order to participate in distance and hybrid learning. States and districts need
to survey device needs and work proactively with service providers and families to buy
devices and hot spots in bulk and help them become usable in many different contexts.
Priority 2: Strengthen Distance and Blended Learning

Once all students have access to high-speed internet and devices, the challenge of implementing
high-quality distance learning and blended learning models remains. Plans for continuity of
learning are essential to enable teaching to occur without disruption. To strengthen distance and
blended learning, policymakers and educators can:
1. Share pioneering efforts among districts. While this new era may feel like uncharted
educational waters, educators can be guided in part by successful pioneers and by principles
rooted in equity and authentic learning. Strategies can be informed by pioneering districts
such as Miami-Dade in Florida, and Lindsay Unified in California.
2. Support high-quality distance and blended learning models with educator training
and materials. To be effective, online learning should follow research-based principles to
be as interactive and authentic as possible, combining live interaction among students and
teachers with interactive multimedia materials that support well-designed assignments and
projects that students may complete at home.
3. Give special consideration to early childhood learning. As the National P-3 Center and
Edutopia have outlined, early childhood is a unique developmental period that requires a
customized approach, including modeling and teaching strategies to caregivers at home,
using accessible materials to promote equity.
4. Develop standards for digital learning that articulate how technology should be used
to empower learners. Productive policies for using technology involve using interactive
technologies in concert with teachers and peers to enable learners to explore and create
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rather than to experience “drill and kill.” States can encourage these more effective uses
of technology by creating standards and guidance and offering strong models for others to
learn from.
5. Enact distance learning with attention to equity. Strategies such as creating “learning
hubs” that transform community spaces for student support are needed to ensure that
students with the highest needs, including youth experiencing homelessness, those
without internet, and those with working parents who cannot afford child care, can engage
productively in distance and blended learning.
6. Shift from measuring seat time to engagement. The role of attendance in a hybrid,
student-centered learning system shifts from time spent in class to engagement,
participation, and student outcomes. Many states need to rewrite attendance laws and
regulations so that they can track student engagement through competency-based tasks.
These principles and practices can help districts and schools successfully implement strong and
more equitable models of learning that will serve students in the current crisis and in the future.
Priority 3: Assess What Students Need

Schools need to take stock of all of their students’ experiences and needs as they build safe and
welcoming communities, both in person and virtually, when school begins. To support the use of
effective assessment processes moving forward, policymakers and educators can:
1. Ensure that schools have the time and tools to take stock of children’s overall needs.
School leaders can use surveys and other tools to learn what students and staff have
been experiencing and ensure social and emotional supports. They can also identify and
leverage community partners and resources to support all students across in- and out-of-
school settings.
2. Prioritize assessments that illuminate student growth and learning. State and local
leaders can emphasize authentic diagnostic and formative assessment approaches rather
than decontextualized summative assessments; provide access to diagnostic assessment
tools; support locally relevant assessments connected to curriculum and instructional
resources; and avoid overtesting by making use of expertise, tools, and assessment data that
are already available.
3. Support acceleration of learning, not remediation. While many districts and educators
may feel pressure to address learning loss by holding students back or tracking them for
remedial instruction, research shows that grade retention and “down tracking” actually
undermine achievement. Formative assessment that includes actionable feedback
immediately applied through practice and revision of work can more rapidly improve
learning, especially when used with tailored acceleration strategies. This personalized
instruction is best informed by the use of high-quality performance tasks such as those
from the Balanced Assessment of Mathematics or the Developmental Reading Assessment
that provide rich information, not just scores.
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4. Invest in teachers’ knowledge and skills for formative assessment. Policymakers
and school leaders can support ongoing and embedded teacher professional learning
for formative assessment, including through micro-credentialing, and build capacity
for meaningful use of existing assessment information that is already part of a
teacher’s repertoire.
5. Move toward more coherent systems of assessment of, for, and as learning. Formative
and summative assessments should represent ambitious learning goals and be coherently
linked through a well-articulated model of learning that incorporates learning progressions,
along with intermediate stages and instructional means for reaching those goals. States
and districts can use this moment to consider how to create more thoughtful systems of
assessment that accomplish these goals, as New Hampshire has done and a growing number
of other states are doing, using federal waivers that may set the stage for new approaches
when the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) is reauthorized.
While it is important to assess what students learned at home over the past several months, it is
equally if not more important to shift away from deficit-oriented strategies and decontextualized
modes of assessment toward authentic, formative assessments that are part of a coherent strategy
to improve student learning.
Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning

Integrating social and emotional learning (SEL) into the life of a school is essential to mitigate the
pandemic’s impact on lifelong success and learning. To ensure supports for SEL, policymakers and
educators can:
1. Implement a comprehensive system of support. Effective school environments take a

systematic approach to promoting children’s social, emotional, and academic well-being,
including counseling and additional behavioral, mental health, and trauma supports.
2. Ensure opportunities for explicit teaching of social and emotional skills at every
grade level. These include locating a place in the curriculum and school day in which
students and educators can develop and practice key skills and competencies, such as
morning meetings and advisories; developing or adopting an evidence-based SEL program;
and using strategies for managing stress, such as mindfulness and other techniques that
calm and center thinking and emotions.
3. Infuse SEL into instruction in all classes. Students need opportunities to develop social
and emotional skills throughout their school day. Schools can leverage readily available
curricular resources, such as Facing History and Ourselves, EL Education, and Transforming
Education, that include embedded SEL. They can also provide guidance and training to help
educators integrate SEL skills, including executive function, collaboration, and productive
mindsets, into daily work.
4. Institute restorative practices. SEL programs cannot enable meaningful long-term growth
for students in environments that are otherwise authoritarian, punitive, and exclusionary
rather than educative and inclusive. Instilling more educative and inclusive environments
can be accomplished by ending zero-tolerance policies and exclusionary discipline and
adopting equity-oriented restorative practices in their place.
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5. Enact policies that enable SEL and restorative practices. States and districts can help
schools to implement these practices by adopting clear standards and guidance for SEL,
trauma-informed practices, and restorative practices as well as providing funding and
supports for curriculum resources and ongoing professional development.
Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships

Research shows that school designs that support caring and continuity in student–teacher
relationships are more able to address trauma and strengthen achievement than traditional factory
model schools. In addition, the latest international and U.S. guidance makes clear that safely
reopening school buildings and resuming in-person learning requires having fewer students and
staff interact face-to-face. Relationship-centered cohort designs will be key. To redesign schools for
strong relationships, educators and policymakers can:
1. Create structures that foster health and safety, as well as personalization and
trust, among children and staff. Policymakers and school leaders can help schools put
these structures into place by offering models of new designs and removing regulatory
impediments. This can be accomplished by maximizing relationships through looping,
advisories, and small mentored groups and by restructuring schools to create small cohorts
or houses that stay together.
2. Strengthen partnerships with families. Out of necessity during school closures, many
schools and districts have found new strategies and routines for connecting with families
that should not be lost with reopening but rather should become part of the core approach
to education. Virtual home visits are one of the many strategies that schools can use to
build relational trust and make families feel welcome.
3. Cultivate supportive environments filled with emotional safety and belonging. To
provide the emotional supports students need to learn, schools and educators can dedicate
time at the start of the year for intentional community building while designing learning
experiences and cohorts that promote inclusion and reduce segregation, allowing children
to interact and learn in heterogeneous groups and classes.
4. Enact policies that support relationship-centered designs. These include removing
impediments to and providing supports for relationship-centered school designs. These
designs can be paired with policies that provide time and funding for collaboration and
capacity building among staff and for staff outreach to students and families, including
home visits and regular check-ins.
These strategies can help foster strong relationships even in virtual environments and in ways that
can promote the health and success of the entire school community for generations to come.
Priority 6: Emphasize Authentic, Culturally Responsive Learning

Schools that have successfully motivated students to engage in learning even when schooling has
been disrupted have connected lessons to real-world applications, allowing students to explore the
world around them and to demonstrate what they know through projects and presentations that
display the products of their work. To support this kind of learning, policymakers and educators can:
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1. Offer guidance for how schools can restart by focusing on authentic learning and
assessment strategies. States and districts can support curriculum that emphasizes
opportunities for students to meet standards through student-driven projects.
2. Provide curriculum tools and professional learning for educators to support more
authentic learning and assessment. States and districts can offer schools and educators
opportunities to engage in professional learning; to join networks of schools that have
created productive approaches to learning; and to access standards-based curricula they
can draw upon and adapt to develop authentic learning experiences for students—such as
project-based learning and performance-based assessments, including capstone projects.
3. Ensure that authentic learning is also culturally connected and culturally sustaining.
Schools and districts can support educators in developing and using culturally responsive
curriculum and pedagogies as a means for engaging and deepening student learning by
recognizing their students’ experiences as a foundation on which to build knowledge.
4. Build capacity for inclusive, identity-safe, culturally responsive practice. State and
local leaders can help build the capacity of school staff by providing resources, time, and
space for professional learning that include identity-safe schools and classrooms, strategies
to address stereotype threat and implicit bias, and proactive approaches to anti-racist
practice and culturally responsive pedagogies.
5. Redesign assessments to emphasize applied learning and complex problem-solving.
A growing number of states, schools, and districts are working together in collaboratives
from New York and Massachusetts to California and Hawaii to create equitable and
high-quality performance assessment systems that support authentic learning and focus
schoolwork on higher-order skills. This is the time for these efforts to redefine curriculum,
instruction, assessment, and accountability as focused on the ability to apply meaningful
learning in deep and transferable ways.
Given the shifts in schooling that will continue to occur, this is the time to reinvent educational
practices so that teaching is guided by the science of learning and supported through high-quality
opportunities for authentic learning and assessment that can support meaningful, relevant, and
complex learning experiences in the classroom and virtually.
Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time

A critical approach to restarting and reinventing school is to provide expanded learning time (ELT)
and opportunities for all students, with special attention paid to students with special education
needs, students who are English learners, and students who have been disconnected during the
pandemic. ELT is not just an add-on program, field trip, or enrichment opportunity; it complements
the learning that takes place during the typical school day. To better structure and expand ELT,
policymakers and educators can:
1. Infuse high-quality tutoring within and beyond the school day. There is a well-
established literature on the positive effects of tutoring, which can produce large gains that
can be achieved cost-effectively both in-person and virtually.
2. Expand high-quality after-school programs. Research shows that after-school
extensions of learning time, when used well, can accelerate learning and reduce the
opportunity gap. After-school learning opportunities are made more meaningful when they
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align with the school’s academic learning goals and incorporate meaningful activities that
engage deeper learning pedagogies with content that is connected to students’ cultural
backgrounds and lives outside of school.
3. Create high-quality summer programs. States and districts should plan to provide ELT
for students in summer 2021 and in future summers, when learning loss typically occurs.
Well-designed summer programs have a purposeful curriculum, have stable staff, and
are culturally relevant and engaging enough to stimulate consistent attendance; these
programs are most effective when students experience them for multiple summers.
4. Expand the reach and duration of early learning programs. The gap in learning time
between students from lower-income and upper-income families begins in early childhood
and continues into k–12; therefore, one critical way to expand learning time for children
is to ensure high-quality early learning. While some part-day programs have shown strong
results, most of the highly effective programs are full-day.
5. Enact policies and access funding to support expanded learning time. States can use
a variety of federal programs to support districts and schools to add instructional days to
the calendar and extend the length of the school day to provide meaningful increases in
learning time for students, including multiple funding streams under the Every Student
Succeeds Act (ESSA), CARES Act funds, and state-level funding.
By integrating ELT with existing school programs and making it culturally relevant for students and
families, schools and districts can help counteract the negative impacts of the pandemic.
Priority 8: Establish Community Schools and Wraparound Supports

Community schools offer a path forward to coordinate services for supporting children and families
during this stressful time and have demonstrated their capacity to meet students’ needs during the
pandemic. To establish and expand community schools and wraparound supports, policymakers and
educators can:
1. Enact local policies that support well-designed community schools. These policies
should be grounded in four evidence-based pillars: integrated student supports, expanded
and enriched learning time, active family and community engagement, and collaborative
leadership practices.
2. Enlist regional agencies that can provide technical assistance and help coordinate
local services. Technical assistance in this context includes the various supports needed to
launch and sustain community school initiatives at scale, such as coordination of state and
county services from multiple agencies, professional development and coaching for district
and school staff, support for strategic planning, and partnership development that brings
resources to schools (e.g., direct staffing, service provision, and funding).
3. Create reliable funding streams to support community school needs. State and local
leaders can blend and braid federal, state, and local funding streams to provide integrated
health, mental health, and social services alongside high-quality, supportive instruction in
community schools.
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4. Create Children’s Cabinets at the federal, state, and county levels to coordinate,
integrate, and streamline services across agencies. Leaders at multiple levels can help
enable more effective and efficiently provided resources for services to children and youth
by creating a Children’s Cabinet or other vehicle to coordinate services at the top of the
system so that they flow smoothly and seamlessly to districts and schools.
Priority 9: Prepare Educators for Reinventing School

Everything described here requires knowledgeable, skilled, dedicated educators; there is no other
way to get the kind of teaching we need. While the immediate needs of communities will create
major pressures on budgets, it is important for policymakers to recognize how critically important it
is to recruit, develop, and retain a strong educator workforce so that other aspirations for education
for our children can be realized. The incentives needed to accomplish this reside at the federal,
state, and local levels. To ensure that educators are prepared for the daunting work they undertake,
policymakers and educators can:
1. Invest in high-quality educator preparation, especially for high-need communities

where shortages continue to be problematic. High-quality programs begin with strong,
research-aligned standards for teaching, which policymakers can update and strengthen to
reflect the needs of today’s students. Policymakers can support high-retention strategies
and pathways, including service scholarships and loan forgiveness programs, teacher and
leader residencies, and Grow-Your-Own programs.
2. Transform educator learning opportunities to match current needs. Expectations of
educators are higher than they have ever been. Educator preparation programs need more
effective ways of developing and sharing expertise across the profession, such as through
the Educator Preparation Laboratory, collaboration to spread best practices for teacher and
leader preparation across the profession, and strategies like micro-credentialing, which
may become increasingly important in identifying teaching experts in distance and blended
learning, as well as other intensely needed skills.
3. Support mentoring and new teacher roles. Policymakers and school leaders can consider
new teaching roles and arrangements that support novice teachers and address the health
concerns of veteran teachers. This may include veteran teachers serving as virtual mentors
for colleagues and new teachers; leveraging student teachers and paraprofessionals as
members of teaching teams; and utilizing technology to increase professional expertise
sharing, such as by streaming lessons offered by expert teachers and providing job-
embedded learning.
4. Create collaboration time. As many states and districts are thinking very differently about
their use of time and are developing innovative teaching and learning schedules, a part of
the new normal should include efforts to secure more collaboration time for teachers and
opportunities for them to work in teams.
5. Take the long view. Policymakers can also use this time to plan ahead to ensure that, as
resources come back into the system, they are spent to leverage greater teaching expertise.
States (and countries) that have made substantial gains and closed achievement gaps have
made systemic investments in educator quality. Preparation to make such investments can
begin now, informed by the changing needs of today’s students and schools.
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Priority 10: Leverage More Adequate and Equitable School Funding
Even before COVID-19, most state education finance systems were not working for students from
low-income families, students of color, and those with a range of needs. Without a determined
effort to produce a different outcome, funding cuts made to education now could be as long-lasting
as they were after the Great Recession. To leverage more equitable funding, policymakers and
educators can:
1. Leverage federal funds for equity. States and districts have an opportunity to use the
funds provided through the CARES Act and any subsequent federal aid by making strategic
investments that build local capacity to support all students—and especially the most
marginalized—throughout the school year and in times of crisis.
2. Adopt more equitable state school funding formulas. States can seize the moment of
the economic downturn to transform their funding systems to create new funding formulas
that are designed to distribute funds more equitably as resources return to the system, as
California and Rhode Island did during the Great Recession.
3. Include preschool in funding formulas. Policymakers can add preschool programs to
school funding formulas. Even in the midst of recessions, state policymakers have added
preschool through strategies such as the 10-year phase-in period used in West Virginia.
Policymakers have the opportunity during economic downturns to redesign both federal aid and
state and local funding systems to lead to increased educational equity over time.
Conclusion
As states, districts, and schools prepare to restart and reinvent in response to the
COVID-19 pandemic, it is imperative that we transform our ideas of school to match the demands
of this historic moment. It is clear that returning to business as usual in education is not possible
and that we must think of “school” in deeply different ways. Irrespective of the approach taken
to instruction or the medium through which it takes place—online, in person, or a hybrid—
policymakers and educators can take steps to ensure that all children, regardless of income and
internet access, can participate in supportive and meaningful learning experiences. To accomplish
this, our education system needs to transform our ideas of school to match the demands of this
moment. Reinventing school means focusing on authentic learning and equity and harnessing
the knowledge of human development, learning, and effective teaching accumulated over the last
century and needed for the next.
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Introduction
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread throughout the United States, every school district
faces a series of difficult decisions about what is best for children, families, and the community.
It is now clear that picking up where we left off and returning to business as usual in education is
not possible. But since its inception, our education system has been deeply unequal and erratic in
delivering on the promise of a quality education for all of America’s children. This pandemic puts a
stark light on an emerging truth—education as we know it is over, and we must think of “school” in
deeply different ways.
As the crisis began, millions of children lacked fundamental internet and device access to make
remote learning possible, creating even greater equity gaps than before. But some states and
districts have risen to the challenge of providing ongoing learning and supports to students and
their families. Many of their creative responses hold promise for new and enduring ways to address
educational quality and inequity. We now have the opportunity to follow the many inspiring
examples educators have set and to shift our very idea of school to match the demands of this
historic moment.
Why We Should Aim for Reinvention

Our current system took shape almost exactly a century ago, when scientific managers were
looking for ways to accommodate the huge influx of students into urban areas from migration
and immigration, coupled with the spread of compulsory education. The primary goal was
preparing students for manual work on farms and in factories, as factory and landowners sought
efficiencies from the rise of assembly-line technologies and new model bureaucracies. Schools
were developed to maximize rule following and rote learning and to minimize relationships.
Only a small number of students were identified for access to the higher-order skills needed
for thinking work. Funding, school assignment, and tracking systems designed to allocate
students to their “places in life” were enacted within contexts of deep-seated racial, ethnic, and
cultural prejudice.
Educators and policymakers have sought to evolve this system over the ensuing decades, with
recurring eras of reform that have made small dents in the systems we have inherited. However, in a
moment when we have more knowledge about human development and learning, when society and
the economy demand a more challenging set of skills, and when—at least in our rhetoric—there is a
greater social commitment to equitable education, it is time to use the huge disruptions caused by
this pandemic to reinvent our systems of education.
We now know a great deal that we did not know 100 years ago. We know much about how people
learn; how to enhance children’s development through productive relationships in supportive
settings; and how to enhance their learning through inquiry-oriented, culturally relevant pedagogy
and curricula, as well as through authentic, formative assessments.
The question is: How can we harness these understandings as we necessarily rethink school?
How can we transform what has not been working for children and adults? As state and district
leaders prepare for what schooling will look like in 2020 and beyond, there is an opportunity
to identify evidence-based policies and practices that will enable them to seize this moment to
LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 1

strengthen learning opportunities for students. Currently, these efforts are highly variable and
inequitably available, but growing coordination across state and district lines can solve some of our
greatest challenges.
While deep inequalities have pervaded every aspect of education since schools were closed in the
spring, remarkable areas of innovation and change have also occurred. We have seen more rapid
progress in 2020 in bridging the digital divide than we have seen in the last 20 years. We have seen
more uptake of technology-driven innovations in teaching, more outreach directly to families, and
more collaboration time for teachers than were thought possible even a few months before the
pandemic shut down in-person learning.
The initial changes were made quickly to meet immediate needs, but a broader question should
guide our efforts throughout this year and beyond. How can we redesign schools to be:
• student-centered in ways that support the whole child’s social, emotional, cognitive, moral,
and identity development;
• focused on deeper learning that meets the demands of today’s society;
• culturally and linguistically connected and sustaining;
• grounded in collaboration among students, staff, families, and communities; and
• equitable in the opportunities provided and outcomes achieved?
The Purpose of This Framework

Policymakers, educators, students, and families face daunting challenges as the 2020–21 school
year begins. As communities continue to suffer from surging outbreaks of COVID-19, districts are
considering a range of differing approaches to online, hybrid, and in-person instruction while they
balance health and safety considerations. The framework presented here does not try to replicate
the guidance that has been issued related to health and safety guidelines for reopening schools
and how to organize school schedules to allow for social distancing, distance learning, and blended
learning (see resources below).
This report builds on this guidance and focuses on how policymakers as well as educators can
support equitable, effective teaching and learning regardless of the medium through which
that takes place. It provides an overarching framework to inform the restart of schools for the
2020–21 school year while also providing a long-term vision that can guide leaders toward new and
enduring ways to address educational quality and inequity (see Figure 1). The framework provides
research, state and local examples, and policy recommendations in 10 key areas that speak to both
transforming learning and closing opportunity and achievement gaps.
2 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Figure 1
A Framework for Restarting
A Framework and Reinventing
for Restarting and School
Reinventing School
2 3
Strengthen Assess what 4
distance and students need
1 blended Ensure supports
Close the learning for social and
digital divide emotional learning
5
6 Redesign schools
Emphasize for stronger
7 authentic, relationships
Provide culturally-responsive
expanded learning
learning time
10
9 Leverage more
8 Prepare adequate and
Establish educators for equitable school
community schools reinventing funding
and wraparound schools
supports
This framework builds on and recognizes other student-centered, equity-oriented frameworks that
have been developed, synthesizing key ideas while organizing them within a broader framework
focused on authentic learning and equity and grounded in research spanning early childhood
through secondary schooling. Woven throughout the framework and included, as relevant, in
the areas of focus identified above is the important role that engagement of children, families,
educators, and communities plays in creating and advancing a vision for quality and equity in our
schools and school systems.

Resources
Health and Safety
• Considerations for Schools (Centers for Disease for Control and Prevention)
• Framework for Reopening Schools (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and
Cultural Organization)
• A Plan to Safely Reopen America’s Schools and Communities: Guidance for Imagining a New
Normal for Public Education, Public Health and Our Economy in the Age of COVID-19 (American
Federation of Teachers)
• Ready Schools, Safe Learners: Guidance for School Year 2020–21 (Oregon Department
of Education)
• Reopening Schools in the Context of COVID-19: Health and Safety Guidelines From Other
Countries (Learning Policy Institute)
Strategies for Reopening
• All Hands on Deck: Initial Guidance Regarding Reopening School Buildings (National
Education Association)
• A Blueprint for Back to School (American Enterprise Institute)
• COVID-19 Resources for Field Leaders (Science of Learning and Development Alliance)
• Guidance on Culturally Responsive-Sustaining School Reopenings: Centering Equity to Humanize
the Process of Coming Back Together (Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the
Transformation of Schools)
• Guidelines for Reopening Schools (American Association for School Administrators)
• Planning for Reentry & Recovery: A Guide for Promoting Equity, Improvement, and Innovation
(FourPoint Education Partners)
• Recommendations for Prioritizing Equity in the Response to COVID-19 (Alliance for
Excellent Education)
• Restart & Recovery: Considerations for Teaching & Learning Overview (Council of Chief State
School Officers)
• Restart & Recovery: Considerations for Teaching & Learning: States Policies and Actions
(Council of Chief State School Officers)
• The Return: How Should Education Leaders Prepare for Reentry and Beyond? (Chiefs for Change
and Johns Hopkins University Institute for Education Policy)
• Reunite, Renew, Thrive: Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Roadmap for Returning to School
(Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning)
• Reopening: Moving Toward More Equitable Schools (EL Education)

Priority 1: Close the Digital Divide
The COVID-19 crisis has made it clear that technology-supported learning will be part of the future
of education and that all children must be provided with access. Schools may reopen only to close
again for periods of time over the coming school year; some may reopen with schedules that blend
distance learning with social distancing on-site; and, even when schools reopen, students will need
to stay home if they have been exposed to the virus, so they may have to plug in to distance learning
at any time. Even once the pandemic passes, natural disasters such as hurricanes, floods, and fires
will continue to shutter schools for periods of time.
What Students Need

Computers and connectivity are to today’s schools what textbooks and chalkboards were to the
schools of the past. Cell phone access is not enough. Every student needs access to high-speed
connectivity and to computers that are adequate to support not only streaming of videos and access
to information, but also the capacity to write and revise text; create spreadsheets and engage in
mathematical modeling; engage in simulations; and develop PowerPoint presentations, websites,
and web tools in various forms.
The pandemic has highlighted disparities in access to digital devices and the internet. School
closures in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis have had a huge impact on families and learning—an
impact felt most deeply in low-income communities and communities of color.
Even before the pandemic, there were stark digital divides along racial and ethnic lines. In 2018, the
National Center for Education Statistics conducted a study of the percentage of Americans between
the ages of 5 and 17 who had access to the internet. The study found wide differences by race and
ethnicity (see Figure 1.1).
Figure 1.1
Percentage of Students Without High-Speed Internet by Race and Ethnicity
Source: NCES. (2018). The digital divide: Differences in home internet access.

According to a new report from Common
Sense and Boston Consulting Group, based Based on data from the 2018 census,
on data from the 2018 census, roughly roughly 30% of the 50 million
30% of the 50 million k–12 students in the
United States lacked either high-speed
k–12 students in the United States
internet or devices with the capacity they lacked either high-speed internet or
need for easy access to digital learning at devices with the capacity they need for
home. Of these young people, nearly two
thirds lacked both high-speed internet easy access to digital learning at home.
and a usable device. Furthermore, at
least 300,000 teachers lacked high-speed
internet adequate to teach online from
home. A report from the Alliance for Excellent Education, National Indian Education Association,
National Urban League, and UnidosUS shows that these disparities disproportionately impact
students of color, students from low-income families, and students in rural communities.
While a number of states and school districts reduced this divide with investments in devices and
hotspots to enable distance learning during school closings last spring, many of the investments
were temporary, as companies offered free internet for short periods of time and devices were often
pulled from in-school computer carts to which they will return.
A recent national survey from ParentsTogether in spring 2020 revealed that 13% of parents from low-
income homes (earning less than $25,000 annually) reported lacking devices or internet connections,
and they were nearly 10 times more likely to say their children were doing little or no remote
learning than those from affluent homes (38% vs. 4%). Students from low-income homes were also
3 times more likely to report not having consistent access to a device (32% vs. 10%) and were 5 times
more likely to attend a school without distance learning materials or activities (11% vs. 2%).
Another equity concern is access to both basic and assistive technologies needed to support
students with individualized education plans. These students may need adaptive equipment and
special software. They will also require different kinds of instructional planning and preparation,
including ongoing evaluation to determine the appropriateness of particular online and
hybrid approaches.
The digital divide parallels the educational divide, and unless it is closed now, it will result in an
ever-widening learning gap. The current crisis provides an opportunity to close the educational
equity gap and create new and transformative educational strategies based on deeper and authentic
learning. The Common Sense Media report estimated that closing the divide will require at
least $6 billion in immediate investments for infrastructure and devices at the federal level—of
which half would be recurring costs each year. Also needed are changes in policy, so that internet
connectivity is treated by federal and state regulators the same way we treat access to telephone
services, with rate structures and subsidies that guarantee access and affordability.
What Policymakers and Educators Can Do

With connectivity now clearly essential to ongoing learning as well as families’ access to
telehealth, employment, and needed benefits, some states and districts, as well as corporations
and philanthropies, have made major investments in technology for students. At the federal level,

opportunities already exist through the E-Rate program housed in the Federal Communications
Commission (FCC), which schools had already been using for internet connectivity.1 Funds could be
expanded and allocated through the FCC’s E-Rate program to provide broadband as well as hotspot
access to rural areas of the country.
At the state level, there are some outstanding examples of progress being made to close the digital
divide. Promising practices include stakeholder outreach and engagement, robust policy frameworks,
planning and capacity building, and improved funding and operations, as we describe below.
Prioritize federal efforts to close the digital divide

Every student, no matter her or his living situation, deserves access to an adequate computing
device and internet connectivity. An allocation of $500 per student would cover the costs
for equipping a household with an inexpensive device, connecting to a high-speed internet
provider, and funding training. Given the major economic downturn and state revenue declines
accompanying pandemic-related shutdowns, federal recovery funds to education will be needed to
supplement state budgets for this purpose, among others.
As outlined in the recent Common Sense Media report, federal policymakers should take swift
policy action in the short term by passing the next stimulus bill with funding to ensure internet
service and devices at home for students who lack them through expanded funding for federal
E-Rate supports and through direct funds to states and districts. They should also take long-term
action and invest funding to upgrade and close gaps in the nation’s broadband infrastructure.
Furthermore, future regulation of broadband should be modeled more closely on the regulation of
the telephone industry, which provides incentives to providers and rate structures for households
designed to ensure access in every home.
Closing the divide is critical not only to ensuring educational equity but also to sustaining economic
security. The work of economist Brian Whitacre at Oklahoma State University demonstrates that
there are major economic returns on rural broadband investment in both jobs and income.2 Despite
past failures, policymakers in the United States now have an opportunity to bridge this divide with
smart, sustainable, and well-funded policies that support those in need.
Expand broadband access through state and city initiatives

In February 2020, The Pew Charitable Trusts published a comprehensive state-by-state overview,
How States Are Expanding Broadband Access. Kathryn de Wit, manager of the broadband research
initiative at The Pew Charitable Trusts, noted in an interview that “for the better part of a decade,
states have been rolling up their sleeves and making meaningful progress on bridging the digital
divide. As leaders at all levels of government look for solutions to address broadband challenges,
they can learn from states.”
At least nine states have made substantial gains in broadband access in recent years. Minnesota has
placed most of its broadband program in statute and included clear goals for broadband expansion,
a state Office of Broadband Development, and a fund to support broadband infrastructure, and
launched the Minnesota K-12 Connect Forward Initiative in 2016. In West Virginia, the legislature
established the West Virginia Broadband Enhancement Council to provide policy guidance and
technical assistance to communities.

The Colorado Department of Local Affairs centralizes the state’s financial and technical assistance
to local governments and offers regional broadband planning grants. In Tennessee, the legislature
passed a 2017 measure creating the Tennessee Broadband Accessibility Grant Program to support
broadband deployment in unserved areas in the state. In Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Broadband
Office makes grants to support the deployment of broadband infrastructure in unserved and
underserved areas of the state.
Wyoming has also established itself as a leader in

expanding access. In 2016, the state of Wyoming In 2016, the state of Wyoming
was ranked No. 1 in the nation in broadband was ranked No. 1 in the nation
connectivity, having addressed the needs of 100%
in broadband connectivity,
of its school districts in a sparsely populated, rural
state. This outcome was in large part because of having addressed the needs of
a statewide education technology plan, which 100% of its school districts in a
has as its goal to “better provide equal access to
education through technology.” Each of these
sparsely populated, rural state.
states has developed strong solutions for ensuring
that every child has internet access.
Cleveland, OH, is a city-level example of access success. The Cleveland Metropolitan School District
and the nonprofit DigitalC have worked together since the pandemic struck to hand out over
17,000 devices and provide 4,700 temporary hotspots. In partnership with, and with additional
funding from, the city of Cleveland and MetroHealth, the district is paying DigitalC a discounted
rate of $16 per household to install antennas and other equipment throughout the city.
Organize access to devices and connectivity

Once every home has the potential for internet access, many students will still need Wi-Fi and
an internet-capable device at home in order to participate in distance and hybrid learning. When
cellular service is the only viable option, students will need LTE-enabled devices or mobile hotspots.
Many state and local reopening plans include a requirement that each district undertake a survey of
device needs across families to determine how best to narrow the digital divide.
This work can be centralized in order to ensure quick delivery of laptops and other devices during
a time when there are already disruptions in the supply chain. California has already surveyed all
of its districts, and in April 2020 established a task force overseeing the California Bridging the
Digital Divide Fund, a joint effort of the Governor’s Office, the State Board of Education, and the
California Department of Education (CDE). The funds raised go directly to equip school districts
with resources they need to enable distance learning. With contributions from corporations and
foundations, the state has purchased hundreds of thousands of Wi-Fi hotspots and Chromebooks
for students to support district efforts. Many county offices and large districts, including Los
Angeles, did the same to purchase devices and hotspots in bulk.
In May 2020, California Assemblywoman Rebecca Bauer-Kahan introduced a bill to close the digital
divide by providing school districts financial relief through the elimination of the sales tax on device
purchases. This new legislation, which is currently being amended in the state senate, builds upon prior
efforts, including a 2017 measure sponsored by the California Emerging Technology Fund that created
the California Advanced Services Fund Broadband Adoption Account, which provided $20 million for

digital literacy programs. A cross-sector partnership between the California Public Utilities Commission
and CDE was formed as part of a broadband in schools initiative to distribute $25 million from the
California Teleconnect Fund for Wi-Fi hotspots and internet service for student households.
Nebraska has also quickly responded to both the immediate crisis and the longer-term challenge
with the Launch Nebraska initiative, which contains a thorough set of digital learning guidelines.
The state has established a hierarchy of digital learning needs, beginning with infrastructure (equity
of broadband internet access to every home); proceeding to devices (a computing device for every
student), software systems (learning management, content management, collaborative learning
technologies, and the integration of these systems), and digital content (online digital resources);
and finally to professional development and training (effective methods for teaching and learning in
a digital world, whether virtual or face-to-face).
Policymakers can learn from these examples and others that inform efforts to bridge the digital
divide. Every family will need both broadband and device access in order to have an uninterrupted
education. With COVID-19 surging across broad swaths of the country, learning cannot occur
without these foundational investments. Left unaddressed, the digital divide will continue to widen
gaps in achievement and attainment. Even with uncertain federal funding and local tax revenues,
it will be imperative for states, cities, and districts to move swiftly to make blended and distance
learning possible for every child.
Resources
• How States Are Expanding Broadband Access (The Pew Charitable Trusts). This report identifies
and explores promising practices for connecting unserved communities through examples in
nine states.
• Closing the K-12 Digital Divide in the Age of Distance Learning (Common Sense Media).
This report, done in partnership with Boston Consulting Group, analyzes the digital divide for
America’s k–12 public school students and teachers and provides strategies for moving forward
to close the digital divide.
• Digital Learning Plan (Wyoming). This 2017-2018 framework helped the state achieve 100%
broadband connectivity and become the national leader in high-speed access.
• empowerCLE+ (DigitalC). This nonprofit organization provides a growing number of communities
in the greater Cleveland area with $18/month internet access—a potential model for
philanthropic partnerships in other states.
• Return to School Roadmap (Opportunity Labs). This roadmap neatly describes what to do first,
what to do before school opens, and what to do when schools are open and operating, including
districtwide procedures for devices.
Endnotes
1. Puma, M. J., Chaplin, D. D., & Pape, A. D. (2000). E-Rate and the digital divide: A preliminary analysis from
the integrated studies of educational technology. Chicago, IL: Urban Institute. https://www.urban.org/
research/publication/e-rate-and-digital-divide.
2. Whitacre, B., Gallardo, R., & Strover, S. (2014). Broadband’s contribution to economic growth in rural
areas: Moving towards a causal relationship. Telecommunications Policy, 38(11), 1011–1023.

Priority 2: Strengthen Distance and Blended Learning
Once all students have access to high-speed internet and to devices adequate for managing school
work, the challenge of implementing high-quality distance learning and blended learning models
remains. Hybrid and blended learning models can facilitate continuity of learning by enabling
teaching and learning to occur both in person and online on an as-needed basis. The key goal is
that “the modalities along each student’s learning path within a course or subject are connected
to provide an integrated learning experience.”1 Furthermore, student-centered blended learning
models that tap new uses of technology across home and school spaces can, when they guide
purposeful use of teacher time, increase equity in learning while offering productive models in this
new environment.
What Students Need

Most students will not have access to school buildings for a full 5 days a week this fall. Some will
still be engaged in distance learning because of their personal health considerations or until
infection rates recede in their community. Others will be in school on alternating days or weeks
to allow for social distancing, as recent guidance from the CDC acknowledges. In models in which
students are in school only part of the time to allow for social distancing—or alternating on Zoom
between synchronous and asynchronous activities—the time in class may be used to introduce new
concepts and information to the group and to get students started on the inquiries they will use to
further explore or apply that information. Then students may continue those inquiries when they
are in asynchronous or distance learning mode by
applying newly learned skills; collecting data or
In-school and out-of-school
evidence; completing additional reading and written
reflection; working virtually with a small group to learning needs to be connected
complete tasks; and preparing to present their ideas, and seamless, with the tasks
findings, solutions, conjectures, or conclusions when
they return to a full-class setting, either in person or
chosen to take advantage of
online. In-school and out-of-school learning needs the different settings in which
to be connected and seamless, with the tasks chosen learning is taking place.
to take advantage of the different settings in which
learning is taking place.

While distance and blended learning models may be an entirely new experience for the majority of
k–12 schools in the United States, there is a growing body of evidence about what works in these
contexts that can be replicated across contexts.
Share pioneering efforts among districts

While this new era may feel like uncharted educational waters, educators can be guided in part
by successful pioneers and by principles rooted in equity and authentic learning. Among the
blended learning pioneers is the Miami-Dade County Public School District in Florida, where
recurring hurricanes and flooding have long required a comprehensive distance learning strategy.
The Miami-Dade County approach includes an instructional continuity plan with curriculum

designs, plans for access to devices and connectivity, and supports for parents and teachers that are
activated whenever needed to ensure that instruction continues seamlessly. Along with extensive
professional development, among the resources the district offers teachers are videos of expert
teachers, “Distance Learning Champions,” illustrating and discussing their lessons and approaches.
Lindsay Unified School District in California has offered a performance-based learning system
over the past 5 years that leverages technology and blended learning as a tool to deliver learning
approaches that are learner-centered, inquiry-based, personalized to learner interests, offered at a
differentiated pace with multiple means to demonstrate knowledge, balanced between online and
in-person settings, and engaged in formative feedback to inform instruction daily.
With personalized, competency-based learning and blended learning implemented, Lindsay Unified
was able to transition seamlessly to distance learning during the pandemic. This was made possible
because in 2015, the district designed and implemented a free Community Wi-Fi program. Today, all
of Lindsay Unified’s students and their parents can access filtered internet from their homes, free of
charge. This program was not grant-funded or financed externally. Instead, the district repurposed
budgets and avoided textbook adoptions to invest in digital formats and systems that support
equity and all learners’ needs.
According to a recent study, Building Solid Evidence—It’s Working at Lindsay Unified, this
school district that serves 91% students from low-income families and 41% English learners has
maintained a 97% attendance rate for the past 5 years and a 94% graduation rate. Over the past
5 years, Lindsay Unified students’ proficiency rates have increased from 26% to 47% on the state’s
Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium assessment in English language arts, moving the district
from the 33rd percentile to the 87th percentile among similar school districts in California.
As noted in the examples below and the resources provided, there are many pioneering districts
across the country that can help others think about how to undertake these new challenges well.
Support high-quality distance and blended learning models with educator training and materials
To be effective, online learning should be much more than the teacher talking and the students
listening through another medium. It should be as interactive and authentic as possible, combining
live interaction among students and teachers with interactive multimedia materials that support
well-designed assignments and projects that students may complete at home. A recent synthesis of
research on computer-supported distance learning,2 reinforced by other research,3 found that:
• Well-designed online or blended instruction can be as or more effective than

in-classroom learning alone. While many worry that distance learning is necessarily
less effective than in-person learning, many studies show that well-designed distance
learning that has the features described below is generally more effective than traditional
in-classroom learning alone. (One caveat is that most studies are of students in the upper
elementary grades and older; less is known about distance learning for young children.)
• Synchronous and asynchronous instruction should be combined in strategic ways.
Combining synchronous activities in which students meet online or in person with their
teachers and classmates with asynchronous activities in which students engage deeply
with both the subject matter and groups of peers is more effective than fully synchronous
online courses.

• Student control in how to engage
with asynchronous online elements Students do better when they
enhances learning. Students do better can go at their own pace, on
when they can go at their own pace, on
their own time, when they have some
their own time, when they have
choice over their learning strategies, and some choice over their learning
when materials enable them to engage strategies, and when materials
deeply and critically with course content.
For example, in one study, students who enable them to engage deeply
were allowed to watch assigned videos in and critically with course content.
any order, and fast-forward, rewind, and
replay them, significantly outperformed
those who had to use the videos in a
predetermined standardized fashion. Similarly, student control over when and how to use
other learning materials enhances their motivation and performance.
• Frequent, direct, and meaningful interaction is critical. The more intense the
interaction among students, teachers, and interactive content, the deeper the learning. In
online learning environments in which there is little student–student, student–instructor,
and student–content interaction, students are more likely to become disengaged and are
at higher risk of dropping out. Fully online courses with little high-quality interaction also
contribute to gaps in educational success across socioeconomic groups.
• Interaction should focus on solving problems and developing ideas. Opportunities for
students to engage in interdependent cooperative learning are important. This includes
group engagement in shared projects and presentations as well as opportunities to interact
with peers and the teacher in multiple formats. For example, whole-group and small-group
discussion in synchronous instruction (for example, in Zoom breakout rooms), chat rooms
and discussion boards that may be synchronous or asynchronous, and quick polls and votes
followed by debate and discussion are all means to improve engagement and create positive
effects on learning gains, as are interactive materials.
• Interactive materials are extremely important. High-quality distance learning should
not rest on static textbooks or worksheets but on the use of interactive multimedia
materials, typically during asynchronous learning. For example, 8th-grade students
whose teachers integrated the use of the Pathways to Freedom Electronic Field Trips—an
online collection of interactive activities designed by Maryland Public Television—in their
teaching about slavery and the Underground Railroad outperformed those who had the
same unit without these materials. Fifth-grade science students in Taiwan who used a
virtual web-based science lab, which allowed them to conduct virtual experiments while
teachers observed student work and corrected errors online, outperformed those who did
an in-person manual science lab. Elementary special education students across five urban
schools who used a web-based program that supports writing in action (by prompting
attention to the topical organization and structure of ideas during the planning and
composing phases of writing) outperformed those who had the same materials in hard
copy in the classroom.

• Opportunities for formative feedback, reflection, and revision strongly enhance
learning. For example, students performed better when they used a formative online self-
assessment strategy that gave them feedback when they answered an item incorrectly: They
were told that their response was not correct, and they were given additional resources to
explore to find the correct answer. (They were not given the right answer.) Students who
received quizzes that allowed them the opportunity for additional practice on items they
answered incorrectly did better over time than those who received quizzes identifying
only right and wrong answers. Studies have found positive effects on online learning of
a variety of reflection tools, ranging from prompts asking students to reflect on their
problem-solving activities to prompts asking them to provide explanations regarding their
work; student reflection exercises during and after online learning activities; and learning
guidance systems that ask questions as students design studies or conduct other activities
that support their thinking processes without offering direct answers.
• Self-management strategies should be explicitly taught. Students who receive
instruction in self-regulation learning strategies, such as managing study time, goal-
setting, and self-evaluation, perform better in online learning. One tool found to promote
success was a form on which students could record their study time and environment, note
their learning process, predict their test scores, and create a self-evaluation.
Successful online teachers describe how these principles come alive in their practices and can be
sources of professional development for other teachers. For example, teacher John McCarthy notes
how important it is to:
1. Establish structures for self-regulation and interaction. Many students need help
managing work time and productivity when adapting to a virtual environment. Provide
checklists that are readily available to students and parents that break out the steps for
task completion to help them understand the scope of the work and the milestones they’ll
accomplish along the way. Do check-ins to monitor progress on checklists and collect
assessment data on students’ growth. Include discussion boards and/or links to external
dialog tools such as Flipgrid, and encourage students to discuss, review, and post links and
other content that supports their learning.
2. Provide choice and control by offering a variety of assignment or task formats. Rather
than assigning only worksheets or reading questions, which often leads to frustration and
disengagement, offer students different approaches so they can build and apply knowledge.
For example, provide a recorded lecture, two or three videos, and two readings about the
topic. The students must listen to the lecture and then choose to complete a combination
of the remaining content options. Provide links to reading assignments at different reading
levels so that all students find a path to comprehension, with tools such as Newsela,
Rewordify, News in Levels, and more. Give two or three choices for completing a task,
such as writing; recording a video; building a slide deck; or using Minecraft Education to
demonstrate math concepts, historical events, and literary ideas. Allow students to upload
their work onto the classroom learning platform to share with peers.

3. Keep it real. Make the content relevant to authentic purposes outside of school. Connect
assignments to career-related tasks, such as business plans, lab experiments, survey
statistics, or recorded presentations. Identify an audience from the community whose
occupation applies the concepts being taught, or give students a target audience for the
tasks they are doing.
4. Make work public. Curate and publish student work for viewing by a target audience, such
as the local community or organizations that might benefit from or appreciate a different
perspective. Students who contribute to their communities see that their voice matters,
and being published shows them the value of their evaluation and synthesis of curriculum.
Work can also be shared with others in the classroom—as in book reviews to inform peers
or presentations of work to others in the school. Learners tend to take more care with their
work when the intent is to share with an audience beyond the teacher.
Teacher and professional development provider Kathryn Welby describes how to structure distance
learning to support students with individualized education plans (IEPs), including how to:
• engage parents, set goals, and support them in supporting their child;
• create synchronous activities that are doable, engaging, fun, and productive; and
• create asynchronous supports including visuals, schedules, routines, movement breaks, and
effective tools and materials, as well as a range of ways for students to show their learning.
Give special consideration to early childhood learning

Because very young children are also now learning from home, there is a danger that the digital
divide might be baked in at an early age. Edutopia has published distance learning principles for
educators to use in working with very young learners and their caregivers that offer a systematic
approach meant to empower all families by:
• modeling everything that is being taught;

• speaking directly to caregivers about how they can support their young learners;
• ensuring equity by tailoring tasks and supports to families’ needs and capacities; and
• creating a collaborative community among the families who are part of the class.
Early childhood and the early grades (pre-k through 3rd grade) is a unique developmental period
that requires a different approach when conceptualizing and supporting distance learning than
the upper grades. Despite this, few states required districts to give special consideration to the
unique needs of distance learning for pre-k through 3rd-grade students. The National P-3 Center
has identified the following principles to guide districts’ and schools’ at-home learning supports for
pre-k through 3rd-grade students based upon fundamentals of child development and equity:
• Focus on relationships and social-emotional development. When technology is used, it

should be used as a means to encourage interactions between children and adults and
among children.
• Emphasize active, experiential learning. Focus on creating and promoting experiences that
spark children’s natural curiosity, foster self-directed investigations, and involve physical
activity rather than passive screen time.

• Consider the unique needs of English learners. Work from an asset-based lens when offering
supports, and partner with families to build upon multilingual families’ funds of knowledge.
Websites such as Ellevation from the Wide Open School project offer distance learning
activities and other resources to supplement existing and new curricula.
• Consider the unique needs of students with IEPs. Utilize universal design for learning (UDL)
to ensure that children with developmental delays and disabilities have access to the same
opportunities as the rest of the student population, and leverage technology for IEP meetings
and assessments. On the Road to High-Quality Early Learning offers a detailed look at how
to implement these systems, and there are promising models for recruiting and retaining
diverse, high-quality early childhood educators who can meet the needs of students with IEPs.
Develop standards for digital learning that

articulate how technology should be used As research confirms, productive
to empower learners policies for using technology do not
As research confirms, productive policies try to replace teachers with electronic
for using technology do not try to replace
workbooks, which many studies
teachers with electronic workbooks, which
many studies have found to be ineffective; have found to be ineffective; rather,
rather, they use interactive technologies in they use interactive technologies in
concert with teachers and peers to enable
learners to explore and create rather than
concert with teachers and peers to
to “drill and kill.” One literature review enable learners to explore and create
summarized succinctly the typical uses rather than to “drill and kill.”
and effects of technology in relation to
different learner populations, noting that
“the drill and practice activities favored
in low-SES [socioeconomic status] schools tend to be ineffective, whereas the uses of technology
disproportionately used in high-SES schools achieve positive results.”4 An analysis of data from the
National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) illustrates the point:
The use of simulations/applications in eighth grade and games in the

fourth grade positively affected test scores, whereas drill and practice at
the eighth grade negatively affected the scores. In science, games … word
processing … simulations … and data analysis … all positively affected test scores.
And in eighth grade reading, use of computers for writing activities positively
affected test scores, but use of computers for grammar/punctuation or for reading
activities (which usually involve drill or tutorials) negatively affected test scores.5
States can encourage these more effective uses of technology by creating standards and guidance
and offering strong models for others to learn from. For example, in addition to its No. 1 ranking
for internet access, Wyoming has created a Digital Learning Plan that provides a robust structure
for digital learning and implementation, focusing on personalized, student-centered learning. (See
Figure 2.1.) This research-based framework includes seven key “gears”: (1) curriculum, instruction,
and assessment; (2) use of space and time; (3) robust infrastructure; (4) data and privacy; (5)
community partnerships; (6) personalized professional development; and (7) budget and resources.
This framework guides professional learning and other supports for educators.

Figure 2.1
Wyoming’s Framework for Digital Learning
Source: Wyoming Department of Education Digital Learning Plan.
Another resource is the International Society for Technology in Education’s (ISTE) standards for
student learning in the digital age, which are the foundation for resources available through ISTE
Connect. Reflecting the ways in which technology is a tool for empowerment, the seven standards
suggest the ideal student in the digital age is:
1. An Empowered Learner: Students leverage knowledge to take an active role in choosing,
achieving, and demonstrating competency in their learning goals, informed by the
learning sciences.

2. A Digital Citizen: Students recognize the rights, responsibilities, and opportunities of
living, learning, and working in an interconnected digital world, and they act and model in
ways that are safe, legal, and ethical.
3. A Knowledge Constructor: Students critically curate a variety of resources using digital
tools to construct knowledge, produce creative artifacts, and make meaningful learning
experiences for themselves and others.
4. An Innovative Designer: Students use a variety of technologies within a design process to
identify and solve problems by creating new, useful, or imaginative solutions.
5. A Computational Thinker: Students develop and employ strategies for understanding and
solving problems in ways that leverage the power of technological methods to develop and
test solutions.
6. A Creative Communicator: Students communicate clearly and express themselves
creatively for a variety of purposes using platforms, tools, styles, formats, and digital media
appropriate to their goals.
7. A Global Collaborator: Students use digital tools to broaden their perspectives and enrich
their learning by collaborating with others and working effectively in teams locally
and globally.
Enact distance learning with attention to equity

Distance and hybrid or blended learning models carry their own equity challenges that will need
special attention from school districts.
For example, Portland Public Schools in Oregon has proposed a model for reopening in which the
first 2 weeks of school are dedicated to foundational activities conducted virtually prior to students
returning to school buildings in small A/B cohort models. These activities include ensuring that
every student has a working device and online access along with multiple opportunities to become
familiar with the learning technology, to learn new health protocols, and to have their social and
emotional needs assessed.
Other districts are creating educational support hubs to enable students to succeed at distance
and blended learning. San Francisco schools, which will start the school year with remote
learning, will help up to 6,000 students this fall with their distance learning needs by transforming
dozens of recreation facilities, libraries, and community centers across the city into “learning
hubs”—spaces where young students who may struggle with remote instruction can go each day
to access their digital classwork and the social interactions that virtual schooling cannot provide.
As Maria Su, the Executive Director of San Francisco’s Department of Children, Youth and Their
Families, noted:
The barriers for distance learning are not just access to Wi-Fi. It’s making sure that
children have a quiet place to even connect in to their Zoom calls and have the
support they need to … submit homework and participate virtually.6

The hubs will offer computers and internet connections necessary for students to connect with
their teachers and classwork remotely, along with some of the trappings of ordinary scholastic
environments, such as meals, snacks, exercise, and peers. The first 40 such hubs will prioritize
serving low-income families, children in public housing or the foster care system, youth
experiencing homelessness, and others in living situations that make remote learning particularly
challenging. At first, the hubs will serve students in kindergarten through 5th grade, a group
that has lower rates of infection, but officials will consider making the hubs available to older
students. They will operate 5 days a week during ordinary school hours and will be staffed by
experienced nonprofits and other organizations—many of which already partner with the city to
provide after-school programs.
A similar plan in West Contra Costa Unified School District will be managed by education
professionals for the 25% of families who have reported they struggle to facilitate distance learning
for their children. A district leader explained:
What we’re doing is taking the homeschooling process out of the living
rooms and dining rooms of some of those 25%, and providing them a place
with qualified people who can facilitate and help them if they’ve got issues
with wellness or technology or nutrition or attendance or English language
or academics.7
The plan prioritizes serving high-need students in three tiers. Those in the first tier are the first
priority for student support hubs: They include students with high numbers of absences, students
from underserved populations, students in special education, youth in foster care, and children
experiencing homelessness. The second tier includes students who have had little participation in
distance learning, as well as students who are learning English as a second language and students
with mental health concerns. The third tier includes students whose parents have expressed the
need for out-of-home support for distance learning.
Shift from measuring seat time to engagement

Key to the new models of learning that are The role of attendance in a hybrid,
emerging is for states to rethink how they count student-centered learning system
attendance—which is often tied to funding
shifts from time spent in class to
as well as to compulsory education laws and
requirements for instructional minutes. The engagement, participation, and
role of attendance in a hybrid, student-centered student outcomes.
learning system shifts from time spent in class
to engagement, participation, and student
outcomes. Attendance Works defines attendance
in this context as relying on contact, connectivity, engagement around wellness and social and
emotional learning and supports, and participation in learning activities (see Figure 2.2).

Figure 2.2
Additional Terms for “Attendance” During Distance Learning
Source: Attendance Works. Monitoring Attendance in Distance Learning.
States such as Kentucky and California have redefined attendance for the coming school year when
students are in distance learning mode to include not only the time students are logging in to
online instruction, but also the time equivalents for their work on assignments and assessments.
Student completion of assignments, collaboration on projects, and other measures of student
engagement, including check-ins with peers and teachers, can give students more ownership of
the learning process, while encouraging engagement in meaningful work. Further, in personalized,
competency-based models, teachers can track students’ development of knowledge and skills
through their progress on projects, portfolios, and performance assessments and by monitoring
their learning progressions. Using these examples and the resources provided, even inexperienced
districts and schools can successfully implement strong and more equitable distance learning.
Resources
• ISTE Standards for Students (ISTE). This interactive website provides additional detail and
illustrative videos on seven standards for leveraging technology. The site helps educators,
schools, and districts adopt these standards and put them into practice in order to create
authentic learning opportunities that empower student voice and prepare students to be future-
ready, lifelong learners.
• At-Home Teaching and Learning in PreK-3rd Grade (National P-3 Center). This document provides
specific guidance related to school districts’ and elementary schools’ supports for at-home
learning across the primary grades (pre-k to 3rd grade) based on fundamentals of effective
teaching and learning in early childhood.

• Attendance Playbook: Smart Strategies for Reducing Chronic Absenteeism in the COVID Era
(Attendance Works and FutureEd). This playbook provides a detailed, three-tiered approach to
addressing a lack of student attendance whether classes are held in person or online.
• Restart & Recovery: Considerations for Teaching and Learning: Academics (Council of Chief State
School Officers). This resource includes strategies states might consider as they work to support
their districts as they adapt instruction in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• What Will Return to School Look Like This Fall? A Look Inside Hybrid Learning Plans (Panorama
Education). This website describes additional examples with links to states and districts that are
developing hybrid learning models for fall 2020.
• Supporting Learning in the COVID-19 Context (Policy Analysis for California Education). This
research brief provides 10 recommendations with accompanying resources for implementing
distance and blended learning.
Endnotes
1. Christensen Institute. (n.d.). Blended learning definitions. https://www.christenseninstitute.org/blended-
learning-definitions-and-models/ (accessed 07/20/20).
2. Means, B., Toyama, Y., Murphy, R., Bakia, M., & Jones, K. (2010). Evaluation of evidence-based practices in
online learning: A meta-analysis and review of online learning studies. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of
Education. https://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/tech/evidence-based-practices/finalreport.pdf.
3. Bernard, R. M., Abrami, P. C., Borokhovski, E., Wade, C. A., Tamim, R. M., Surkes, M. A., & Bethel, E.
C. (2009). A meta-analysis of three types of interaction treatments in distance education. Review of
Educational Research, 79(3), 1243–1289.
4. Warschauer, M., & Matuchniak, T. (2010). New technology and digital worlds: Analyzing evidence of
equity in access, use, and outcomes. Review of Research in Education, 34(1), 179–225.
5. Wenglinsky, H. (2005). Using Technology Wisely: The Keys to Success in Schools. New York, NY: Teachers
College Press, as cited in Warschauer. M., & Matuchniak, T. (2010). New technology and digital worlds:
Analyzing evidence of equity in access, use, and outcomes. Review of Research in Education, 34(1), p. 205.
6. Fracassa, D. (2020, July 23). “Learning hubs” opening across SF to help 6,000 kids in need with distance
education. San Francisco Chronicle. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/San-Francisco-readies-
program-to-help-up-to-6-000-15429333.php.
7. Tadayon, A. (2020, July 13). A California district’s plan to boost remote learning includes in-person
“student support hubs.” EdSource. https://edsource.org/2020/a-san-francisco-bay-area-districts-plan-to-
boost-remote-learning-includes-in-person-student-support-hubs/635882.

Priority 3: Assess What Students Need
As students return to school in the fall, they will be bringing with them a wide range of learning
experiences from the previous 6 months since COVID-19-related school closures began. Even
students who were in the same class when schools initially closed will have had different home lives,
experiences, and responsibilities during school closures; different access to devices and support for
distance learning; and different emotional reactions to the ongoing and unfolding situation.
Some may have been in daily online learning with a well-planned curriculum supported by teachers
and counselors since the week after schools closed, while others may have had only hurriedly
assembled instructional packets to complete on their own during this time. Some may have
sheltered in place safely with all of their needs met, while others may have experienced illness
and the loss of loved ones, or their families may have lost employment, housing, and health care.
Teachers will need to take stock of all of students’ experiences and needs—social, emotional,
health-related, potentially trauma-related, and academic—as they build safe and welcoming
communities in person or online (or a combination of both) when school begins.
What Students Need

The ongoing pandemic will have lasting impacts on students’ social, emotional, and physical
wellness, all of which can influence student learning moving forward. Students may have lost loved
ones, lost homes and food security due to family members’ unemployment, and been negatively
impacted by social isolation over the past several months. A panel of assessment experts convened
by the Center on Reinventing Public Education identified a set of principles for effective assessment
as schools reopen. They emphasized that educators should prioritize understanding student
experiences, forging caring connections, surfacing considerations of what students have had the
opportunity to learn, and connecting students to the appropriate supports within school and
community systems.
A first step in assessing students’ needs will include evaluating their contexts and their social and
emotional needs in order to make appropriate supports available and to foster strong, trusting
relationships. (See also “Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning” and
“Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships.”) Regardless of what school reopening
looks like, students’ success depends on their entry into a caring community and on academic
supports that focus on growth over remediation, taking a forward-looking view of learning status
and progress rather than a deficit-oriented view of student abilities that starts off the year under
a cloud of discouragement and self-doubt. Instructionally relevant assessment processes can
help teachers and students recognize, celebrate, and leverage current student understanding
and skills to propel student thinking forward through opportunities for feedback, reflection, and
continuous improvement.
Because learning happens progressively—that is, we learn by building on our current and prior
thinking, rather than just adding new knowledge to a blank slate—knowing how to surface and grow
from these learning experiences is essential for supporting all learners, including those with unique
learning needs such as students with disabilities, English learners, students placed in foster care,
and students experiencing homelessness. Diagnostic and formative assessment processes—those
that provide feedback both to teachers about what students have learned and are ready to learn

next and to students on how they can improve their learning—can play a tremendous role in student
learning and performance gains when they are tailored to individual student experiences and the
specific learning progressions students are working along.

State and local leaders have an opportunity to
support systems of assessment that both take This shift from a measurement
account of students’ broader needs and support
culture to a learning culture
their learning. With respect to learning supports,
it is critical to prioritize curriculum-embedded is imperative now, so that we
formative assessment processes—which research can support diverse learners
shows can lead to some of the largest learning
gains when coupled with supportive instructional
well: It paves the way for
practices.1 This shift from a measurement culture to assessment systems that
a learning culture is imperative now, so that we can are designed to transform
support diverse learners well: It paves the way for
assessment systems that are designed to transform learning and close opportunity
learning and close opportunity and achievement and achievement gaps.
gaps, rather than just surface them, as many current
assessment systems do.
State and local leaders should consider these recommendations to support meaningful assessments
as students restart school and to incentivize the use of effective formative and diagnostic
assessment processes moving forward.
Ensure that schools have the time and tools to assess the needs of the whole child
Following the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning’s (CASEL) Social and
Emotional Learning (SEL) Roadmap for Reopening School, school leaders can help engage students
and staff to learn about what they have been experiencing as well as identify the partners, resources,
and community assets that they can leverage to support all students across learning settings.
In Oregon, as part of Portland Public Schools’ proposed reopening plan, the first 2 weeks of school
are dedicated to virtual activities to prepare staff, students, and staff for the new year of learning
ahead. One of these activities will be for teachers to connect individually with students and families
to learn about their social and emotional needs and experiences during the months that school was
closed. States such as Kentucky provide detailed guidance on how to begin these conversations,
offering advice on how school communities can grieve their losses while also maintaining a sense of
optimism and resilience.
In order to understand the strengths and needs of all students, schools will need a collaborative
process to help them learn from and leverage the insights of diverse members of the school
community, going beyond traditional school leadership positions. There are multiple ways
to accomplish this, but the goal should be to include representation from students, families,
educators, and community partners (e.g., early childhood, after-school, extended learning, and
youth development programs, as well as mental health providers) to plan for and tailor social and
emotional supports based on the specific experiences of each school community.

families, leaders can begin to cultivate the healing, empathy, resiliency, and collective resolve needed to navigate
the transition ahead and more effectively continue the work of teaching and learning.
• Communicate widely and consistently that SEL is foundational to the holistic success of your school
community. If needed, build your own foundational understanding of SEL research and practices. Use
newsletters, social media, and meetings with staff, families, students, and community partners to share how
social and emotional competencies and supportive environments can support children and adults through
This may betransition
this done byand setting
the newupways
structures for
of learning connecting
that may occur inand communicating, such as phone
schools.
calls, video conferences,
• Elevate the voices andor perspectives
surveys, andofby creating
students, a transition
families, coalition
educators, that
and other includes
adults students,
to develop
as recommended
responsive transition plans. Use formal and informal ways to identify their hopes and concerns aboutby
by CASEL. (See Figure 3.1.) Back-to-school surveys, such as those created
Panorama, and measures
transition of social,the
while communicating emotional, andtoacademic
school’s desire incorporatewell-being, suchinto
their perspectives as decision-making.
those created by For
example,
California’s provide
CORE individual
Districts, canoutreach when both
be helpful possible, call or
at the survey
start of students and families,
school and or holdthe
throughout focus groups
year.
with staff and key community partners. When reaching out to families and students, use home languages and
inclusive strategies for those who have limited access to technology. Also consider alternative ways to reach
Figure 3.1 such as through churches, social service agencies, neighborhood groups, social media, and other
all families,
Sample Questions for Stakeholder Engagement

community connections.
Put it Into Practice

Learn From Families, Students, and Community Partners
The sample questions below can be used as a starting point for phone/video conferences or written
surveys that engage stakeholders in sharing their perspectives.
– What has your experience been like since school has been closed?
– What is on your mind as you think about next school year? What are your biggest hopes or worries?
– What has our school done well during the past months, and what could we have done better?
– How might you like to contribute as we prepare to transition to a new school year?
– What will help you learn this upcoming year?
– What can we do to make school feel even more like a community that cares for you?
Source: CASEL. (2020). An initial guide to leveraging the power of social and emotional learning as you prepare to reopen
• Examine
and renew wherecommunity.
your school SEL efforts have been impactful and where more support is needed. Review whether
the strategies taken during school closures to promote SEL have been effective in supporting and engaging
students. Find out which students and families have received individual outreach from staff, who has engaged
Some states, suchlearning,
in distance as Louisiana
and whatand North
barriers haveDakota, areothers
prevented advising schools to
from engaging. implement
Identify universal
which staff have felt
social, emotional, andSEL
comfortable with behavioral healthstrategies
distance learning screening.
and Universal
those who may screening is conducted
require additional forAlso
support. all pay
students
attention to individual needs that will impact the ability to return to school. Have staff, students, or their
(including those already receiving special education services or other supports) and repeated in
families experienced a loss of a loved one, housing or employment instability, or other circumstances
the fall, winter, and spring. Optimally, screening occurs within a tiered system of support to enable
that may require support? It may be helpful to connect with local service agencies and community
educators to connect
partners students
to help identify with
these needswhat
andthey need.
provide
2
additional support.
School reopening surveys can also be used to determine the needs of students and families. In
addition,
AN INITIAL GUIDEinformal
TO LEVERAGINGassessment processes
THE POWER OF SOCIAL may
AND EMOTIONAL involve
LEARNING AS YOUengaging students
PREPARE TO REOPEN in YOUR
AND RENEW discourse, written
SCHOOL COMMUNITY
and oral reflections on their experiences, reading and writing activities that are culturally and
5 | © 2020 CASEL All Rights Reserved
linguistically sustaining, use of math in low-stakes problem-solving, and other instructionally
embedded strategies that can help teachers and students understand how students’ out-of-school
experiences are influencing their thinking and approach to learning while providing an opportunity
for teachers to build caring, feedback-oriented relationships with students.
Regardless of the specific approach, schools should create ongoing opportunities for connection
and for identifying students who need additional support, taking care to be inclusive of and
give additional focus to students who are English learners, are experiencing homelessness, are
undocumented or from mixed-immigration-status families, have a disability, live in rural areas, or
are impacted by the juvenile justice or foster care systems.
Some districts are also pioneering new digital solutions to offer continuous feedback to school leaders
and educators about students’ social and emotional and additional learning needs. California’s
CORE Districts partnered with Education Analytics to provide districts across the state with a
new interactive platform, Rally, that will help teachers and school leaders track data on students’

well-being and academic progress by putting multiple sources of available data in one place. The goal
is to support teachers in their responses to the unique needs of each individual student, to address
the trauma that many students experience, and to work toward equity and racial justice.
Prioritize assessments that illuminate student growth and learning

When it comes to assessments used for
diagnostic purposes, local needs—and As state and local leaders compile
particularly those of teachers and
students—must be centered. As state and
and release guidance about how
local leaders compile and release guidance assessments should be used in the
about how assessments should be used fall, it will be crucial to emphasize the
in the fall, it will be crucial to emphasize
the use of tools and instructional tasks use of tools and instructional tasks
that will provide the most useful kinds that will provide the most useful
of information to move student learning
kinds of information to move student
forward within the classroom. State and
local leaders should emphasize authentic learning forward within the classroom.
diagnostic and formative assessment
approaches rather than decontextualized
summative assessments.
What Are Formative and Diagnostic Assessments?

Experts identify three primary goals of assessments, including:
1. Assessment of learning: Assessments that are used to monitor student progress at the end of
instruction (e.g., summative assessments).
2. Assessment for learning: Assessments that are used to directly surface current student
understanding and provide feedback for next steps in learning (e.g., diagnostic and formative
assessment processes).
3. Assessment as learning: Assessments used for either summative or formative purposes that
take a performance-based approach, asking students to show what they know and can do by
actually doing certain tasks (e.g., writing an essay or designing an experiment), thus engaging
students in the learning process while surfacing student understanding.
Formative assessment, or assessment for learning, is carried out as part of the instructional
process for the purpose of adapting instruction to improve learning. Formative assessment is
contrasted with summative assessment, which measures the outcomes of learning that has
already occurred.
Diagnostic assessment is a particular type of formative assessment intended to help teachers

identify students’ specific knowledge, skills, and understanding in order to build on each student’s
strengths and specific needs. Because of their domain specificity and design, diagnostic tools can
guide curriculum planning in more specific ways than most summative assessments.
Combined with insights from diagnostic assessments that help teachers identify students’ current
thinking and chart next steps, formative assessment processes allow students and teachers
to monitor and adjust learning together, in real time, as they progress along an identified path.

Formative assessment processes provide feedback both to the teacher and the learner; the feedback
is then used to adjust ongoing teaching and learning strategies to improve students’ attainment
of curricular learning targets or goals on a day-to-day and minute-to-minute basis. Formative
assessment processes are fundamentally grounded in relationships, providing participatory ways for
students and teachers to attend to the full set of student experiences. These processes are linked to
instruction and designed to support growth, as suggested in the following table.
Instructionally relevant assessment that Instructionally relevant assessment that

supports growth looks less like… supports growth looks more like…
• Standardized, multiple-choice tests or • Contextualized opportunities for students
banks of items to make their thinking (not just right or
wrong answers) visible to inform next steps
in learning
• Assessment opportunities that happen • Embedded checks on student
entirely separately from learning understanding that happen as part of
experiences learning sequences
• Assessments that assume a single right • Assessment processes that illuminate
answer and a dominant way of knowing as facets of student thinking and
the goal understanding that build complex
cognition in multiple ways
• Emphasis on assigning grades and scores • Emphasis on descriptive feedback
• Assessments that occur after learning has • Processes that treat current student
occurred and focus on locating deficits for understanding as a resource for extending
remediation learning and making connections
• Assessments that focus on content as the • Assessments that integrate content and
primary goal for learning disciplinary practices so that students
develop and consider evidence as part of
acquiring knowledge
• Processes that focus on mastery of • Processes that take into account learning
discrete learning goals progressions and curricular models of
learning
• Processes that focus on educators • Processes that include students’
and policymakers as the consumers of participation in their learning through self-
assessment data assessment, reflection, and goal-setting
• Focus on the instrument • Focus on the process
Provide access to diagnostic assessment tools that pinpoint student thinking relative to
learning progressions and provide actionable guidance over time for how to move students along.
Diagnostic assessments are only as useful as the student thinking they surface. It is essential that
the assessments used give students the opportunity to make their thinking—and not just right or
wrong answers—visible and that they include careful interpretation guidance that helps teachers
and students understand which next steps in learning will move student thinking forward. State
and local leaders should consider assessments that include performance tasks, which teachers can
build upon and modify to suit their needs, and reports on individual student progress relative to
multiyear learning progressions rather than a focus on percentile scores and rankings.

For example, California provides districts with a state-approved set of options they may want to
consider as part of their assessment strategies for the upcoming school year. The list includes
assessments such as the Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA), which provides opportunities
to individually assess students through both performance tasks and guided interviews multiple
times a year. The DRA connects student performance to strengths, areas for growth, and
personalized learning pathways to move forward. It is individually administered to students several
times a year, allowing teachers to determine each student’s independent and instructional reading
level by evaluating reading engagement, oral reading fluency, and comprehension. The diagnostic
DRA Word Analysis assessment provides additional information on how struggling and emerging
readers attend to and work with various components of spoken and written words. The resulting
individualized plan documents what each student needs to learn next and enables teachers to
differentiate instruction and select books at the appropriate level. Teachers can then intentionally
“scaffold up” to provide students with the support they need to engage with grade-level texts.
Support locally relevant assessments, rather than selecting a single statewide assessment
for all students. Formative assessment processes are an essential part of effective teaching and
learning. While states may feel some pressure to provide a statewide measure of student learning
early in the year, a summative test that delivers only a set of scores or proficiency levels will
not help educators or students as much as tools that diagnose where students are in more fine-
grained ways and inform decisions about teaching. Moreover, they distract teachers from valuable
instruction time by introducing both testing and preparation time that could be better spent
connecting with students, understanding their learning needs, and moving them forward.
Many districts have already chosen and integrated a diagnostic or interim assessment strategy
into their curriculum and teaching plans. Preserving access to these existing approaches will allow
districts to evaluate where students are in their learning when they return to school—relative to
their progress in the prior year—and to follow their progress in the year ahead.
Furthermore, research shows that assessments to support and inform learning are most effective when
they are connected to planned curriculum, instructional approaches, and materials for learning. While
there are research-based learning progressions that span multiple grade levels in many disciplines,
student learning is deeply connected to local contexts—the scope and sequence a district is pursuing,
the curriculum teachers are using, and students’ experiences in and outside the classroom.
For example, many diagnostic assessments are linked to specific next steps for teaching that
may be embedded in a particular curriculum, such as a culturally relevant classroom library with
leveled texts in multiple languages, or a familiar software program that supports practice in
particular math skills. A school for newly immigrated students may most need to assess English
language development progress for its students, rather than using an inaccessible test in English
that provides little information for the teaching needed. This makes it particularly challenging to
find a “one-size-fits-all” approach to diagnostic assessments. To be useful, they have to be tied
intentionally to local decisions about how student learning is supported and structured.
States could consider providing guidelines while enabling local ownership of which assessments—
integrated into curriculum and instructional strategies—are most productive to use. This could
include providing guidance about a range of assessment options that might be useful, with
considerations for schools and districts to weigh as they determine which is most useful for their
context, and/or providing a set of common performance tasks that teachers and schools can decide
to implement in instructionally relevant ways.

Do not overassess: Make use of expertise, tools, and
data that are already available. There is an abundance There is an abundance of
of information about individual and groups of students’ information about individual
progress already available within schools and districts,
if educators and leaders are supported in using it. In
and groups of students’
addition to summative test scores, report cards, teachers’ progress already available
classroom records, and school-level cumulative records, within schools and districts,
many schools and districts have diagnostic and formative
assessment processes in place already. In many cases, if educators and leaders
these processes are part of their ongoing teaching and are supported in using it.
learning efforts, and the schools and districts have
built capacity and routines to support teachers and
administrators in understanding and using the resulting
data. Rather than adding new tests, schools and districts should be supported in making effective use
of the tools they already have in place, designed to be useful within their local contexts.
Additionally, individual teachers collected a wealth of information about their students during the
2019–20 school year and should be supported with time and opportunity to share that information
with the students’ new teachers in the fall. Leaders can intentionally cultivate horizontal and
vertical networks across subjects within a grade and across grade-level instructors to ensure that
teachers are going into the fall term with the best possible understanding of student learning.
Students with learning disabilities and English learners are at particular risk of being overassessed.
TESOL has published guidelines for serving English learners in this time of the COVID-19 crisis,
including methods for using informal and performance-based assessments for these students
that can minimize the number of sit-down tests they encounter as well as supporting teachers in
meeting their instructional needs.
Support acceleration of learning, not remediation

While many districts and educators feel pressure to address learning loss through remedial
instruction, research shows that grade retention and “down tracking” actually have the opposite
effect: Students who experience these deficit-oriented approaches are more likely to fall further
behind their peers, as they are often prevented from engaging with rich curriculum opportunities
and are subjected to stigma, which undermines their confidence, motivation, and learning.3
Educators and leaders should commit to strategies that focus on scaffolding up: that is, providing
students with opportunities to participate in engaging learning opportunities that are within their
zone of proximal development, providing appropriate supports and “just-in-time” scaffolds to
support strong progress. Informal (and more formal) formative assessment information can be used
to identify students’ current thinking, skills, and ideas, allowing teachers to provide students with
the specific supports to be able to engage with targeted material.
Tailored acceleration strategies use formative assessments to help teachers explicitly address
learning gaps associated with skills that were meant to be previously learned. Linking formative
assessments to grade-level concepts can help students make faster progress than remedial courses
that provide little opportunity for them to truly catch up. Such strategies are also more successful
than plowing through grade-level standards without attention to skill gaps that create failure for
many students. (See “Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time” for additional strategies to
support accelerated progress.)

Emphasize actionable feedback as a means for improvement. Some of the largest gains in
student performance come from teachers and students themselves (both self and peers) providing
actionable, descriptive feedback using criteria applied to tasks that are grounded in student
performance. Most important is that students have the opportunity to respond to this feedback as
they practice and revise their work. Conversely, grades and scores often limit student motivation
and learning.4 Formative assessment processes can accelerate and advance learning for all students
if they focus on providing students with detailed and descriptive feedback—rather than scores and
grades—about performance and, importantly, how to improve.5
State and local leaders can consider ways to increase the footprint of formative assessment
processes within their assessment systems, and they can support teachers’ knowledge and skills for
using these kinds of assessments. Teachers can learn to use both informal processes (e.g., check-ins
with students, listening to student discourse, evaluating student-generated artifacts produced as
part of a learning cycle, and exit tickets) and formal processes (e.g., structured assignments that
are evaluated according to particular criteria and assessments that are administered multiple times
throughout the year). In both cases, educators and leaders should emphasize measures that produce
descriptive feedback that can improve learning while learning is ongoing, through strategies and
tasks that students can engage in to grow toward learning goals and success criteria.
This approach is important for all children and is often best exemplified in early childhood
assessments. For example, many early childhood assessments are based on teacher observation of
students performing a work-embedded task and produce descriptive feedback that can be shared
with children and families. These assessments, such as the Desired Results assessment used in
California, ask teachers to observe students two to three times throughout the year and observe
their progress on multiple domains of development, including physical, social and emotional,
language and literacy, English language, math and science, and approaches to learning. The rubric
used to measure progress helps identify not just whether students are on track, but what the next
stage of development might be, and includes a progression of skills that can be measured from
infancy to kindergarten. The information gained from the assessment can be used to guide teaching
and inform conversations with families.
Promote the use of high-quality

performance tasks that provide Performance-based approaches to
rich information, not just scores. assessments can provide students
Performance-based approaches to
assessments can provide students
and teachers with information about
and teachers with information about both student performance relative to
both student performance relative to learning goals and students’ thinking
learning goals and students’ thinking
and understanding, which can be
and understanding, which can be
leveraged into next steps. This makes leveraged into next steps.
such approaches particularly compelling
assessment tools, as they can provide
avenues for detailed formative feedback
while both holistically surfacing evidence of student thinking and providing learning opportunities
through the assessment. Performance assessments are particularly well suited for feedback based
on transparent rubrics, which can help students identify how they are progressing and how they

can grow and improve their knowledge and skills. States can play a variety of roles in incentivizing
performance assessments, from making their use a formal requirement (such as Oregon’s Local
Performance Assessment Requirement) to cultivating libraries of vetted performance tasks (such
as the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium’s Tools for Teachers) that can be modified and
used locally.
One example of an instrument that uses performance-based assessments to support formative

processes is the Mathematics Assessment Resource Service suite of assessment resources, which
includes lessons that embed research-based performance tasks in math (Balanced Assessments
of Mathematics) that can be used to formatively support student learning. In addition to end-of-
instruction performance tasks, these assessment resources provide teachers with modifiable lessons
that embed performance-based formative assessment opportunities, with clear support for teachers
around learning goals, interpreting student performance, and next steps for teachers to pursue.
These lessons and tasks are grounded in descriptive rubrics rather than scores and prioritize next
steps over labeling student performance. Many of these tasks have also been incorporated into the
Acuity diagnostic assessment system that is used by many states and districts.
Invest in teachers’ knowledge and skills for formative assessment

Formative assessment is fundamentally a process between students and teachers. No matter which
tools are used, effective formative assessment practices depend on teachers who know how to
interpret student responses and take next steps to move forward. Research suggests that while
teachers often have access to assessment data, they are poorly supported in understanding how
to interpret that information and take next steps in response.6 Investing in teachers, and their
understanding of theories of learning, learning progressions, and formative feedback cycles, is
imperative to support student success.
Support ongoing and embedded teacher professional learning that encourages teachers
to adopt culturally responsive and sustaining formative assessment processes as part of their
existing teaching responsibilities. Such assessments are responsive to students’ base of experience,
respectful of their cultures, and grounded in their learning in the classroom. In many districts,
professional learning to support formative assessment practices is limited or missing altogether; is
provided primarily by assessment instrument developers and tied to the instruments themselves;
or is something teachers have to pay for out of pocket. Given the centrality of formative assessment
processes in learning—and the particular urgency around effective formative assessment processes
in light of COVID-19—it is essential that states and districts allocate funding and dedicated,
sustained time for collaborative teacher learning. This is particularly effective when connected
directly to teachers’ practice, such as being centered on task development and student work analysis
of tasks that are actually administered in a given teacher’s classroom.
The National Education Association (NEA) has created a micro-credentials site with certification
banks on a wide variety of topics to make it easier for educators to access professional learning
opportunities. NEA micro-credentials provide options for educators to participate in a learning
community and are performance-based. The Assessment Literacy certification bank includes
six micro-credentials for educators to develop their knowledge and skills to utilize meaningful
assessment practices.

Build capacity for meaningful use of assessment information that is already a part of a
teacher’s repertoire, rather than introducing new tools with little support for implementation or
process. Without attention to assessment literacy and developing teacher practice with formative
assessment, there is a limit to how much new assessments and tools can impact learning—and
indeed, they may actually detract from meaningful learning. By working in communities of practice
centered on student work, teachers can more effectively use the assessment information available
to them in their classrooms.
Washington is one example of a state that is dedicating professional learning resources for
assessment. For several years, the state has provided a 2-day professional development session
for kindergarten teachers at the beginning of the school year related to WaKIDS, the state’s
kindergarten readiness assessment. The assessment is linked to the state’s preschool curriculum but
has been modified to be more culturally responsive and includes a parent engagement component.
In professional development, teachers learn how to conduct objective student observations and
how to use the assessment results as a mechanism for parent engagement through one-on-one
meetings. The assessment is also used as a means of creating conversations between preschool
and kindergarten teachers, who often have limited lines of communication, about fostering
student development.
Anticipate moving toward more coherent systems of assessment of, for, and as learning
As education leaders focus on assessment for learning in this time of crisis, it may also become
possible to start a new conversation about summative assessments, which have typically driven
learning in the United States toward decontextualized, multiple-choice modes of learning and
teaching that are disconnected from real-world applications of knowledge and out of sync with
the demands of a knowledge-based economy and society in which information is exponentially
increasing every day.7
Ultimately, formative and summative assessments should be coherently linked through a well-
articulated model of learning that incorporates learning progressions representing ambitious
learning goals, along with intermediate stages and instructional means for reaching those goals.8
Both formative and summative assessments should represent these goals and stages well and
should foster the kind of instruction that will lead to critical thinking and problem-solving, transfer
of knowledge to new situations, and the ability to continue to learn.
Assessment reform efforts in states such as New Hampshire, which have emphasized formative
processes and the use of performance tasks for measuring learning more frequently and
authentically, may lead the way toward more coherent and meaningful assessment policies across
the country. More states are taking advantage of assessment waivers from the U.S. Department of
Education, and the Every Student Succeeds Act is eligible for reauthorization at the end of 2020,
which may provide an opportunity to create new ground rules that will allow assessment to become
a more useful tool for learning.

Resources
• Learning as We Go: Principles for Effective Assessment During the COVID-19 Pandemic (Center
on Reinventing Public Education). Based on a consensus panel of experts, this document
provides a set of principles that can help schools, districts, and states make decisions about
assessments to inform instruction as schools reopen. While these principles can inform good
assessment practices in general, they are particularly salient in our current environment.
• Using Formative Assessments to Create Coherent and Equitable Assessment Systems
(University of Colorado Boulder). This brief describes principles and examples for building
coherent assessment systems, informed by research and lessons learned from 3 decades of
assessment reform.
• Formative Assessment and Next-Generation Assessment Systems: Are We Losing an Opportunity?
(Council of Chief State School Officers). This paper can serve as a catalyst and resource for ongoing
conversations and planning. It describes why it is critical to make the distinction that formative
assessment is not a tool, but a process true to the practice of effective teaching and learning.
• Blueprint for Testing: How Schools Should Assess Students During the COVID Crisis (FutureEd).
This resource provides guidance on how and when states, school districts, and schools should use
assessments to gauge and help accelerate students’ learning and provide systems-level insights.
• Guidance on Diagnostic and Formative Assessments (California Department of Education). This
implementation tool assists district leadership in selecting and using diagnostic assessments
to understand students’ academic needs throughout the school year. It describes approved
diagnostic assessments that are aligned to Common Core standards and provides information
about how to use the expanded interim and formative assessment tools provided by the Smarter
Balanced Assessment Consortium to inform instruction for all students.
• School Reopening Surveys (Panorama Education). These reopening surveys can invite students
and families into the reopening process as well as enable districts to determine those students
and families most in need of additional in-person instruction.
• The Informal Formative Assessment Cycle as a Model for Teacher Practice (STEM Teaching
Tools, University of Washington Institute for Science and Math Education). This research brief
summarizes and illustrates, through examples of informal assessment conversations, the nature
of informal formative assessment and its connection to student learning.
• Beyond “Misconceptions”: How to Recognize and Build on Facets of Student Thinking (STEM
Teaching Tools, University of Washington Institute for Science and Math Education). This resource
presents things to consider; discusses how to attend to equity; and provides recommendations
for actions educators can take to be able to recognize, build on, and respond to the range of
ideas, or facets of students’ thinking, during instruction.
• NEA Micro-Credentials in Assessment Literacy (National Education Association). The NEA
micro-credentials site was created to make it easier for educators to access professional learning
opportunities. The Assessment Literacy certification bank includes six micro-credentials for
educators to develop their knowledge and skills to utilize meaningful assessment practices.
• Best Practices in Universal Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Screening: An Implementation
Guide (School Mental Health Collaborative). This guide summarizes research-based best
practices and resources for selecting, implementing, and using data from universal social,
emotional, and behavioral screening.

Endnotes
1. Hattie, J., & Yates, G. C. (2013). Visible Learning and the Science of How We Learn. New York, NY:
Routledge; Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (2010). Inside the black box: Raising standards through classroom
assessment. Phi Delta Kappan, 92(1), 81–90.
2. Lane, K. L., Menzies, H. M., Oakes, W. P., & Kalberg, J. R. (2019). Developing a Schoolwide Framework to
Prevent and Manage Learning and Behavior Problems (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Guilford Press; McIntosh, K.,
& Goodman, S. (2016). Integrated Multi-Tiered Systems of Support: Blending RTI and PBIS. New York, NY:
Guilford Press.
3. Darling-Hammond, L. (1998). Alternatives to grade retention: Four complementary strategies to improve
teaching and learning make more sense than holding students in grade. The School Administrator.
https://www.aasa.org/SchoolAdministratorArticle.aspx?id=15030.
4. Shepard, L. A., Penuel, W. R., & Pellegrino, J. (2018). Using learning and motivation theories to coherently
link formative assessment, grading practices, and large-scale assessment. Educational Measurement: Issues
and Practice, 37, 21–34.
5. Hattie, J., & Yates, G. C. (2013). Visible Learning and the Science of How We Learn. New York, NY:
Routledge; Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (2010). Inside the black box: Raising standards through classroom
assessment. Phi Delta Kappan, 92(1), 81–90.
6. Shepard, L. A., Penuel, W. R., & Davidson, K. (2016). Using formative assessment to create coherent and
equitable assessment systems. Boulder, CO: University of Colorado Boulder. http://learndbir.org/resources/
Shepard-Penuel-Davidson-Kappan-FA.pdf.
7. Darling-Hammond, L., & Adamson, F. (2015). Beyond the Bubble Test: How Performance Assessments
Support 21st Century Learning. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.
8. Shepard, L. A. (2019). Classroom assessment to support teaching and learning. The ANNALS of the American
Academy of Political and Social Science, 683(1), 183–200. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716219843818.

Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning
I’m concerned about food, jobs, money, my education. Racism toward Asian Pacific
Islander folks is a big concern for us too. I miss being around my friends, and I’m
feeling really, really depressed, but I can’t really tell my family.
—Oakland Student
The COVID-19 crisis has stretched families to the breaking point, as many struggle to balance
the demands of work with caring for their loved ones—often at a distance. Children of all ages are
grappling with the ensuing stress and trauma. The results of racial discrimination have also been
clear throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, as children and families of color have experienced
greater infection and mortality rates, unemployment, housing and food instability, and the
digital divide. Although adversity impacts learning, the psychological effects of these traumatic
experiences can be partly mitigated by
strong, trusting relationships, social and
emotional supports, and opportunities to
Social and emotional skills, coupled
develop social and emotional learning (SEL) with mental health supports and
skills. These skills, coupled with mental restorative practices, are critical
health supports and restorative practices,
are critical for supporting children, youth, for supporting children, youth,
and adults as they cope with the challenges, and adults as they cope with the
uncertainty, and stress presented by the
challenges, uncertainty, and stress
pandemic, the economic crisis, and systemic
racism. Infusing SEL through both virtual presented by the pandemic, the
and in-person instruction will help to economic crisis, and systemic racism.
mitigate the pandemic’s impact on lifelong
success and learning.
What Students Need

Recent data indicate that young people are experiencing chronic stress and trauma as they navigate
basic needs and health concerns, a lack of connectivity to their school communities, and exhaustion
from constant anxiety about the future. The pandemic has been disruptive for nearly everyone but
has also exposed and exacerbated existing inequities, including those in health and safety, mental
health, and learning opportunities and experiences. As one middle school teacher described,
although her students were hungry to learn, they faced many barriers to participation:
Many of my students are refugees, fleeing violence in their home countries,

children who have been separated from their families, and longtime English
language learners…. My students fight a silent battle against inequity every day.
Distance learning has made this battle so much harder.
In order to buffer a generation of children and youth from the negative impacts of these cumulative
inequities, schools need to nurture the whole child by intentionally integrating social and
emotional learning. As part of this effort, in this moment of deep trauma converging with deep

awareness of racial injustice, children and youth need their schools to dismantle practices that
have perpetuated systemic racism, including discriminatory discipline practices that have too often
criminalized and marginalized children of color. These should be replaced with restorative practices
that help students get the help they need while acquiring the social and emotional skills, habits, and
mindsets necessary to be successful in school and in life.
The science of learning and development, which builds on rich developments over the past
2 decades, helps us see that academic, social, and emotional learning are interrelated and
reinforcing and that learning is inherently social and emotional.1 For instance, children and youth
learn best when they feel safe, find the information to be relevant and engaging, are able to focus
their attention, and are actively involved in learning. This requires the ability to combine skills of
emotion regulation and coping strategies with cognitive skills of problem-solving and social skills,
including communication and cooperation.
Attitudes, beliefs, and mindsets also matter for school and life success. Educators and school
personnel play an important role in shaping students’ beliefs about their own abilities, their sense
of belonging, and their academic mindset. Self-efficacy is enhanced by a student’s confidence that
effort increases competence. A growth mindset enables students to engage more productively in
academic and personal pursuits. All of these are supported by an inclusive learning environment
that uses educative and restorative approaches to support behavior rather than relying on punitive
methods that exclude and discourage students.2
The pandemic, economic uncertainty, and heightened awareness of long-standing racial injustices
have made it abundantly clear that children and youth need an adaptive and responsive school
system that supports them to fully develop their social and emotional capacities and leverages
children’s assets to strengthen their learning and well-being.

With support from state and local education leaders, educators have an opportunity as schools and
communities restart, recover, and reinvent to prioritize policies and practices that are immediately
responsive to students’ and adults’ social and emotional needs while building capacity for a whole
child approach going forward.
Implement a comprehensive system of support

Effective school environments take a systematic approach to promoting children’s social,
emotional, and academic well-being in all facets of school life and in connections to the community.
Students’ personal responses to the pandemic, economic crisis, and racial injustices may vary
widely, and some students may need targeted or intensive supports.
CASEL’s SEL roadmap for reopening school recommends that schools develop an “adaptive and
responsive system of tiered supports that leverages students’ assets to help them cope, navigate
and strengthen their social and emotional competencies.” As schools learn about and identify
the strengths and needs of students, they will need clear processes (e.g., screeners, referrals) and
structures (e.g., tiered, integrated systems of support) for school staff to work with families and

partner with school-employed or community-based mental health and trauma professionals to
connect students with additional targeted (tier 2) or intensive (tier 3) supports to meet their needs.
(See, for example, North Dakota’s well-developed resources for multi-tiered systems of support.)
This may include counseling and additional behavioral, mental health, or trauma supports; it
may also include providing connections to food, housing, technology, transportation, or other
resources. (See “Priority 8: Establish Community Schools and Wraparound Supports” for more on
integrated supports and services.) Schools must ensure that these processes avoid labeling students
and do not rely on assumptions about students based upon their race, their language, or their
socioeconomic status.
Ensure opportunities for explicit teaching of social and emotional skills at every grade level
While a whole-school approach to social and emotional learning is necessary, schools also need to
set aside a time and place to focus explicitly on social and emotional skill building.3 By explicitly
teaching the interrelated set of cognitive, social, and emotional competencies that underscore the
way people learn, develop, maintain mutually supportive relationships, and become psychologically
healthy, educators can ensure that students
and staff have tools for both the short term
and long term. Teaching students how to Teaching students how to recognize
recognize and manage their emotions,
and manage their emotions, access
access help when they need it, and learn
problem-solving and conflict resolution help when they need it, and learn
skills makes schools safer. A meta-analysis problem-solving and conflict
of more than 200 studies found that schools
resolution skills makes schools safer.
using SEL programs reduced bullying and
poor behavior while supporting increased
school achievement.
Locate a place in the curriculum and school day in which students and educators can
develop and practice key skills and competencies. In early childhood education and preschool
programs, this may take place through scripted stories and books, and intentional activities
embedded throughout the day. In elementary classrooms, this might take place in morning
meetings or another dedicated block in the day. In middle and high schools, this can take place in
advisories. (See “Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships” for more detail.)
Baltimore City Public Schools built upon existing SEL implementation efforts and developed SEL
lesson plans aligned with grade groupings and weekly themes around compassion, connection,
and courage.

3
environments that promote all students’ social and emotional development.
A large body of research demonstrates the effectiveness of evidence-based SEL programs and practices to support
students’ academic and long-term success. The disruption during the pandemic has further highlighted the
importance of social and emotional competencies to help students cope with challenges, manage stress, practice
empathy, create social bonds across distance, make healthy decisions, take collective action, and manage loss and
Figure 4.1
grief. These situations elevate the role of supportive adults and family-school partnerships in creating conditions
Strategies
that help studentsfor Explicitly
develop Addressing
their academic, Socialcompetencies
social, and emotional and Emotional
to navigateLearning at Every
daily interactions and
challenges, including modified schedules and new learning experiences.
Grade Level
Put it Into Practice

Addressing Students’ Developmental Needs During Transition
Students go through many transitions from early childhood to young adulthood, such as the annual return from
summer break or the transition from middle to high school. What happens during these transitions, and the degree
to which students’ developmental needs are met, influence their social and emotional competencies and long-term
success. To help students with the important transition into this coming school year, identify ways to meet their
developmental needs. For example:
– In early childhood programs: Provide young children with simple strategies for exploring, discussing, and
regulating their emotions. Read alouds offer an easy way to prompt conversations about how big changes
make them feel.
– In elementary school: Support students in developing relationship-building and conflict-resolution skills

by helping them co-create shared agreements for their new class or distance learning environment.
– In middle school: Offer adolescents an opportunity to reconnect and create a sense of closure from the
previous school year, such as by writing letters to their former classmates or teachers, or discussing with
peers how the last few months will impact their perspectives as they enter a new grade.
– In high school: Provide older students with a way to reflect on and document their experience and what
they’ve learned about themselves during the pandemic, either through journal writing, artwork, music,
or other creative outlets.
For more practices, review the SEL Providers Council website.
Source: CASEL. (2020). An initial guide to leveraging the power of social and emotional learning as you prepare to reopen
and•renew your school
Intentionally community.
build structures that promote supportive adult-student relationships and a sense of belonging.
Ensure every student has at least one caring adult at the school who checks in regularly with them and whom they
can reach out to. Also examine daily schedules or class assignments to create greater opportunities for meaningful
Develop or adopt an SEL program. Schools may develop their own approach or adopt an evidence-
teacher-student relationships. Examples include minimizing the number of transitions between teachers and
based SEL program.
classrooms However,
(e.g., through teamadopting a elementary/middle
teaching in program is not enough
schools orto ensure
block positive
scheduling outcomes.
high schools), To
creating
be successful, educators need ongoing support beyond an initial training (e.g., coaching, follow-up
or extending time in homeroom or advisory classes, and “looping” students with the same teachers and peers from
training). It is important
the previous that administrators
year. If distance learning continues,and school
identify leaders
routines support
to maintain the effective
or deepen connectionsimplementation
virtually or
of SEL over the phone,
programs by such as through
setting smaller group meetings
high expectations or individual
and allocating check-ins. for
resources Recognizing that new structures
programming. 4
School
will most likely be in place, create consistent routines and procedures that allow for flexibility as much as possible.
leaders who model the use of SEL language and practices and endorse the use of SEL practices
Predictable structures promote a sense of safety that helps students, especially those who have experienced
throughout the school create a schoolwide climate for SEL.
trauma or struggle behaviorally, regulate emotions and take on new challenges and developmental tasks.
States and districts can support the adoption and implementation of social and emotional
learning by establishing SEL curriculum specialists in leadership positions to support sustainable
AN INITIAL GUIDE TO LEVERAGING THE POWER OF SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL LEARNING AS YOU PREPARE TO REOPEN AND RENEW YOUR SCHOOL COMMUNITY
use of SEL activities for students, educators, and families. School-based SEL coalitions of
9 | © 2020 CASEL All Rights Reserved
educators, community organizations, and families, supported by these district specialists, can
ensure the creation and high-quality implementation of SEL supports based on local needs
of staff and students in every grade. In its reopening plan, Oregon emphasizes the need to
incorporate multiple non-dominant voices in such coalitions and to formalize an SEL lead for
each school.

It is important to prevent potential equity pitfalls
It is important to prevent
by avoiding a deficit mindset that assumes that
the purpose of SEL is to develop skills that some potential equity pitfalls by
students do not possess and to underemphasize avoiding a deficit mindset that
the meaningful development of student agency.
assumes that the purpose of
Because social and emotional competencies
can be expressed differently across cultures, if social and emotional learning
leaders and educators implement SEL without is to develop skills that some
an appreciation of similarities and differences,
with an underemphasis on student agency, some
students do not possess and to
students may feel more alienated. The National underemphasize the meaningful
Equity Project has developed guidance with development of student agency.
recommendations to prevent such pitfalls, as has
CASEL, which offers a five-part webinar series.
Consider using mindfulness strategies. The use of mindfulness strategies and other techniques
for calming oneself, as well as monitoring and redirecting attention, also shows benefits for
learning and stress management.5 Mindfulness practice—which cultivates greater awareness of
one’s experience infused with kindness6—and related contemplative practices have also been
linked to greater social and emotional competencies, including capacities for regulation, as well as
reductions in stress and implicit bias.7 Mindfulness strategies can be integrated into instruction
to include educators and school staff to support their self-care and stress management abilities.
Pure Edge provides several free tools that have been adopted by districts such as Jackson, MS, and
Philadelphia, PA; and by entire states, including Delaware and Rhode Island.
Infuse social and emotional learning into instruction in all classes

Students need opportunities to develop social and emotional skills throughout their school
day. Research shows that when SEL opportunities are embedded throughout the school day and
integrated into other subject matter, the benefits are even more pronounced.8 Capitalizing on
teachable moments reinforces and provides more opportunities for children to practice the skills
they are learning through explicit SEL instruction.
Integrate SEL skills into curriculum and instruction. Schools and educators that have not
already been working to infuse SEL skills into their academic instructional practice may feel
daunted by the task and be unsure of how to do it, but there are helpful resources readily available.
For example, Facing History and Ourselves, EL Education, and Transforming Education have tools
and curricula that include embedded SEL components. Resources based on the science of learning
and development are also available from the National Commission on Social, Emotional, and
Academic Development, CASEL, and Greater Good Science Center.
At Lakewood Elementary School in Sunnyvale, CA, teachers and leaders understand that SEL should
be integrated into every aspect of the school, from explicit classroom instruction and infusion
into academic content to school climate and culture (see Figure 4.2).9 Teachers at Lakewood use
strategies such as the Chillax Corner, which offers space and activities for students to regulate their
emotions when upset; building relationships through team-building exercises; and collaborative
academic work that allows students to put into practice social and emotional competencies such as
active listening, understanding others’ perspectives, and resolving disagreements.

Figure 4.2
Ways That Social and Emotional Learning Can Be Integrated Throughout the
School Day
Students practice self-awareness by

Students are given multiple
identifying how they feel throughout
opportunities for self-directed work and
the day, especially when confronted
play, which develops self-management
with difficult academic tasks.
and responsible decision-making.
Teacher actively models social

and emotional competencies,
stopping at times to “think
Teacher identifies the social
aloud” and describing how
and emotional competencies
she or he feels, thinks, and
needed for academic work,
acts in a certain situation.
and incorporates them into
the lesson plan.
Students develop relationship

skills, such as communication
and collaboration, through
structured group work.
Teacher uses “teachable

moments” to help guide students
through social and emotional
challenges, such as helping
students mediate a conflict.
Source: Melnick, H., & Martinez, L. (2019). Preparing teachers to support social and emotional learning: A case study of San
Jose State University and Lakewood Elementary School. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.

Washoe County School District in Nevada is creating weekly distance learning plans incorporating
practices for all grade levels to continue students’ in-school SEL lessons at home. These efforts
are connected to longer-term investments in SEL curriculum and professional development
the district began making prior to the pandemic. For instance, Washoe developed and trained
SEL lead teams, composed of school staff, to share and debrief data on school climate and on
students’ social and emotional skills, habits, and mindsets. The district also developed early
warning indicators of students at risk of dropping out of school to look at trends in the data
to inform student engagement efforts. These efforts have included student data summits that
district leaders believe have led to greater student engagement and empowerment.10 As a result, in
partnership with WestEd and the Regional Educational Laboratory West (REL West), Washoe County
School District developed a toolkit of student engagement exercises to gather data and analyze
student experiences.
All educators can play an active role in co-regulating students’ behaviors by providing them with
a repertoire of words and strategies to use in different situations to help them develop their self-
regulation skills. For example, teachers might use disagreements as opportunities to help students
practice conflict resolution by walking students through a structured, stepwise process that involves
calming techniques, turn-taking (in which each student acknowledges the other’s perspectives and
emotions), and collaborative solution development. As a component of the school’s advisory class,
Social Justice Humanitas Academy in Los Angeles uses councils to build community and create
space for “the practice of listening and speaking from the heart.” During councils, students and
teachers take turns sharing the positive and difficult things happening in their lives while sitting
together in a circle. North Dakota’s reopening plan specifically suggests expanding advisory classes
to better meet current needs.
It is important that teaching for self-regulation not be implemented in ways that suggest that
students cannot fully express their emotions or demonstrate their feelings, or that students
should exhibit equanimity in the face of trauma and injustice. Concerns have emerged that some
interpretations of SEL have been used to undermine student expression, to manage student
behavior in ways that are culturally insensitive, and, in some cases, to extend policing into
interactions around students’ emotional self-expression. The Abolitionist Teaching Network
identifies ways to engage colleagues and students in conversation in the pursuit of anti-racist,
abolitionist SEL.
Provide guidance and support to develop students’ executive functions and productive
mindsets. In addition to emotional awareness and specific skills for handling emotions and
engaging in prosocial behavior, there are a set of habits and mindsets that can have a powerful
effect on students’ learning and achievement. Holding a growth mindset and connecting academic
endeavors to personal values supports learning and helps students persevere in the face of
challenges. Four key mindsets have been identified as conducive to perseverance and academic
success for students:
1. Belief that one belongs at school

2. Belief in the value of the work
3. Belief that effort will lead to increased competence
4. Sense of self-efficacy and the ability to succeed11

The types of messages conveyed by teachers and schools and corresponding attitudes may be
especially relevant with adolescents whose self-perceptions and perceptions about school have a
strong effect on their motivation and behavior. Effective programs that promote stronger learning
for adolescents involve creating climates in which adolescents feel respected, affirmed, and
challenged with the opportunity to improve through feedback, supports, and chances to revise
their work.12
Institute restorative practices

In this moment, as many schools are
End zero-tolerance policies and
exclusionary discipline. SEL programs considering eliminating the police
cannot enable meaningful long-term presence in schools that has often been
growth for students in environments that
are otherwise authoritarian, punitive,
associated with harsh punishments
and exclusionary, rather than educative for trivial offenses and criminalization
and inclusive. Zero-tolerance policies of children of color, it is essential to
that were widespread in many states
and districts have led to high rates of replace police with restorative practices,
suspension and expulsion that have rather than leaving a vacuum.
also proved to be discriminatory, with
students of color and students with
disabilities disproportionately excluded
from school. Evidence shows that this is not because of worse behavior but because of harsher
treatment for minor offenses, such as tardiness, talking in class, and other nonviolent behavior.
Rather than teaching students how to change their behavior, exclusionary punishment undermines
student learning and attachment to school and increases the chances of students dropping out.
Even one suspension can double the odds of a student dropping out, feeding the school-to-prison
pipeline, which for some children begins in preschool.
In this moment, as many schools are considering eliminating the police presence in schools that has
often been associated with harsh punishments for trivial offenses and criminalization of children
of color, it is essential to replace police with restorative practices, rather than leaving a vacuum. As
Tiana Lee, the Alternatives to Suspensions Specialist at Brooklyn Center High School, described:
The impacts of suspensions were clear: our neediest students were falling further
behind and excluding them did little to improve their behavior. But simply ending
suspensions was not enough, as we had still not begun to address the root causes of
students’ misbehavior.
Accumulating research evidence suggests that shifting to restorative practices reduces the use of
exclusionary discipline, resulting in fewer and less racially disparate suspensions and expulsions
while also making schools safer, improving school climate and teacher–student relationships, and
improving academic achievement.13 Restorative practices enable educators and school leaders to
understand how they may unintentionally trigger or escalate problem behavior; these practices
help students and staff cultivate strategies for resolving conflict and creating healthier, more
positive interactions.14

Adopt equity-oriented restorative practices that enable students to solve problems.
Restorative justice practices support the overarching goal of strengthening school climate by
developing a restorative mindset in adults that allows them to establish and sustain relationships
and build a sense of community that is a precursor to community members’ understanding that
violating community norms harms their community. Central to a restorative justice approach is the
belief that all people have worth and that it is important to build, maintain, and repair relationships
within a community.15
Relationships and trust are supported through restorative practices, including universal
interventions such as daily classroom meetings in which students and staff regularly share
experiences and feelings, community-building circles, and conflict resolution strategies. These
are supplemented with restorative conferences when a challenging event has occurred, often
managed through peer mediation. A restorative justice approach deals with conflict by identifying
or naming the wrongdoing, repairing the harm, and restoring relationships. As a result, restorative
discipline is built on strong relationships and relational trust, with systems for students to reflect
on any mistakes, repair damage to the community, and get counseling when needed. Creating an
environment in which students learn to be responsible and are given the opportunity for agency
and contribution can transform social, emotional, and academic behavior and outcomes.
The more comprehensive and well-infused the approach, the stronger the outcomes. For example,
a continuum model including proactive restorative exchanges, affirmative statements, informal
conferences, large-group circles, and restorative conferences substantially changed school culture
and outcomes rapidly in one major district, as disparities in school discipline were reduced every
year for each racial group, and gains were made in academic achievement across all subjects in
nearly every grade level.16
At the school level, Bronxdale High School in New York City illustrates what can happen when
a comprehensive program of equity-oriented educative and restorative behavioral supports is
put in place. An inclusion high school that serves a disproportionate population of students
with disabilities in a low-income community of color, the once chaotic and unsafe site is now
a safe, caring, and collaborative community in which staff, students, and families have voice,
agency, and responsibility. At Bronxdale, community building—accomplished through SEL
work in advisories, student-designed classroom constitutions, and supportive affirmations and
community development in all classrooms—is integral to the now successful restorative approach.
As Bronxdale Principal Carolyn Quintana described, restorative practices have value only when
there is something to restore and that something is “the community, relationships, and harmony.”17
Restorative deans support the building of community and implementation of a restorative justice
approach; teaching students behavioral skills and responsibility; and repairing harm by making
amends through restorative practices such as peer mediation, circles, and youth court. Their work
is also supported by teachers, social workers, counselors, and community partners who are part of
the school’s multi-tiered system of support (MTSS) that enables trauma-informed and healing-
informed supports for students.
Now a demonstration site for restorative justice in New York City, Bronxdale is known for its low
suspension rate and strong academic program and results. Although most of its 445 students
enter Bronxdale performing far below proficiency levels on standardized tests, they leave having
outperformed their peers in credit accrual, 4- and 6-year graduation rates, and enrollment in
postsecondary education.

Importantly, restorative practices can be implemented at all grade levels. Building community and
supporting children by teaching them the skills to resolve conflicts and repair harm can begin in
early childhood. For example, Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) in California has been scaling
implementation of its restorative justice program since 2007. Glenview Elementary School in OUSD
is one of the schools implementing schoolwide restorative justice practices, and one of its key
strategies is the use of dialogue circles (illustrated in this video) to check in, settle disputes, teach
skills, and build community.
Enact policies that enable social and emotional learning and restorative practices
Adopt standards and guidance for SEL and restorative practices. Throughout this pandemic
and beyond, states and districts can support schools by developing clear guidelines and standards
for children’s learning and development in these domains. Standards can span preschool through
grade 12 and specify the social and emotional skills children should be able to demonstrate,
describe how to promote those competencies in children, and specify the conditions and settings
that cultivate these competencies. They can also specify the necessary preparation and ongoing
professional learning for educators to infuse social and emotional skills into all school experiences.
Washington state has worked to develop and implement social and emotional learning standards,
benchmarks, indicators, and a constellation of professional learning resources, including an SEL
Online Education Module that covers trauma-informed, restorative, and culturally responsive and
affirming practices as well as promoting social awareness, relationships skills, self-awareness,
self-management, and responsible decision-making skills.
Illinois and Minnesota are two states that have developed restorative practice guidance and
resources for schools. Minnesota has developed a suite of resources, including key principles to
guide restorative practices in schools and implementation guidance to provide school districts,
administrators, and educators with resources to integrate restorative practice into schoolwide
climate, discipline, and teaching and learning. The key principles, each of which has corresponding
practices, include:
• Principles that develop a restorative mindset—including putting relationships first and

providing support and accountability so that those in positions of authority (teachers, staff,
and administrators) do things with students rather than to or for them;
• Principles for just and equitable learning communities—including the belief that history,
race, justice, and language matter; that interconnection and innate goodness matter; and
that balancing relationship building and problem-solving in the process matters; and
• Principles of just and equitable discipline—including emotional literacy and discipline as
guidance to repair harm, make amends, and give back to the community.
The Dignity in Schools Campaign has developed a model code and several additional resources that
provide recommended language for alternative policies to pushout and zero-tolerance policies.
The campaign’s guidance supports removing police from schools and replacing them with effective
staff-led strategies for classroom management, conflict resolution, and mediation. When staff lack
strategies for managing behavior, focused supports may be needed. Using class-level data to provide
targeted professional development for teachers may also be effective.

Provide funding and supports for curriculum resources and professional development. States
such as Minnesota and cities such as Cleveland, OH, have developed curriculum resources for
educators to infuse social-emotional skills into school experiences and have funded counseling and
wraparound supports that enable children to cope with the many challenges they are experiencing.
State agencies and districts can use ESSA funds as well as federal stimulus funds from the Coronavirus
Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to support SEL programs and teacher training in SEL.
(See “Priority 10: Leverage More Adequate and Equitable School Funding” for more detail on how to
leverage federal funding.)
School leaders can also create working conditions (e.g., time and space for professional learning and
self-care) that help adults feel connected, empowered, and valued. Studies have found that efforts
to support SEL are strongest when they are conducted by school personnel who have opportunities
to support and deepen their own skills,18 which highlights the critical need for ongoing professional
development as a vital element for promoting these capacities in students. Districts can take
advantage of hybrid learning schedules that allow for a transition day between cohorts to dedicate
more time to professional development and collaboration.
Professional learning should focus on

trauma-informed SEL practices; culturally Professional learning should focus on
responsive, affirming, and anti-racist
practices; restorative justice; and the
trauma-informed social and emotional
promotion of social and emotional learning practices; culturally responsive,
competencies for educators and school affirming, and anti-racist practices;
leaders to engage in self-care in order
to respond to the needs of students. restorative justice; and the promotion
Organizations such as Sanford Inspire, of social and emotional competencies
part of Sanford Harmony at the National
for educators and school leaders.
University System, and the Friday Institute
at North Carolina State University have
developed free courses to support educators
in building their capacity to support SEL and their own social and emotional skills. The American
Federation of Teachers (AFT) has also developed professional learning resources and lessons to
support educators’ capacity for SEL-informed and trauma-informed practices.
Resources
• Reunite, Renew, and Thrive: Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Roadmap for Returning to School
(Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning). This guide provides school leaders
with whole-school, anti-racist SEL strategies centered on relationships and built on the existing
strengths of a school community. Specifically, the guide provides concrete SEL Critical Actions with
essential questions; actions as schools prepare, implement, and sustain their integrative SEL work;
and tools to help them along the way.
the Process of Coming Back Together (Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the
Transformation of Schools). This guide poses questions and practices for policymakers, district and
school leaders, and school personnel to consider for engaging in culturally responsive, equitable,
and sustainable school reinventions.

• The Whole Child: Building Systems of Integrated Student Support During and After COVID-19
(Center for Optimized Student Support at Boston College). This action guide offers practical steps
for schools to develop a system of integrated support.
• A Model Code on Education and Dignity (Dignity in Schools Campaign). The Model Code toolkit
is organized into five chapters: (1) Education; (2) Participation; (3) Dignity; (4) Freedom From
Discrimination; and (5) Data, Monitoring, and Accountability. Each of these chapters addresses
a key component of providing a quality education and reflects core human rights principles and
values. Each chapter includes recommended policies for states, districts, and schools.
• Restorative Practices: Fostering Healthy Relationships & Promoting Positive Discipline in Schools
(National Opportunity to Learn Campaign). This guide provides examples of restorative practices,
along with implementation tips and strategies as well as examples from school districts.
• Restorative Justice: Resources for Schools (Edutopia). This is a compilation of resources and
case studies for bringing restorative justice into schools and classrooms.
• Social-Emotional Learning and Equity Pitfalls and Recommendations (National Equity Project).
This chart highlights potential pitfalls and provides guidance on how to avoid them as schools
advance equity and inclusion in the implementation of SEL.
• Social and Emotional Development Matters: Taking Action Now for Future Generations
(Pennsylvania State University). This broad policy brief indicates a number of steps with actions
to take at every level (federal, state, district, school, classroom, and home) to integrate SEL into a
whole child approach.
Endnotes
1. Darling-Hammond, L., Flook, L., Cook-Harvey, C., Barron, B. J., & Osher, D. (2019). Implications for
educational practice of the science of learning and development. Applied Developmental Science, 24(2),
97–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2018.1537791.
2. Darling-Hammond, L., & Cook-Harvey, C. M. (2018). Educating the whole child: Improving school climate to
support student success. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
3. Greenberg, M. T., Domitrovich, C. E., Weissberg, R. P., & Durlak, J. A. (2017). Social and emotional learning
as a public health approach to education. Future of Children, 27(1), 13–32; Hamedani, M. G., & Darling-
Hammond, L. (2015). Social emotional learning in high school: How three urban high schools engage, educate,
and empower youth. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education. https://edpolicy.
stanford.edu/library/publications/1310.
4. Durlak, J. A., Weissberg, R. P., Dymnicki, A. B., Taylor, R. D., & Schellinger, K. B. (2011). The impact
of enhancing students’ social and emotional learning: A meta-analysis of school-based universal
interventions. Child Development, 82, 405–432.
5. Zenner, C., Herrnleben-Kurz, S., & Walach, H. (2014). Mindfulness-based interventions in schools: A
systematic review and meta-analysis. Frontiers in Psychology, 5(603).
6. Mind and Life Education Research Network. (2012). Contemplative practices and mental training:
Prospects for American education. Child Development Perspectives, 6, 146–153.
7. Schonert-Reichl, K., & Roeser, R. W. (2016). “Mindfulness in Education: Introduction and Overview of
the Handbook” in Schonert-Reichl, K., & Roeser, R. W. (Eds.). Handbook of Mindfulness in Education:
Integrating Theory and Research Into Practice (pp. 3–16). New York, NY: Springer.
8. Jones, S. M., & Bouffard, M. B. (2012). Social and emotional learning in schools: From programs to
strategies. Social Policy Report, 26(4), 1–33.

9. Melnick, H., & Martinez, L. (2019). Preparing teachers to support social and emotional learning: A
case study of San Jose State University and Lakewood Elementary School. Palo Alto, CA: Learning
Policy Institute.
11. Farrington, C. (2013). Academic mindsets as a critical component of deeper learning [Whitepaper]. Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago School Research.
12. Dweck, C. S. (2017). Mindset - Updated Edition: Changing the Way You Think to Fulfill Your Potential.
New York, NY: Brown, Little Book Group; Yeager, D. S., & Walton, G. M. (2011). Social-psychological
interventions in education: They’re not magic. Review of Educational Research, 81(2), 267–301.
13. Augustine, C. H., Engberg, J., Grimm, G. E., Lee, E., Wang, E. L., Christianson, K., & Joseph, A. A. (2018).
Can restorative practices improve school climate and curb suspensions? An evaluation of the impact of
restorative practices in a mid-sized urban school district. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR2840.html; Fronius, T., Darling-Hammond, S.,
Sutherland, H., Guckenburg, S., Hurley, N., & Petrosino, A. (2019). Restorative Justice in U.S. Schools:
An Updated Research Review. San Francisco, CA: WestEd. https://www.wested.org/wp-content/
uploads/2019/04/resource-restorative-justice-in-u-s-schools-an-updated-research-review.pdf;
Gregory, A., Clawson, K., Davis, A., & Gerewitz, J. (2016). The promise of restorative practices to
transform teacher–student relationships and achieve equity in school discipline. Journal of Educational
and Psychological Consultation, 26(4), 325–353.
14. Losen, D. J. (2015). Closing the Discipline Gap: Equitable Remedies for Excessive Exclusion. New York, NY:
Teachers College Press.
15. Evans, K., & Vaanering, D. (2016). The Little Book of Restorative Justice in Education: Fostering
Responsibility, Healing, and Hope in Schools. New York, NY: Good Book.
16. Gonzalez, T. (2015). “Socializing Schools: Addressing Racial Disparities in Discipline Through Restorative
Justice” in Losen, D. J. (Ed.). Closing the Discipline Gap: Equitable Remedies for Excessive Exclusion
(pp. 151–165). New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
17. Ancess, J., Rogers, B., Duncan Grand, D., & Darling- Hammond, L. (2019). Teaching the way students learn
best: Lessons from Bronxdale High School. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. (p. 25).
18. Weissberg, R. P., Durlak, J. A., Domitrovich, C. E., & Gullotta, T. P. (2015). “Social and Emotional Learning:
Past, Present, and Future” in Durlak, J. A., Domitrovich, C. E., Weissberg, R. P., & Gullotta, T. P. (Eds.).
Handbook of Social and Emotional Learning: Research and Practice (pp. 3–19). New York, NY: Guilford.

Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships
Widespread school closures, social isolation, food scarcity, and parental unemployment brought
about by the pandemic have destabilized children’s support systems in a way that is traumatic to
most children. When schools reopen—whether virtually, in person, or in a hybrid model—educators
will need to address a wide range of learning needs, both social and emotional and academic, and
these needs will remain in a future that promises to disrupt schooling further.
School designs that promote

supportive, responsive The latest international and U.S. guidance
relationships with caring adults
makes clear that safely reopening school
provide the foundation for
healthy development and learning buildings and resuming in-person learning
and can mitigate the effects of requires a reduction in the number of people
adversity.1 In addition, the latest
with whom school staff and students interact
international and U.S. guidance
makes clear that safely reopening face-to-face—which can be accomplished
school buildings and resuming through relationship-centered cohort designs.
in-person learning requires a
reduction in the number of people
with whom school staff and
students interact face-to-face—which can be accomplished through relationship-centered cohort
designs (see “Cohorting”). Thus, this moment poses an opportunity to shift from the depersonalized
structures of factory model schools inherited from the designs of a century ago to structures that
allow students to be well known and allow teachers to care for students more effectively.
Cohorting
CDC guidance notes that an important strategy for minimizing exposure to the virus is cohorting, or
forming “pods.” Cohorting forms groups of students, to the greatest extent possible with the same
teachers or staff, that stay together throughout the school day. The guidance notes that, ideally,
students and staff within a cohort would only have physical proximity with others in the same
cohort. This practice decreases opportunities for exposure to or transmission of the virus; facilitates
more efficient contact tracing in the event of a positive case; and allows for targeted testing,
quarantine, and isolation of a single cohort instead of schoolwide closures in the event of a positive
case or cluster of cases.
Cohorting can be done as part of a traditional model, with all students attending school in person,
on a full-time basis, or as part of a hybrid school model (i.e., students attending in-person school
on an alternating schedule). Cohorting is a commonly used strategy in many elementary schools, in
which students have the same teacher and classmates during the entire day and often for the entire
school year. In secondary schools, schools may keep a single cohort together in one classroom and
have teachers rotate between cohorts, or have small cohorts move together in staggered passing
schedules to other rooms they need to use (e.g., science labs) without allowing students to mix with
others from distinctive cohorts. Schools may also assign student cohorts to specific days or weeks
for in-person and online learning.

What Students Need
We know from the science of learning and development that warm, caring, supportive student–teacher
relationships, as well as other child–adult relationships, are linked to better school performance
and engagement, greater social competence, and increased ability to take on challenges.2 However,
the basic structures of the factory model system of education on which most U.S. schools are still
based can undermine schools’ efforts to support strong relationships.
These designs have been critiqued for their impersonal structures, fragmented curricula, segregated
and unequal program options, and inability to respond effectively to different student needs.3
Designs that follow the Prussian age grading model adopted in the early 1900s typically move
students to another teacher each year, and in secondary schools, to another teacher every 45 or
50 minutes (with students seeing as many as seven or eight teachers daily). These models also
assign counselors to attend to the personal needs of hundreds of students. Especially in large
schools where thousands of students experience these kinds of fragmented encounters with adults,
there is neither time nor opportunity for strong continuous relationships, personalization, or
community building. In this model, teachers and counselors, despite their best efforts, are unable to
know and attend to all of the personal needs of all of their students or their families. Students who
experience adversity may have no one to turn to for support.
Enabling the development of relationship-centered schools so that they are the norm and not the
exception will be more important now than ever before. Educators will need to provide children and
youth a sense of physical and psychological safety in order for learning to occur, because fear and
anxiety undermine children’s cognitive capacity for learning.4 Schools that have been designed to
support caring and continuity in teachers’ relationships with students—for example, by allowing
teachers to loop with students for more than 1 year or to serve as advisors to a small group in
secondary school—are more able to address trauma and strengthen achievement than is possible
in traditional factory model schools.5 In addition, school designs in which a team of teachers
shares a group of students around whom they can plan a coherent, interdisciplinary curriculum
and for whom they can be mutually accountable can personalize secondary education in ways that
traditional fragmented scheduling does not allow.
Students who were already at higher levels of risk for poor outcomes can especially benefit from
nurturing relationships with teachers and other adults as a means to increase student learning
and support their development and wellness,6 especially when these relationships are culturally
sensitive and responsive.7 Students learn best when they can connect their cultural contexts
and experiences to what they are learning in school, when their teachers are responsive to their
strengths and needs, and when their environment is “identity safe,”8 reinforcing their value and
belonging. (See also “Priority 6: Emphasize Authentic, Culturally Responsive Learning.”) For these
reasons, and because children develop through individual trajectories shaped by their unique traits
and experiences, adults need to know them well to create productive learning opportunities.9 This
is especially important given the stress and trauma children are experiencing as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic, and even more so for those children who were already experiencing systemic
racism and living under adverse conditions prior to the pandemic.
One of the most important approaches to reduce risks of COVID-19 infection and transmission is to
organize small cohorts of students that remain constant with a common set of continuous staff—
such as homeroom-based cohorts and teaching teams that share students with extended block

schedules so they see fewer teachers each semester and remain together with the same teachers.
Additionally, ensuring physical distancing will often require small class sizes and groupings.
These approaches not only reduce the risk of disease transmission but also provide opportunities
for teachers and staff to know students and their families well. When combined with intentional
structures that enable greater continuity in relationships between students and teachers—such as
looping teachers with their students from the previous year—schools can put into place designs that
research has shown will strengthen students’ academic success and ability to cope with trauma.

With traditional structures of school having been upended during the pandemic, there is a need and
opportunity for school, local, and state leaders to consider ways to organize children and adults that
build strong relationships and also reduce risk of infection. This means small, stable cohorts and
built-in time for school staff, teachers, students, and parents to connect and develop continuous
relationships. Redesigning schools to support stronger relationships was and will always be
important for children and youth to succeed, but times of crisis make it especially so.
Create structures that foster health and safety, as well as personalization and trust, among
children and staff
Developing strong relationships can be difficult in schools where organizational structures
minimize opportunities for personalized relationships that extend over time, as is often the case in
many U.S. schools. Policymakers and school leaders can help schools put into place these structures
that foster health and safety, personalization, and relational trust by both offering models of new
designs and removing regulatory impediments enforcing antiquated notions of how time and staff
are organized in schools, as described below.
Minimize transitions and maximize

relationships. Whether in person or online,
When teachers work with
strengthening the relationships that students
form with teachers as well as each other leads students over multiple years and
to greater comfort, engagement, and motivation come to know their students well,
to learn.10 When teachers work with students
they can better support academic
over multiple years and come to know their
students well, they can better support academic and social and emotional learning
and social and emotional learning (SEL), connect (SEL), connect with families, and
with families, and attend to a range of needs.
(For more implementation information, see
attend to a range of needs.
“Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and
Emotional Learning.”)
For this reason, some teachers and other experts are recommending that students return next year
to their teacher from last year (a practice known as looping), staying with that teacher for at least
the first quarter or—when plausible—for the entire year. Similarly, Chiefs for Change recommends
that secondary school students return to small mentored groups when school reopens. The
Connected Learning Model recommends encouraging teachers to hold office hours and schedule
one-on-one check-ins with each student to provide a safe haven for students to discuss their

feelings and experiences. California has developed a set of essential questions for districts to
consider when developing continuity of relationships and learning plans. Its reopening schools
guidance emphasizes the importance of cohort groups.
Restructure schools to create small cohorts that reduce disease transmission and foster
strong relationships. Organizing students and staff into small, stable cohorts across primary and
secondary grades serves not only to minimize disease transmission but also to ease transitions,
strengthen relationships, and enable more continuity between distance and in-person learning.
This is relatively common and straightforward to put into place for preschool and elementary
school students through homeroom-based instructional models. Students are assigned a
consistent homeroom teacher, and when students return to in-person learning, they stay in their
homeroom classes—avoiding contact with other groups—for class time, lunch, recess, and any
special classes, such as art or library. It is important that teachers also work with only one cohort, so
as not to create a vector of transmission between two or more groups. This approach has been used
effectively by other countries, including Denmark and Taiwan.
Although less common in middle and high schools, models and examples exist for organizing
older students and staff into small cohorts through the house system, combined with
block scheduling.
The House System

The house system was a traditional feature of schools in England in the 19th century, when
students were divided into subunits called “houses” to which teachers were also assigned. (Think
of Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin, the four houses at Harry Potter’s Hogwarts.)
American public schools have reintroduced the house system, a smaller learning community
within a larger building, as a way to help students feel more connected and to develop a sense
of belonging. Some schools that serve students who have had their education interrupted due to
homelessness, mobility, or family circumstances also divide their students into smaller learning
communities called “arenas” to provide them with a consistent set of experiences and relationships
as well as the opportunity to personalize learning.
Although some houses in large comprehensive schools are 300 to 600 students, the ideal for the
current context would be to identify much smaller cohorts of perhaps 80 to 120 students within
such larger units that share the same set of teachers throughout the school day and school year,
preferably in a dedicated space, separate from others. Where interdisciplinary courses are possible
(e.g., humanities and math/science), cohorts might be as small as 40 to 60 students. This provides
students with the opportunity to interact with the same set of teachers consistently so they can
make stronger bonds and connections while running a much lower risk of infection than would be
the case if they were in classes with other students outside the cohort. In this case, as well as the
elementary case above, it is important for teachers not to be assigned across cohorts so that they
do not then become vectors for transmission.
Some middle and high schools combine courses in interdisciplinary team block schedules in
which teachers from two or more courses share a common group of students—such as a combined
math and science course taught by one teacher alongside a combined English language arts and
social studies course (often called humanities) taught by another teacher. Often these courses are

co-planned with other math or science or humanities teachers so that all teachers get the benefits
of each other’s disciplinary expertise, even as they are teaching smaller groups of students for
longer blocks of time individually. Team block schedules can further reduce the total number of
individuals with whom students and teachers interact while also fostering greater collaboration
among teachers to coordinate curriculum.
The kind of cohort organization needed for safe schools may combine block scheduling with smaller
learning communities. For example, Vista High School, a traditional large comprehensive high
school serving the needs of a diverse small suburban and rural community north of San Diego, CA,
combines block scheduling with a house system. The freshman class was broken into six houses
of 100 to 130 students who shared a set of four teachers to cover core subjects and one special
education teacher. Each house was located in a dedicated area of the Vista High School campus
so teachers and students could have space to build stronger positive relationships (including
relationships between students, between students and teachers, and between teachers within the
house structure). Each team defined how spaces in and around their classroom and house could
be used to meet the learning needs of students and reimagined how the grouping of students and
grouping of teachers within that space and time could positively impact student learning.
Hillsdale High School in the San Francisco Bay Area uses cohorts within a house system to help
achieve personalization within a student body of nearly 1,500. Within the three houses, there are
teams of subject matter teachers representing each of the core academic fields who share a group of
about 110 to 120 heterogeneously grouped students. The school worked hard to eliminate tracking
so that all students would experience a curriculum aimed at deeper learning and so that the groups
would not become segregated. Each 9th-grade teacher also has a group of these students as an
advisory class that continues through the end of their sophomore year, at which time the students
graduate up to another team and advisory group for their junior and senior years.
Four teachers coordinate with one another in mostly adjacent classrooms as they teach those
subjects. Teachers have time in their schedule both for joint curriculum planning and for separate
meetings in which they talk about students they share, seeking to solve emerging problems and to
share their insights about how to support each one. Hillsdale Principal Jeff Gilbert says, “You know
every family, and you know every student. You stop dealing with them in these sort of large, abstract
cohorts, in addition to allowing for much more individualized responses.”11
A similar strategy is used at the Internationals High Schools that serve newcomers successfully. A
team of four core content area teachers shares a group of about 80 to 100 students, with a counselor
attached to the cohort, and loops with them from 9th to 10th grade. These personalized supports
are especially important in some of the network schools, where as many as one third of students
arrive as unaccompanied minors and struggle to manage housing, food, health care, and other basic
supports, as well as learning the language and customs of a new country.
Importantly, in order to further reduce the risk of disease transmission as well as bolster continuity
in relationships and learning, it is critical that schools, after-school programs, and community
programs can work together to co-construct cohorts between school and extended learning
programs. As the Connecticut After School Network illustrates, schools that coordinate student
cohorts with extended learning providers greatly limit COVID-19 infection and transmission (see
Figure 5.1).

Figure 5.1
Coordination Between Schools and Extended Learning Programs Is Critical
to Limiting the Spread of COVID-19
Stopping the Spread of COVID-19: Coordination Between Schools and

Afterschool Programs
Comparison of Schools That Coordinate Student Grouping with Afterschool Providers vs. Schools That Do Not
Coordinate with Afterschool Providers
Typical First Grade – a class of 24 students grouped into 4 groups of 6 students each. represents students represents students who
needing afterschool care can go home after school
Option 1: No Coordination
Day 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4 4
School Day
If even one student becomes
Day 1 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 ill, as shown by the
After School then without coordinated
groupings every group
One child mixed with other first graders in the afterschool program can infect all school day groupings.
is infected and the virus
Day 2 spreads to all 24 students
1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 4 4 4
School Day and 4 teachers and 4
afterschool staff within days.
Day 2 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
After School
Option 2: Coordinated Groupings

Day 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4
School Day
Day 1 But if the groupings are

1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4
After School coordinated and do not mix,
then even if one student
One child in a group that is maintained after school can infect only the one group during the school day. becomes ill, the exposure
is limited to only the 6
Day 2 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 students and 1 teacher and 1
School Day afterschool staff.
Day 2 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4
After School
Original concept was created by the Connecticut After School Network
Source: Connecticut After School Alliance. (2020). Stopping the Spread of COVID-19: Coordination Between Schools and
Afterschool Programs.
Strengthen partnerships with families

Out of necessity during the period of school closures, many schools and districts have found new
strategies and routines for connecting with families by phone, email, and web-based platforms,
creating much more frequent communication and supporting parents with everything from
technology supports to partnership in the co-teaching activities they have undertaken.
These more robust connections with students’ homes is something that should not be lost with
school reopening. Families are critical to providing deeper knowledge of their children and greater
alignment between home and school, especially as we move between in-person and distance
learning. We know, too, that collaboration and relational trust between school and district staff
and parents and caregivers is an essential ingredient to sustaining change and improvement. A
multiyear study of Chicago elementary schools found that relational trust fostered open and honest
conversation, built alignment toward a shared vision among staff and parents, and contributed to
improvements taking hold more broadly across a school.12

Relational trust is fostered in stable school communities by skillful school leaders who nurture
authentic parent engagement, grounded in partnerships with families, in order to promote student
growth and capitalize on their cultural assets. Relational trust requires authentic listening and
sharing power. Families are far more likely to partner with schools when the school’s norms and
values reflect their own experiences and when the school makes them feel welcome.
Schools can cultivate partnerships and trust with families by using multiple approaches to
relationship building with families as part of the core approach to education. This may include
planning teacher time for virtual home visits; student–teacher–parent conferences that are
flexibly scheduled around parents’ availability and designed to help teachers learn from parents
about their children; outreach to involve families in school activities; and regular communication
through positive phone calls home, emails, and text messages.13 Importantly, schools that succeed
in engaging families from diverse backgrounds embrace a philosophy of partnership in which power
and responsibility are shared. It is important to recognize that in some communities in which trust
has been violated—for instance, as a result of racial injustices or incidents of police brutality—
relationships must be rebuilt through a proactive, authentic process that includes extensive
listening and demonstrations that educators are trustworthy.
Parent–teacher home visits have been

found to be a particularly effective strategy A number of states and districts are
for engaging families and combating already exploring and encouraging the
implicit bias, particularly in communities
where educators and families differ by race, use of virtual home visit techniques
culture, and/or socioeconomic status.14 A to stay connected with families during
number of states and districts, including
the protracted reopening period.
Oregon and Sacramento, CA, are already
exploring and encouraging the use of
virtual home visit techniques to stay
connected with families during the protracted reopening period. Stand for Children Leadership
Center recommends starting the school year with virtual home visits and has developed a page
dedicated to virtual home visit resources, including a how-to guide.
Cultivate supportive environments filled with emotional safety and belonging

Children learn when they feel safe and supported, and their learning is impaired when they are
fearful or traumatized.15 Thus, they need both supportive environments and well-developed abilities
to manage stress and cope with both the results of the pandemic and evidence of racial injustice
that are surfacing, as well as the inevitable conflicts and frustrations of school and life beyond
school. Therefore, it is important that state and local leaders ensure that schools provide a positive
learning environment that offers a measure of security and support that maximizes students’ ability
to learn social and emotional skills as well as academic content.
Dedicate time to creating opportunities for intentional community building. A supportive

learning community encourages student agency and leadership in the context of a culturally
responsive curriculum that values diverse experiences and involvement in the community. Such
environments foster a sense of belonging and safety, with shared norms—which students have
helped create—represented in all of the school’s activities. School staff can learn about the strengths

and needs of students as well as their families’ funds of knowledge through regular check-ins and
class meetings, conferencing, student journaling, close observation of students and their work, and
regular connections and outreach to parents. These practices can foster developmentally informed
relationships among students, parents, and staff, which is arguably even more important now, when
other avenues for connecting with peers and community are limited during the pandemic.
Design learning experiences that

promote inclusion and reduce As part of reopening and learning
segregation. Students also need continuity plans, schools can
opportunities to form relationships
across lines of socioeconomic, racial, and promote equity and inclusion in
ethnic difference. As part of reopening learning experiences by creating
and learning continuity plans, schools
cohorts that are socioeconomically,
can promote equity and inclusion in
learning experiences by creating cohorts racially, and ethnically diverse.
that are socioeconomically, racially, and
ethnically diverse.
States and districts can support schools to eliminate tracking and exclusionary remediation practices.
In a recent post, Halley Potter of the Century Foundation and Josh Starr of PDK International
describe how well-intentioned proposals to automatically hold back large groups of children or place
them in remedial groups pose a risk of exacerbating dropout rates and reinforcing academic tracking
that separates students into different classes based on perceived ability levels. As they outline the
decades of research on how tracking harms students by reducing achievement for those exposed
to a low-level curriculum, they also describe strategies to catch students up without reinstituting
segregative tracking systems. (See also “Priority 3: Assess What Students Need” and “Priority 7:
Provide Expanded Learning Time” for more discussion of how this can be accomplished.)
To avoid tracking students in ways that become more segregative, teachers may need additional
supports in the form of both curriculum tools and professional development to teach successfully
in heterogeneous classes, and students may need additional time and supports to catch up on some
skills. (See “Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time.”)
One more threat to equity is the recent emergence of learning pods clustered within wealthy
neighborhoods, largely formed by well-resourced families to supplement distance or hybrid
learning, which have the potential to exacerbate inequities and segregation. Districts and schools
can promote equity by working with child care providers and families to connect with those in
their inclusive school-based small cohort when forming learning pods and by providing strategies
to make the groups more diverse. Schools can focus on implementing inclusive, heterogeneous
learning settings and experiences that allow children to interact and learn across lines of racial,
socioeconomic, linguistic, and other differences. (See “Priority 2: Strengthen Distance and Blended
Learning” for additional examples of how to support equitable learning in out-of-school settings.)
Enact policies that support relationship-centered school designs

State and district leaders can remove impediments to new school designs that may exist in
traditional formulas for staffing allocations and schedules and for collective bargaining agreements
that assume traditional teaching assignment patterns. They can also provide supports for

relationship-centered school designs. These designs can be paired with policies that provide
time and funding for collaboration and capacity building among staff as well as for staff outreach
to students and parents, including home visits and regular check-ins. Features that have been
consistently identified as critical to the success of student-centered schools16 include:
• structures that enable adults to know children well and develop strong, personalized
relationships, including advisors and advisory classes, looping, block scheduling, longer
grade spans, and small learning communities;
• opportunities for collaboration among school staff to share knowledge about
students and achieve a shared developmental approach, which can be achieved through
interdisciplinary teaching teams and dedicated blocks for staff collaboration;
• supports for outreach to families to engage them in partnership around their children’s
education; and
• efforts to preserve stability in school staffing for both principals and teachers that
support stronger trust, relationships, and continuous improvement.17
States and districts can encourage redesign of schools by rethinking staffing designs and ratios
embedded in state and local policies and providing flexibility for local leaders to adopt new
approaches to staffing that favor personalization across boundaries of grade levels, departments,
and other traditional organizing features that have sometimes fragmented schools.
Allow for new designs that enable stronger teacher–student relationships and time for staff
collaboration. Many approaches are possible in pursuing these goals. For example, in its guide
Preventing a Lost School Year, Stand for Children has identified advisors for all students and grade-
level staff teaming as two of its six essentials for motivating and supporting students. The group also
recommends that English learners be assigned to advisory staff who speak their native language to the
greatest extent possible and that staff who are assigned students with individualized education plans
(IEPs) be well versed in their advisees’ IEPs and be in regular communication with IEP case managers.
An Advisors for All how-to guide is based on the pioneering “Every Student Every Day” advising
approach of Phoenix Union High School District in Arizona, where every student in the district’s
21 high schools is “connected to a caring adult who monitors the teen’s progress, attendance, and
social-emotional well-being.”18 Prior to the pandemic, students connected with advisors daily, and
when brick-and-mortar schooling closed in March 2020, the district recruited administrators and
school board members into the advisory program to be able to reach out to all students at home
for wellness check calls. District advisors documented their calls and either provided resources or
connected families to other programs or community organizations for assistance meeting their needs.
Districts can partner with networks of schools that have demonstrated, at scale, how to successfully
secure the necessary structures that allow schools to design for stronger relationships, deeper
learning, and equity. Among those that work with schools around the country are Big Picture
Learning, the Internationals Network for Public Schools, and New Tech Network.19 A recent study
shows how these three networks partner with districts to redesign schools for student-centered,
deeper learning models by rethinking the structures governing how teachers are organized to work
with students and with each other to support learning. This includes creating schools that allow for
advisory systems, teacher teaming, and teacher looping, along with flexible schedules that provide
ample time for teachers and students to engage in collaborative and applied learning.

To achieve this time for teacher collaboration as well as strong relationships with students, districts
need to be willing to consider new approaches to scheduling; staffing allocations to schools; teacher
assignments; and, sometimes, collective bargaining arrangements that may be grounded in factory
model assumptions about how teachers do their work.
Another such network that partners with districts to redesign schools is the Institute for Student
Achievement (ISA), a national nonprofit organization specializing in high school redesign that
collaborates with school leaders and staff to implement ISA’s research-based design principles.
Supported by district policies enabling flexibility in staffing and school design, these principles
guided Bronxdale High School in New York City—an inclusion high school serving high proportions
of students with disabilities as well as students of color from low-income families—in reorganizing
to develop community and relationships.20 Among the school’s strategies are:
• small class sizes (approximately 22 students per course) to create more opportunities for
teacher support to students, particularly English learners and students with IEPs;
• advisors assigned to each student and advisory class two to three times per week;
• teaching teams in which staff work in community groups to develop shared norms and
practices so that a cohort of interdisciplinary teachers (English, math, science, and social
studies) teaches the same students;
• explicit relationship building leveraged through advisories and teaching teams;
• attention to student voice and needs through student engagement in research and
“passion projects” on topics of concern and student leadership in advisories and clubs; and
• outreach to families that includes frequent communication with parents to engender a
sense of belonging within the Bronxdale community.
Provide time, funding, and supports for outreach to students and families. State and
district leaders can support schools to meaningfully partner with students and families by
providing time, funding, and guidance for regular outreach, including home visits and regular
check-ins (as described above). Enacting policies that provide teachers with dedicated time
and compensation for home visits, for instance, is critical to the success and longevity of such
initiatives. The Parent Teacher Home Visits Project is an inexpensive and easily replicable
model for parent engagement, with a platform for connecting online, that has been shown to
build trust, respect, and the capacity for cultural competency among parents and school staff.
States and districts can leverage ESSA Title I, III, and IV and federal CARES Act funds to support
training for family engagement, such as home visits, and outreach efforts. (See “Priority 10:
Leverage More Adequate and Equitable School Funding” for more detail on how to leverage
federal funding.)
Reopening guidance can also include recommended measures, such as expanded advisory or
mentoring periods, mandatory communication teams, and regular virtual check-ins and home
visits. In Louisiana, the state’s Strong Start 2020 Plan states that schools will “implement
a strategic communications plan to: connect with every student daily; provide feedback on
student work at least weekly; and help families understand their role in supporting their child’s
continuous learning.”21

Ensure greater stability of teacher and
principal assignments. Research clearly Research clearly indicates that
indicates that organizational conditions such as organizational conditions such as
low turnover among school staff and leadership
promote higher achievement for students22 and
low turnover among school staff
also promote relational conditions that are and leadership promote higher
conducive to caring. Teacher turnover is reduced achievement for students and
in settings that enable greater collaboration,
professional learning, and engagement in also promote relational conditions
decision-making—and where principals that are conducive to caring.
have longer tenures.23 Principal turnover is
a great concern given the critical role played
by principals in leading long-term school
improvement efforts, as schools plagued by turnover exhibit lower commitment to improvement.24
Principal turnover leads to teacher turnover, which causes dissatisfaction and burnout and
decreases the possibility of satisfying, caring relationships. This especially affects schools in
high-poverty neighborhoods that have greater student mobility. Constant reshuffling of principals,
common in many U.S. districts, is a policy that needs to be reexamined, as research increasingly
suggests the value of maintaining effective principals in their schools.
In sum, while it has long been important to redesign schools to support stronger, long-term
relationships, the COVID-19 pandemic accelerates the urgency to do so. In this moment of crisis,
state, district, and school leaders can leverage these insights from the science of learning and
development to rethink century-old factory model assumptions in ways that can promote the health
and success of the entire school community for generations to come.
Resources
• Reunite, Renew, and Thrive: Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Roadmap for Returning to
School (Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning). This guide provides school
leaders with whole-school, anti-racist SEL strategies centered on relationships and built on the
existing strengths of a school community. Specifically, the guide provides concrete SEL critical
actions with essential questions; actions as schools prepare, implement, and sustain their
integrative SEL work; and tools to help them along the way.
• Preventing a Lost School Year: The Crucial Importance of Motivating Students & Engaging
Families (Stand for Children Leadership Center). This guide identifies essentials for motivating
and supporting students and for strong partnerships with families, including advisors for all, staff
teaming, and virtual home visits, accompanied by tools and resources.
• The Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships (Karen L. Mapp, Eyal
Bergman, & the Institute for Educational Leadership). The Dual Capacity-Building Framework for
Family-School Partnerships (Version 2) was designed to help districts and schools chart a path
toward effective family engagement efforts.
• Making Families Feel Welcome (Siegel, Esqueda, Berkowitz, Sullivan, Astor, & Benbenishty
[2019], via Greater Good Science Center). This brief reflection activity for school staff lists
methods for making students’ families feel valued and respected.

• Family-School Partnerships (Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning). This
webpage provides a list of resources for starting, supporting, and strengthening family–school
partnerships, from accessible blogs and videos to interviews with veteran researchers.
• Insights From Networks Video Feature (Learning Policy Institute). In these videos, school and
district educators and network representatives share their insights on the strategies and
practices to support designing schools to be student- and relationship-centered.
• Building a Positive School Climate (Learning Policy Institute). This brief focuses on state efforts to
build a positive school climate and also provides policy considerations and resources for helping
states and districts help schools improve their climate.
• Identity Safe Classrooms: Places to Belong and Learn (Dorothy M. Steele & Becki Cohn-Vargas).
This website, based on a book of the same name, includes activities, practices, and resources for
creating identity-safe classrooms.
• COVID-19 and Homelessness: Strategies for Schools, Early Learning Programs, and Higher
Education Institutions (SchoolHouse Connection). This resource provides guides, checklists, and
strategies for meeting the needs of children and youth experiencing homelessness.
Endnotes
97–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2018.1537791.
2. Osher, D., Cantor, P., Berg, J., Steyer, L., & Rose, T. (2018). Drivers of human development: How
relationships and context shape learning and development. Applied Developmental Science, 24(1),
6–36. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2017.1398650.
3. Darling-Hammond, L., Ross, P., & Milliken, M. (2006). High school size, organization, and content:
What matters for student success? Brookings Papers on Education Policy, 9, 163–203. www.jstor.org/
stable/20067281; Lee, V. E., Bryk, A. S., & Smith, J. B. (1993). The organization of effective secondary
schools. Review of Research in Education, 19, 171–268.
97–140. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2018.1537791.
5. Darling-Hammond, L., Ancess, J., & Ort, S. W. (2002). Reinventing high school: Outcomes of the coalition
campus schools project. American Educational Research Journal, 39(3), 639–673; Lee, V. E., & Smith, J. B.
(1993). Effects of school restructuring on the achievement and engagement of middle-grade students.
Sociology of Education, 66(3), 164–187; Lindsay, P. (1984). High school size, participation in activities, and
young adult social participation: Some enduring effects of schooling. Educational Evaluation and Policy
Analysis, 6(1), 73–83.
6. Roorda, D. L., Koomen, H. M., Spilt, J. L., & Oort, F. J. (2011). The influence of affective teacher–student
relationships on students’ school engagement and achievement: A meta-analytic approach. Review of
Educational Research, 81(4), 493–529.
7. Hammond, Z. (2016). Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and
Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
8. Steele, D. M., & Cohn-Vargas, B. (2013). Identity Safe Classrooms: Places to Belong and Learn. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

10. DiPietro, M., Ferdig, R. E., Black, E. W., & Presto, M. (2010). Best practices in teaching k–12 online:
Lessons learned from Michigan virtual school teachers. Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 7(1), 10–35.
11. Cornwall, G. (2018, May 14). How being part of a ‘house’ within a school helps students
gain a sense of belonging. KQED MindShift. https://www.kqed.org/mindshift/50960/
how-being-part-of-a-house-within-a-school-helps-students-gain-a-sense-of-belonging.
12. Bryk, A. S., and Schneider, B. (2003). Trust in schools: A core resource for school reform. Educational
Leadership, 60(6), 40–45. http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar03/vol60/num06/
[email protected].
13. Darling-Hammond, L., Ramos-Beban, N., Altamirano, R. P., & Hyler, M. E. (2016). Be the Change: Reinventing
School for Student Success. New York, NY: Teachers College Press; Osher, T. W., & Osher, D. M. (2002). The
paradigm shift to true collaboration with families. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 11(1), 47–60.
14. McKnight, K., Venkateswaran, N., Laird, J., Robles, J., & Shalev, T. (2017). Mindset shifts and Parent Teacher
Home Visits. Berkeley, CA: RTI International. http://www.pthvp.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/171030-
MindsetShiftsandPTHVReportFINAL.pdf.
15. National Scientific Council on the Developing Child. (2010). Persistent fear and anxiety can affect young
children’s learning and development [Working paper No. 9]. https://developingchild.harvard.edu/resources/
persistent-fear-and-anxiety-can-affect-young-childrens-learning-and-development/; Vogel, S., & Schwabe, L.
(2016). Learning and memory under stress: Implications for the classroom. Science of Learning, 1(16011).
16. Ancess, J. (2003). Beating the Odds: High Schools as Communities of Commitment. New York, NY: Teachers
College Press. https://tcrecord.org/library/abstract.asp?contentid=11175; Darling-Hammond, L.,
Ancess, J., & Ort, S. W. (2002). Reinventing high school: Outcomes of the Coalition Campus Schools
Project. American Educational Research Journal, 39(3), 639–673; Darling-Hammond, L., Ramos-Beban, N.,
Altamirano, R. P., & Hyler, M. E. (2016). Be the Change: Reinventing School for Student Success. New York,
NY: Teachers College Press; Friedlaender, D., Burns, D., Lewis-Charp, H., Cook-Harvey, C. M., Zheng, X., &
Darling-Hammond, L. (2014). Student-centered schools: Closing the opportunity gap. Stanford, CA: Stanford
Center for Opportunity Policy in Education.
17. Carver-Thomas, D., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2017). Teacher turnover: Why it matters and what we can do
about it. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute; Coelli, M., & Green, D. A. (2012). Leadership effects:
School principals and student outcomes. Economics of Education Review, 31(1), 92–109; Ronfeldt, M.,
Loeb, S., & Wyckoff, J. (2013). How teacher turnover harms student achievement. American Educational
Research Journal, 50(1), 4–36.
18. Zalaznick, M. (2020, June 26). How student–teacher relationships can prevent a lost school year. District
Administration. https://districtadministration.com/preventing-a-lost-school-year-student-teachers-
engagement-equity-sel/.
19. Hernández, L. E., Darling-Hammond, L., Adams, J., & Bradley, K. (with Duncan Grand, D., Roc, M., & Ross,
P.). (2019). Deeper learning networks: Taking student-centered learning and equity to scale. Palo Alto, CA:
Learning Policy Institute.
20. Ancess, J., Rogers, B., Duncan Grand, D., & Darling- Hammond, L. (2019). Teaching the way students learn
best: Lessons from Bronxdale High School. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
21. Louisiana Department of Education. (2020). Strong Start 2020, Louisiana’s plan: A planning guide for school
systems in implementing priorities and aligning funding. Baton Rouge, LA: Author. (p. 11).
22. Kearney, W. S., Valdez, A., & Garcia, L. (2012). Leadership for the long-haul: The impact of leadership
longevity on student achievement. School Leadership Review, 7(2), 24–33; Miller, A. (2013). Principal
turnover and student achievement. Economics of Education Review, 36, 60–72; Ronfeldt, M., Loeb, S., &
Wyckoff, J. (2013). How teacher turnover harms student achievement. American Educational Research
Journal, 50(1), 4–36.
23. Podolsky, A., Kini, T., Bishop, J., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2016). Solving the teacher shortage: How to
attract and retain excellent educators. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
24. Fullan, M. (2000). The role of the principal in school reform. Occasional Paper Series, 2000(6), 2; Fullan, M.
(2002). Principals as leaders in a culture of change. Educational Leadership, 59(8), 16–21; Miller, A. (2013).
Principal turnover and student achievement. Economics of Education Review, 36, 60–72.

Priority 6: Emphasize Authentic,
Culturally Responsive Learning
Reprioritize. This is the time to see if something can be different. To reset the
system, we have to take a loss, but we can recoup the loss if we actually get kids
excited about education and create a more positive space for them to learn.
—Michelle Ampong, Atlanta parent and school volunteer1
Schools that have successfully motivated students to engage in learning even when schooling
has been disrupted have been connecting lessons to real-world applications, allowing students
to explore the world around them and to demonstrate what they know through projects and
presentations that display the products of their work. There may be a temptation when school
resumes to set aside this kind of authentic work and double down on the kind of decontextualized
learning that traditional transmission teaching typically offers—often in preparation for tests that
measure learning in equally decontextualized ways.
However, many innovative schools have demonstrated that standards can be better taught and
learned when students are motivated by the opportunity to dive deeply into serious questions,
demonstrating what they have learned by showing and explaining the studies, products, and tools
they have developed. Furthermore, in the blended learning world that is now a necessity, this kind
of learning process can, with the right kind of teaching supports, help students develop the skills for
planning, organizing, managing, and improving their own work and becoming more self-directed—
skills that will be essential both for this more complex educational world and for the world of
college and careers beyond.
What Students Need

Research from the learning sciences has shown that people learn by building on their prior
knowledge and experiences, drawing on their cultural and community contexts, and connecting
what they are learning to what they already understand.2 In order to make meaning of new ideas, we
need to apply them to new contexts. People are also motivated to learn by questions and curiosities
they hold—and by the opportunity to investigate what things mean, and why things happen.
Humans are inquiring beings, and the mind is stimulated by the effort to make connections and
seek answers to things that matter.
A group of more than 400 researchers offering

advice about education during this time urged A group of more than
that schools “provide the most personalized
400 researchers offering advice
and engaging instruction possible.” Learning
opportunities are most effective when they start about education during this
with meaningful questions; provide opportunities time urged that schools “provide
for inquiry in interaction with others; enable
the most personalized and
hands-on experiences and applications to
meaningful contexts; and provide frequent, engaging instruction possible.”
informative feedback on what students are doing
and thinking in identity-safe environments.

This kind of learning is also more suited to the 21st-century demands in knowledge-work jobs for
critical thinking and problem-solving skills; the capacity to find, analyze, synthesize, and apply
knowledge to novel situations; interpersonal skills that allow people to work with others and
engage effectively in cross-cultural contexts; self-directional abilities that allow people to manage
their own work and complex projects; abilities to competently find resources and use tools; and the
capacity to communicate effectively in many ways.
Learning also depends on strong, positive relationships between and among teachers and students
in identity-safe learning environments that eliminate the social identity threats that undermine
achievement for many students. Such threats—often identified as stereotype threats—occur when
children encounter biases inside or outside of school that communicate negative views about one
or more of the groups they are associated with.3 Social identity threats make students—especially
students of color, students with disabilities, LGBTQ students, immigrant students, language-
minority students, and students from low-income families—feel as if they cannot be seen and
valued for who they actually are. Students under threat can experience acute anxiety born of fear
of discrimination and uncertainty that their efforts will be positively received or produce positive
outcomes—concerns that translate into lower performance when stereotype threats are activated.4
To address these threats, educators must eliminate sources of bias from the school environment
and affirmatively communicate the value they hold for each child by creating strong, trusting
relationships and offering culturally responsive instruction that connects to students’ experiences,
acknowledges cultural assets, and promotes cross-cultural relationships. Support for cultural
pluralism that builds on students’ experiences and intentionally brings students’ voices into the
classroom helps create an identity-safe and engaging atmosphere for learning to take place5 and
enables a positive school climate, particularly for students of color.6
Elements of Identity-Safe Learning Experiences

Identity-safe learning experiences and communities promote student achievement and attachments
to school.7 The elements of such experiences, found to support strong academic performance for all
students, include:
• Teaching that promotes understanding, student voice, student responsibility for and belonging
to the classroom community, and cooperation in learning and classroom tasks.
• Cultivating diversity as a resource for teaching through regular use of diverse materials, ideas,
and teaching activities along with high expectations for all students.
• Relationships based on trusting, encouraging interactions between the teacher and each
student and the creation of positive relationships among the students.
• Caring, orderly, purposeful learning environments in which social skills are proactively taught
and practiced to help students respect and care for one another in an emotionally and
physically safe classroom, so each student feels attached to the others.
Source: Darling-Hammond, L., & Cook-Harvey, C. M. (2018). Educating the whole child: Improving school
climate to support student success. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.

To enable authentic, culturally responsive learning in identity-safe settings, students need
opportunities for voice and agency. Engagement and effort are supported in settings where children
feel they are respected and valued by their teachers and peers, where they see that they can improve
with effort (for example, by receiving feedback and revising their work), and where they are working on
things that matter to themselves and others—including projects they choose and pursue to accomplish
improvements in their lives, families, and communities.
Finally, students need opportunities to demonstrate

what they know and can do in ways that are as authentic
In order to encourage and
and meaningful as the learning they have undertaken. measure authentic learning,
In order to encourage and measure authentic learning, performance assessments
performance assessments that reflect how students
acquire and use knowledge to solve real-world problems that reflect how students
will increasingly be needed. Before the No Child Left acquire and use knowledge
Behind Act, many states used assessments like those
to solve real-world problems
common in high-achieving nations today that require
students to solve complex real-world problems and defend will increasingly be needed.
their ideas orally and in writing. These assessments—
which include research projects, science investigations,
mathematical and computer models, and other products—are mapped to the syllabus and the standards
for the subject and are selected because they represent critical skills, topics, and concepts. Research
shows that schools that are using such assessments better prepare students for college and careers.8
A growing number of districts and states, as well as innovative schools, are revisiting the possibilities
of redesigning assessments to shape the curriculum in ways that stimulate more meaningful learning;
that give teachers timely, formative information they need to help students improve; and that help
students learn about how they learn.

Given the shifts in schooling that will continue to occur, there is no better time to reinvent educational
practices so that teaching is guided by the science of learning and supported through high-quality
opportunities for authentic learning and assessment that can support meaningful, relevant, and
complex learning experiences in the classroom and virtually. States and districts can consider several
strategies to support this kind of learning.
Offer guidance for how schools can restart by focusing on authentic learning and
assessment strategies
Oregon’s guidance for the 2020–21 school year, Ready Schools, Safe Learners, indicates that districts
should seek to “support student-centered project-based educational experiences that ignite student
agency, identity, and voice.” The guidance asks educators to:
• Establish clearly stated learning goals and outcomes based on grade-level Oregon State
Standards. Integrate quality, culturally sustaining instructional strategies and materials
(e.g., Oregon’s Tribal History/Shared History bill).
• Design curricular experiences that utilize authentic and deeper learning experiences to engage
students. Provide opportunities for students to meet the standards in nontraditional ways,
such as through student-driven projects that honor student identity and context.

• Implement opportunities for students to earn credit by proficiency.
• Design experiences using research-based design principles, such as universal design for
learning (UDL), that improve access to learning for all participants.
• Use assessment to celebrate student strengths, identify needs, document learning as
it progresses, and verify student performance in comparison to levels of expectation
or proficiency.
• Implement assessments that are embedded in instructional practices to identify
progression toward grade-level content knowledge and skills that need attention.
• Collect varied evidence of learning related to student strengths and interests.
• Provide multiple ways for students to show what they know.
• Prioritize descriptive feedback that provides students with actionable next steps.
• Evaluate goals and objectives based on progress markers for students supported through an
individualized education plan (IEP) or 504 Plan.
This guidance may also include statements of goals and competencies at the state and district
levels that prioritize higher-order skills that students need to solve problems and learn to learn,
with processes to incorporate these skills more fully into curriculum, assessments, and professional
development. For example, curriculum and assessments can include the skills students need to:
• read for meaning to use what they learn in other contexts, to discuss and debate ideas, and
to solve problems of importance to them;
• conduct research and evaluate information to answer questions they care about;
• collaborate to solve problems, understand more deeply, and design tools;
• conduct investigations in which they collect evidence, observe phenomena, analyze data,
and write up results to explain what they did and what they found; and
• give and receive feedback as they revise their work.
States can also offer supported opportunities to redesign schools to cultivate these competencies.
One approach is demonstrated by the “Kansans Can” project, which is grounded in a graduate
profile that redefined student learning competencies to emphasize not only academic and cognitive
preparation but also technical skills, employability, and civic engagement through higher standards,
a more student-focused system, and increased collaboration. The Kansans Can School Redesign
Project invited districts to apply for funding and technical support to redesign selected elementary
and secondary schools to support these competencies. The Kansans Can Star Recognition Program
also recognized districts for accomplishing goals ranging from social and emotional growth
and kindergarten readiness to high school graduation preparedness, civic engagement, and
postsecondary success.
Similarly, Virginia provided high school innovation planning grants to school divisions to develop
or implement programs that promote Virginia’s 5 C’s—critical thinking, creative thinking,
collaboration, communication, and citizenship—while preparing students for careers and
postsecondary education. The legislature defined the essential elements of high school program
innovation as student-centered learning; progress based on proficiency; “real-world” connections
aligned with local workforce needs and emphasizing transitions to college or career or both; and
varying models for educator supports and staffing.

Provide curriculum tools and professional learning for educators to support more authentic
learning and assessment
States and districts can also offer schools and educators opportunities to access standards-based
curricula they can draw upon and adapt to develop authentic learning experiences for students, engage
in professional learning opportunities, and join networks of schools that have created productive
approaches to learning. These include public schools and districts that work with networks providing
curriculum resources for project-based learning such as New Tech Network and International
Baccalaureate, as well as curriculum tools in particular subject areas, such as EL Education in English
language arts and the Mathematics Improvement Network in math. Organizations such as reDesign
and inquirED offer guidance on how to reshape curriculum around inquiry-based learning.
Recognizing the importance of this kind of learning, Chicago Public Schools offered standards-
aligned projects in every grade level and subject that students could engage in during the time of
school closures. The American Federation of Teachers also supported teachers nationwide with
a virtual initiative on capstone projects that allow students to show what they have learned in
innovative, meaningful ways at any grade level, linked to standards. Student work ranges from
writing essays about a favorite book to researching a current issue to preparing and participating
in online debates. California’s guidance to educators includes platforms that can be used to
demonstrate learning through the use of performance-based assessments that sharpen critical
thinking and communication skills.
Schools that routinely engage in project-based

learning were able to carry students’ projects Schools that routinely engage in
through to virtual defenses of students’
project-based learning were able
completed research projects and portfolios at
the end of the year. These initiatives—with to carry students’ projects through
teachers providing guidance and support— to virtual defenses of students’
enabled students to develop greater agency and
metacognitive skills that allow them to continue
completed research projects and
to learn strategically, preparing them more portfolios at the end of the year.
fully for the kind of work they will experience in
college and in life.
For example, before schools were closed, teachers at Oakland High School had designed an
authentic project on safety issues related to commuting to school—a community challenge students
had identified. Students addressed the question: How can we improve the journey to school for
teachers and students? Their client was the City of Oakland Department of Transportation. They
also worked with a community partner, Y-PLAN, a local initiative based out of UC Berkeley’s
Center for Cities and Schools. Students researched solutions to the logistical challenge of
getting 1,600 people on and off campus safely every day. This required them to observe the many
challenges in the areas around campus; conduct interviews; and develop, administer, and analyze
a community survey. After schools were closed, students met virtually in teams to complete their
research and to identify solutions, supported by teachers through Zoom sessions and telephone
calls. At the end of the year, nearly 30 students made a virtual presentation, “A Competent,
Convenient Commute (CCC),” to members of the Oakland Department of Transportation, Berkeley
SafeTREC (the Safe Transportation Research and Education Center), Y-PLAN, and Oakland High’s
staff, in which they advocated for curb striping, crosswalk lights on the road, and pedestrian islands.

In the course of this project, students had to learn to identify and frame problems and questions;
conduct research; evaluate evidence; develop arguments; explain and defend their thinking;
communicate clearly in writing as well as orally, quantitatively, and graphically; plan a complex
project; receive and incorporate feedback; revise their work; seek out resources; and overcome
obstacles. The performance tasks supported these cognitive skills as well as extending and
authenticating core academic activities.
COVID-19 hit as middle school students from the School for Examining Essential Questions of
Sustainability (SEEQS) in Honolulu, HI, were embarking on self-directed projects as part of their
yearlong interdisciplinary exploration of sustainability. The students had more autonomy to design
and implement their projects at home while sheltering in place, and many students connected their
work to the emotional, physical, and economic threats of COVID-19. Projects included rain catchers
and irrigation systems to sustain home gardens, developing a Twitter bot to remind people to wash
their hands to prevent COVID-19 infection, creating sidewalk art, and researching and engaging
in healthy activities to alleviate stress. The school’s virtual exhibition was presented to all of the
SEEQS community members and many others beyond.9
Similarly, at the UCLA Community School, one of the interdisciplinary projects students conducted
on issues affecting their community was a 10-week inquiry process in which students investigated
the disparate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color and the responses of local students,
teachers, and parents who have organized to work for justice in and beyond schools. After reading
articles and reviewing current data and the latest research on the virus, students reported on how
these issues were affecting them, their families, and their communities. There was no difficulty
getting students to participate because they were learning something they deeply cared about and
could use to improve their own lives and those of their loved ones.
Recognizing the value of this kind of learning, school districts in Oakland, Los Angeles, and
Pasadena, have been working to incorporate project-based learning and performance assessments
into graduation portfolios that students prepare and defend in high school. These districts have
established policies focused on ensuring the tools, staffing, and professional development needed to
support the quality of these efforts and greater student access to this work.10
Ensure that authentic learning is also culturally connected and culturally sustaining
Schools and districts can encourage educators to develop and use culturally responsive pedagogies
as a means for engaging and deepening student learning by recognizing their students’ experiences
as a foundation on which to build knowledge.11 This foundation is created when educators spend
time getting to know their students’ experiences and social identities as well as their strengths
and needs, using this knowledge as a basis for choosing texts and representations of ideas and for
drawing curriculum connections. Teachers can use discussions, regular check-ins, class meetings,
conferencing, close observations of students and their work, and connections to families to learn
about their students’ experiences, interests, and concerns. They can also use dialogue journals and
offer writing prompts that give students a chance to share their unique experiences (e.g., What did
you think about the story we read today? Can you reflect on a time when you…?).
At Social Justice Humanitas Academy (SJHA) in Los Angeles, students engage in projects that help
them learn concepts through the lens of their personal identities. For example, in a 9th-grade ethnic
studies course, students spend time analyzing their personal histories. One SJHA teacher explained

that the project allows students to move into later grades having “already looked at their history and
their past, and the way that they see the world, and how [they can] become better for it.”12 In a related
assignment, students read the memoir Always Running by Luis Rodriguez, in which the author recounts
his experience as a young Chicano gang member surviving the dangerous streets of East Los Angeles
Students were asked to reflect on and write an essay about how the author overcame adversity and
setbacks and achieved self-actualization (a core value at SJHA that guides students’ own reflections).
These kinds of assignments allow students to engage diverse perspectives, exercise higher-level
analytic skills, participate in respectful debate and discussion with their peers, grow their emotional
intelligence, and reflect upon their own attitudes and identities in ways that also help them develop
insights about how to survive and thrive, strengthening their attachment to school and their social
and emotional reserves at the same time.
States and districts can also offer strong models and supports to develop and implement high-
quality curricula that are culturally relevant. Chiefs for Change highlights how several districts,
such as Baltimore, MD; Palm Beach County, FL; and Philadelphia, PA, were already developing such
materials prior to the pandemic, noting research suggesting that culturally relevant curriculum has
been found to increase student attendance, GPA, and course completion.
Additionally, school networks can be sources of such curriculum models. For example, the
Internationals Network for Public Schools, a network of 27 schools in public school districts across
the nation that serve secondary school students who are recent immigrants and English learners,
has demonstrated how to build capacity and put into place culturally responsive and culturally
sustaining learning experiences along with rigorous instruction.13 The network expects that all of
its students will graduate ready for college, career, and life, and that all students will be ready to
pursue a meaningful postsecondary path. To meet these expectations, Internationals has developed
a school model that emphasizes challenging academics offered through project-based learning,
linguistic dignity, and bilingualism. In addition to strong cohort models, teaching teams, and an
inclusive advisory culture that addresses students’ academic and social and emotional needs, the
schools help educators develop cultural competency skills to work with immigrant youth from many
different countries and cultures and pedagogical skills for teaching language and content through
inquiry methods. The curriculum units developed over 30 years of successful practice are available
across the network and are a continually growing source of support for effective teaching.
Build capacity for inclusive, identity-safe, culturally responsive practice

Personalizing structures are important to set the stage for the kinds of caring, consistent,
continuous relationships children need to support their development, and thoughtful curricula help
support engagement in learning. However, the messages students ultimately receive depend greatly
upon the attitudes, beliefs, skills, and capacity of staff.
State and local leaders can help build the capacity of school staff by providing resources, time,
and space for professional learning that includes the development of identity-safe schools and
classrooms; strategies to address stereotype threat and implicit bias; and proactive approaches to
anti-racist practice, cultural pluralism, and culturally responsive pedagogies.
Educators can use these tools as they plan for a restorative opening of schools. A key starting point
is learning about students and seeing them—and affirming them—for who they are. For example,
educators can learn about how to start the year with affirmation interventions that guide students

to share their personal goals for learning with their teachers in notes to which teachers respond.
Such strategies have been found in multiple studies to reduce the effect of stereotype threat among
middle school students, resulting in higher academic performance for Black students as much as
2 years later.14
As described in guidance from New

York University, reopening schools
Reopening schools in a culturally
in a culturally responsive–sustaining responsive–sustaining manner should
manner should also include also include incorporating a set of
incorporating a set of regularly used
healing practices, such as restorative
regularly used healing practices, such
circles, mindfulness, advisories that as restorative circles, mindfulness,
support social and emotional learning, advisories that support social and
and affinity groups. Equally important
is a joyful curriculum connected to emotional learning, and affinity groups.
students’ interests alongside anti-bias,
anti-racist practices.
Educators can also learn how to create environments that are caring and purposeful by including
students as active participants in classroom management and conflict resolution and by organizing
classroom structure around communal responsibility, rather than compliance and punishment.
For example, educators may engage students to help establish classroom norms that define their
classroom’s rule and culture and have students take ownership of dozens of activities in the
classroom that teachers might otherwise do by themselves, ensuring that all students have voice
and membership in the classroom design, norms, and management.
Redesign assessments to emphasize applied learning and complex problem-solving

Students can also take agency in their learning through performance assessments that evaluate the
inquiries they undertake. A number of schools and districts are working together in collaboratives
to create equitable and high-quality performance assessment systems that are accompanied by
clear criteria, expectations, and processes that drive teaching strategies and learning at the school
level. Drawing on tools like the Performance Assessment Resource Bank, schools and districts can
help provide school-embedded learning opportunities for educators to work together to develop
the different components of a performance assessment system (curriculum planning documents,
rubrics, and student and teacher directions) that are aligned to goals for student learning.
These collaboratives include the Quality Performance Assessment initiative of the Center for
Collaborative Education in New England, which supports, among other initiatives, the Massachusetts
Consortium for Innovative Education Assessment (MCIEA)—a collaborative of eight districts with
their local teacher unions that are working together to create a new accountability system that uses
performance assessment instead of standardized testing. The districts’ accountability framework has
been built around multiple measures, including academic, social and emotional, and school culture
indicators, in order to provide a comprehensive picture of school performance.
Several networks of public schools—from EL Education elementary schools to high schools in

networks such as the New Tech Network, Big Picture Schools, and the Internationals Network for
Public Schools—have demonstrated significant gains in student learning as they have developed

and enacted authentic learning strategies grounded in curricula that teach students how to learn
through guided inquiry; collaboration; connections to culture and community; and the production of
complex papers, projects, and products.
Often these performance tasks are designed to illustrate core modes of inquiry in the disciplines,
such as scientific investigation, mathematical modeling, literary analysis, social scientific inquiry, or
artistic performances. Disciplines serve as the organizing principles for performance assessments for
the schools associated with the New York Performance Standards Consortium. The group of 38 schools
associated with the Consortium are authorized to use these disciplinary performance assessments as
part of a graduation portfolio accepted in lieu of Regents examinations by New York State, authorized
by a waiver in effect since 1995. The Consortium’s system asks students to exhibit their learning in
rigorous defenses in front of panels that include external judges as well as teachers, students, and
parents. This approach is one that will be highlighted in a report on diploma options that a Blue
Ribbon Commission will make to the New York State Board of Regents in fall 2020.
Performance assessment collaboratives of schools and districts using systems of performance

assessment for graduation and throughout the grades have also been launched in California and
Hawaii, among other places. As students are developing their performance tasks, they self-assess
and receive feedback from teachers and peers against clear criteria, often expressed in a rubric, as
comments rather than grades, with immediate opportunities to apply that feedback. Hundreds of
studies have found that this kind of ongoing formative assessment process produces significant
learning gains,15 especially when students have several opportunities to review and revise their work.16
This approach to performance assessment allows students to internalize standards, become self-aware
of their learning strengths and needs, and take control of their own learning.
States and districts are increasingly supporting this work. When the Every Student Succeeds Act
(ESSA) was adopted in 2015, states were instructed to implement assessments that measure higher-
order thinking skills and understanding. Because traditional multiple-choice tests are insufficient for
these goals, the law explicitly allows the use of portfolios, projects, or extended-performance tasks as
part of state systems.
New tests that were developed to evaluate more challenging standards, such as the Smarter Balanced
Assessment Consortium and the College and Work Ready Assessment, include some open-ended
items and performance tasks that require students to engage in research, problem-solving, and
analysis, and to explain their reasoning and conclusions.
ESSA invited states to apply for an innovative assessment pilot to develop and pilot new approaches
to assessment, refine the assessments, and gradually scale them up across the state. Just this
year several states joined New Hampshire in undertaking such pilots. The ambitious work in New
Hampshire through the Performance Assessment of Competency Education program has been
underway for several years, authorized by the federal pilot. It combines standardized assessments
once in a grade span with a series of standards-based common performance tasks that engage
students in inquiry. District and statewide performance assessments ask students to show what they
know through projects and products scored reliably by trained teachers using common rubrics. Several
other states are now developing performance assessments as part of evolving systems that emphasize
feedback throughout the year.

More than 25 states have joined together as part of the State Performance Assessment Learning
Community to create performance assessments as part of their overall systems of assessment, with
initial collaborative efforts in science, in which investigation and problem-solving are key to the
new standards and require hands-on inquiry.
This is the time for these efforts to accelerate and redefine curriculum, instruction, assessment, and
accountability as focused on the ability to apply meaningful learning in deep and transferable ways.
Resources
• California Performance Assessment Collaborative (Learning Policy Institute). This website provides
information, videos, and lessons captured from the educators, policymakers, and researchers in
CPAC working to study and advance the use of authentic approaches to assessment that require
students to demonstrate applied knowledge of content and use of 21st-century skills.
• Mathematics Improvement Network Adaptable Tools for School and District Leaders
(Mathematics Network of Improvement Communities [Math NIC]). The Math NIC design team
collaborated with district administrators, principals, mathematics coaches, and teachers
representing 10 school districts and professional organizations to develop tools for improving in
their mathematics programs.
• Performance Assessment Resource Bank (SCALE, SCOPE, CCSSO). The Performance
Assessment Resource Bank is an online collection of performance tasks and resources—
collected from educators and organizations across the United States and reviewed by experts in
the field—to support the use of performance assessment for meaningful learning.
• Reopening: Moving Toward More Equitable Schools (EL Education). EL Education’s framework
provides guidance and support for schools and districts to help them emphasize authentic learning
and assessment regardless of whether school takes place in school buildings or through distance
or blended learning. The framework is organized around five domains: empowering leadership, crew
culture, compelling curriculum, students as leaders of their own learning, and deeper instruction.
the Process of Coming Back Together (NYU Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the
Transformation of Schools). This guide poses questions and practices for policymakers, district
and school leaders, and school personnel to consider for engaging in culturally responsive–
sustaining school reopenings through an equity lens.
• Ready Schools, Safe Learners: Guidance for School Year 2020–21 (Oregon Department of
Education). Oregon’s state reopening guidance provides direction for districts to “support
student-centered project-based educational experiences that ignite student agency, identity, and
voice” that others can draw upon.
Endnotes
1. Center for Innovation in Education. (2020). Assessment, accountability, and the adaptive challenge of
COVID-19: Focus on meaningful learning. Lexington, KY: Author. https://www.leadingwithlearning.org/
post/assessment-accountability-and-the-adaptive-challenge-of-covid-19.
2. Darling-Hammond, L., Flook, L., Cook-Harvey, C., Barron, B., & Osher, D. (2020). Implications for educational
practice of the science of learning and development. Applied Developmental Science, 24(2), 97–140.

3. Tajfel, H., & Turner, J. C. (1986). “The Social Identity Theory of Intergroup Behavior” in Worchel, S., &
Austin, W. G. (Eds.). Psychology of Intergroup Relations (pp. 7–24). Chicago, IL: Nelson-Hall.
4. Steele, C. M. (1997). A threat in the air: How stereotypes shape intellectual identity and performance.
American Psychologist, 52(6), 613–629.
5. Steele, C. M. (2011). Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do. New York, NY:
W. W. Norton & Company; Aronson, J. (2002). “Stereotype Threat: Contending and Coping With
Unnerving Expectations” in Aronson, J. (Ed.). Improving Academic Achievement: Impact of Psychological
Factors on Education (pp. 279–301). New York, NY: Academic Press.
6. Byrd, C. M. (2015). The associations of intergroup interactions and school racial socialization with
academic motivation. Journal of Educational Research, 108(1), 10–21; Gage, N. A., Kaplan, R., Ellis, K., &
Kramer, D. (2019). Student- and school-level predictors of high school students’ perceptions of school
climate: Implications for school counselors. Journal of Child and Adolescent Counseling, 5(3), 239–255;
see also: Chang, J., & Le, T. N. (2010). Multiculturalism as a dimension of school climate: The impact on
the academic achievement of Asian American and Hispanic youth. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority
Psychology, 16(4), 485–492; Schwarzenthal, M., Schachner, M. K., van de Vijver, F. J. R., & Juang, L. P.
(2018). Equal but different: Effects of equality/inclusion and cultural pluralism on intergroup outcomes in
multiethnic classrooms. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 24(2), 260–271.
7. Steele, D. M., & Cohn-Vargas, B. (2013). Identity Safe Classrooms: Places to Belong and Learn. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
8. Darling-Hammond, L., & Adamson, F. (2015). Beyond the Bubble Test: How Performance Assessments
Support 21st Century Learning. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons; Fine, M., & Pryiomka, K. (2020).
Assessing college readiness through authentic student work: How the City University of New York and the
New York Performance Standards Consortium are collaborating toward equity. Palo Alto, CA: Learning
Policy Institute.
9. LaFors, J. (2020, August 18). Beyond the bell: The power of authentic learning [Blog post].
https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/blog/covid-beyond-bell-power-authentic-learning.
10. Maier, A., Adams, J., Burns, D., Kaul, M., Saunders, M., & Thompson, C. (2020). District initiatives to
meaningfully assess student learning: Lessons from the California Performance Assessment Collaborative. Palo
Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. (Forthcoming).
11. Nasir, N. S., Lee, C. D., Pea, R., & McKinney de Royston, M. (Eds.). (2020). Handbook of the Cultural
Foundations of Learning. New York, NY: Routledge.
12. Ondrasek, N. & Flook, L. (2020, January 15). How to help students feel safe to be themselves. Greater Good
Magazine. https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_help_all_students_feel_safe_to_be_themselves.
13. Roc, M., Ross, P., & Hernández, L. E. (2019). Internationals Network for Public Schools: A deeper learning
approach to supporting English learners. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute; Hernández, L. E.,
Darling-Hammond, L., Adams, J., & Bradley, K. (with Duncan Grand, D., Roc, M., & Ross, P.). (2019).
Deeper learning networks: Taking student-centered learning and equity to scale. Palo Alto, CA: Learning
Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/deeper-learning-networks.
14. Cohen, G. L., Garcia, J., Purdie-Vaughns, V., Apfel, N., & Brzustoski, P. (2009). Recursive processes in
self-affirmation: Intervening to close the minority achievement gap. Science, 324(5925), 400–403.
https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1170769.
15. Black, P. & Wiliam, D. (1998). Assessment and classroom learning. Assessment in Education: Principles,
Policy & Practice, 5(1), 7–74. https://doi.org/10.1080/0969595980050102; Hattie, J. (2008). Visible
Learning: A Synthesis of Over 800 Meta-Analyses Relating to Achievement. New York, NY: Routledge.
16. Darling-Hammond, L., Barron, B., Pearson, P. D., Schoenfeld, A. H., Stage, E. K., Zimmerman,
T. D., Cervetti, G. N., & Tilson, J. L. (2015). Powerful Learning: What We Know About Teaching
for Understanding. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons; Barron, B., & Darling-Hammond, L.
(2008, October 8). Powerful learning: Studies show deep understanding derives from collaborative
methods. Edutopia. http://www.edutopia.org/inquiry-project-learning-research.

Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time
Since schools closed nationwide in March, students have had uneven access to distance learning. A
June 2020 survey of nearly 500 nationally representative districts found that, while 85% delivered
some kind of materials to students, only one third required teachers to provide remote instruction
in which they engaged and interacted with all of their students around the curriculum content
(e.g., through online lessons, recorded lectures, or one-on-one support via phone or computer).
These expectations were greatly disparate between affluent and lower-wealth communities, as well
as between urban and rural districts. Some districts in which students lacked consistent internet
access simply sent packets of worksheets home.
The lost opportunities for school-year instruction were compounded by the lack of summer and
after-school enrichment opportunities, particularly for students from low-income or immigrant
families. Those who traditionally have had the fewest educational opportunities have received even
less support over the past several months.
The unequal access to learning during the pandemic further exacerbates the vast differences
between learning opportunities that students from lower-income and upper-income families are
routinely exposed to during out-of-school hours. Research suggests that students from middle- and
upper-income families typically spend 6,000 more hours in educational activities than students in
low-income families by the time they reach 6th grade.1
These opportunity gaps translate to substantial differences in academic achievement. Research

estimates that the cumulative summer learning gap over multiple years accounts for more than half
of the 9th-grade achievement difference between students from lower-income families and their
more affluent peers, which in turn contributes to whether or not students enter college-track high
school programs and meet college-going requirements.2 The U.S. public education system’s 6-hour
day and 180-day year cannot, on its own, offset the gap in out-of-school learning opportunities
between students from more and less affluent families.
With 55 million students out of school and receiving highly disparate education due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, the effects of lost learning time will be widely felt. A McKinsey report suggests
that these negative effects could last a lifetime and disproportionately impact Black and Latino/a
students from low-income families. Expanded learning time (ELT) is a means by which to recover
lost learning opportunities, whether in person or online.
What Students Need

As a number of back-to-school frameworks have argued,3 a critical approach to restarting and
reinventing schooling will be to provide expanded learning time and opportunities for all students,
with special attention paid to students with special education needs and those who are English
learners. ELT takes place before and after the typical school day and over summer vacation and other
scheduled breaks and is one of the four pillars of a comprehensive community school strategy.4 (See
“Priority 8: Establish Community Schools and Wraparound Supports.”) While many schools offer
after-school programs and weekend enrichment opportunities, these opportunities do not necessarily
constitute ELT. Quality ELT is not just an add-on program, field trip, or enrichment opportunity;
it complements the learning that takes place during the typical school day in ways that support
essential curricular standards and the learning activities developed to achieve those standards.

The impact of ELT has been studied by researchers and program evaluators for decades, and an
extensive body of research indicates that additional high-quality learning time leads to positive
achievement and engagement outcomes for students. For example, a meta-analysis of 15 empirical
studies selected for their methodological rigor found that 14 of the studies of extended days and/
or years demonstrated positive achievement outcomes for students.5 Additional research reviews
point to similar findings, often emphasizing that ELT is especially beneficial for students from
low-income families, students of color, and students who are academically behind.6
In the current context, ELT will be particularly important for English learners. For many of these
students, these months away from school have meant a lack of exposure to English and adequate
online instruction. As a consequence, many will need additional learning time—above and beyond
that provided for other students. Students who are English learners will benefit from targeted
language instruction (preferably in both English and their primary language) to catch up, as well as
regular opportunities to be mixed with other students. In many cases, they will also need social and
emotional supports due to the stress they have experienced given recent Administration efforts to
break up families and deport parents.
A research synthesis from the Wallace Foundation notes that quality out-of-school programs that
produce positive effects on outcomes offer targeted instruction focused on particular academic
and/or social and emotional skills; create a warm, positive climate; enable consistent and frequent
participation; and employ a stable group of trained, dedicated instructors who work effectively with
youth. Given the strong evidence base that links well-designed additional learning time to positive
student outcomes, it is encouraging to see that ELT appears in the majority of state plans for
reopening schools that have been developed thus far.
Another form of extended learning is preschool education. Investments in early childhood programs,
such as Head Start, lead to substantial gains in attainment and earnings,7 and those investments
could be greatly expanded to reach more eligible children. But high-quality preschool is not available
to many eligible students both because of inadequate public funding and because many programs run
for only 3–4 hours each day, making them inaccessible to many children from working families. Part-
day programs, furthermore, are less effective than school-day programs in boosting child outcomes.

Now, more than ever, policymakers will
determine the extent to which out-of-school Now, more than ever, policymakers
time exacerbates or mitigates inequitable
will determine the extent to which
educational outcomes for students.
COVID-19 has further illuminated what we out-of-school time exacerbates or
have long known: Our current school schedule mitigates inequitable educational
cannot meet the needs of many students.
Innovations made now will have lasting
outcomes for students.
benefits, as school closures are likely to become
more common, not only due to public health
emergencies, but also due to increasingly
common climate crises.8

In the short term, state and local education leaders can provide opportunities to help make up
for learning time lost to the COVID-19 pandemic with resources focused on students who have
been most impacted by school closures. In the long term, policymakers also have an opportunity
to promote ELT in order to alleviate the out-of-school time opportunity gap by providing high-
quality, meaningful learning opportunities for all students. These opportunities should focus
on acceleration rather than remediation, building on students’ strengths rather than adopting a
deficit-based approach.
Infuse high-quality tutoring within and beyond the school day

As one team of researchers noted in explaining the rationale for investing in tutoring:
Students who fall behind grade-level material tend to stay behind. When these
students miss developing crucial foundational skills, they can have major difficulties
in subsequent learning tasks, which worsens the gap between them and their grade-
level peers as they move from one grade to the next. This persistent mismatch
between the learning needs of students and what classroom instruction delivers can
seriously undermine students’ chances of success in the workforce and beyond.9
There is a well-established literature on the positive effects of tutoring, which can produce large
gains even when conducted virtually.10 When students return in the fall, whether in-person, online,
or in some hybrid form, many will need individualized attention to support learning gains. Effective
tutoring is accomplished not by a cadre of
ever-changing, untrained volunteers, but by a
Effective tutoring is accomplished
focused group of trained individuals working
consistently with individuals or small groups not by a cadre of ever-changing,
of students. In particular, research supports untrained volunteers, but by a
high-dosage tutoring in which tutors work
consistently every day for full class sessions
focused group of trained individuals
(during or after school) with students working consistently with individuals
one-to-one or in very small groups, often or small groups of students.
accomplishing large gains in relatively short
periods of time.
These may be specially trained teachers, as in programs such as Reading Recovery that use a set of
well-defined methods one-on-one or in small groups and have been found to have strong positive
effects on reading gains for struggling readers,11 including students with special education needs
and English learners.12 They may also be recent college graduates, including AmeriCorps volunteers,
who receive training to work with students, as in the Boston MATCH Education program, replicated
by SAGA Education in Chicago. In daily 50-minute sessions added to their regular math classes,
two students working with a tutor gained an additional 1 to 2 years of math proficiency by focusing
on the specific areas they needed to master while also preparing for their standard class. Tutors in
programs such as these have the advantage of a well-developed curriculum with frequent formative
assessments to gauge and guide where support is needed.13
Although districts often think of tutoring as too expensive to undertake as a strategy for helping
students master missed skills, because of the fact that it can be structured to be conducted by cross-
age peers, volunteers, paraprofessionals, or trained teachers—and because of the size and speed

of the gains students can make—economists find that tutoring is one of the more cost-effective
strategies to promote accelerated student learning.14 In light of this powerful evidence, the United
Kingdom is now investing more than a billion dollars for tutoring to help all students catch up on
what they missed during the spring.
Tutoring is also a powerful tool for ensuring that every child has an adult in school whom they can
trust. Lawrence, MA, was one of the lowest-performing districts in the state prior to a state-led
turnaround. Extended learning time was an important part of the district’s success in raising
achievement. The district partnered with MATCH Education to offer intensive mathematics tutoring
during or after school to pairs of the 9th- and 10th-grade students attending two of the district’s
lowest-performing high schools. In addition, expert teachers were recruited and paid to offer
“Acceleration Academies” over weeklong vacation breaks. These provided struggling students with
targeted, small-group instruction in a single subject.15
Expand high-quality after-school programs

Extended learning time and opportunities, used well, can accelerate learning and reduce the
learning opportunity gap between what students from low-income families and their peers from
middle- and upper-income families experience during out-of-school hours.
Additional time will not in and of itself promote positive student outcomes; additional learning
time must be high quality and meaningful in order to move the needle on student
achievement and engagement.16 Among the things that can make out-of-school programs more
meaningful are connections to the work students are doing in school and culturally relevant
strategies that make learning engaging and allow students to explore ideas deeply.
A strong example of this type of collaboration exists in Oakland Unified School District’s community
schools, where ELT is a core model of their full-service community schools approach. Schools
in Oakland, CA, use a number of different strategies to increase collaboration, such as including
partner staff in monthly faculty meetings and providing regular opportunities for ELT staff to meet
with teachers to learn about current curricular goals and units. In some Oakland schools, ELT staff
are further integrated into the regular school day; they provide extra assistance to teachers by
mentoring students and conducting pullout sessions for small-group instruction. A study of the
implementation of the community schools approach in Oakland highlighted one school in which
ELT staff and regular teaching staff worked so closely together that the principal no longer referred
to ELT as “after-school programming.” In this school, where nearly all of the 6th- and 7th-grade
students stay after the traditional school day to participate in coding classes, dance classes, and
STEM, the after-school program is referred to as the 8th and 9th periods, indicating an incorporation
of ELT into the regular school schedule. In this way, the close collaboration among all adults who
work with students allows for a seamless integration of all student learning opportunities.17
Similarly, an extended school-day program offered by Meriden Public Schools District in

Connecticut integrated expanded learning time with traditional instruction. In 2012, the
superintendent and the local teachers union in Meriden, CT, partnered with the YMCA and the
Boys & Girls Club to add 100 minutes per day (roughly equivalent to 40 additional school days)
of personalized learning time at three low-performing schools. The three participating schools
reengineered their schedules to include an enrichment block, during which community partners
staff the classrooms as teachers and provide instruction in three key enrichment areas: healthy

living, literacy, and STEM. A key component of Meriden’s after-school program is that staff at the
community organizations worked closely with teachers to align after-school activities with learning
during the traditional day and with the schools’ instructional goals. Additionally, the participating
schools included community partners in professional learning communities with school staff.
This type of collaboration between teachers and providers of ELT ensures that additional learning
time is strongly linked with the learning opportunities during the school day and that all learning
opportunities complement one another in service of supporting primary instructional goals. The
results in Meriden were promising: Two of the three participating schools saw gains in attendance
rates, core subject test scores, and teacher ratings, which exceeded districtwide averages.
In addition to aligning activities with a school’s academic learning goals, ELT learning
opportunities can be more successful if they incorporate meaningful activities that engage
deeper learning pedagogies with content that is connected to students’ lives outside of school.
Citizen Schools (CS) is an example of ELT programming that engages deeper learning pedagogies
for students. CS youth participate in apprenticeships that consist of hands-on learning projects led
by volunteer citizen teachers. Apprentices work in small groups to do project-based work such as
litigating mock trials, publishing children’s books, and building solar cars. These apprenticeships
are complemented with activities that help students develop their organizational and study skills,
along with homework help. Programs culminate with opportunities for participants to publicly
present their projects. CS’s 8th Grade Academy also includes programming to help students develop
their leadership and decision-making skills to prepare for college.18 A rigorous, quasi-experimental
evaluation of the academy identified positive effects on attendance and enrollment, math and
reading achievement, promotion, and graduation.19
As is the case with all learning, ELT can be more meaningful and engaging if the curriculum
authentically connects to student backgrounds. ELT should aim to ground learning in students’
prior knowledge and cultural backgrounds and to connect learning to real-world issues. This could
include their individual experiences with COVID-19 in their communities. Programming should
also prioritize the increased need for addressing the social and emotional needs of students, who
may be experiencing increased levels of anxiety, grief, and uncertainty about the future due to the
pandemic.20 Nearly every state that has developed a plan for reopening schools post-COVID-19 has
emphasized the need to integrate social and emotional learning into traditional curricula, and this
emphasis should extend to ELT as well, particularly learning opportunities designed to address lost
instructional time for those students who were most impacted by school closures. (See “Priority 4:
Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning” for more information.)
Create high-quality summer programs

States and districts can plan to provide expanded learning time for students next summer, even as
this summer comes to a close. Well-designed summer programs are most effective when students
experience them for multiple summers. Many types of summer programs, offered to all grade levels,
have been found to be effective, including summer programs focused on learning at home, social and
emotional well-being, and employment and career development, as well as those focused on academic
learning. In a systematic review conducted by the RAND Corporation, more than 40 of 43 summer
programs that have been rigorously evaluated showed positive impacts on at least one youth outcome,
ranging from reading fluency to increased social and emotional skills and GPA.21 When developing or
selecting a summer program, it is important to invest in programs that are intentionally designed to

meet student and community needs; are of sufficient duration to make an impact; and provide high-
quality, meaningful learning opportunities. These include stable, trained staff; a systematic approach
to the curriculum; and strategies to ensure consistent, stable participation by students.
Getting high rates of student participation depends on an engaging curriculum that is highly
motivating for students. A summer program that illustrates this principle with a well-developed
community-based philosophy is the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Freedom Schools. CDF Freedom
Schools are modeled after the 1963 Mississippi Freedom Schools, which sought to invest in
communities by developing leaders who could exercise their political power. CDF Freedom Schools
partner with community organizations, churches, and schools to provide literacy-rich summer
programs for k–12 students. Programs vary in length from 5 to 8 weeks and include a curriculum
designed to promote cultural and historical consciousness. The program incorporates five content
areas: social action and civic engagement, intergenerational leadership, nutrition and health,
parent and family involvement, and academic enrichment.
A typical CDF Freedom School day begins with a community meeting called Harambee (a Kiswahili
word that means “let’s come together”). This is followed by a 3-hour block of literacy instruction
during which students engage with the Integrated Reading Curriculum (IRC). The IRC incorporates
a carefully selected array of books that reflect a wide variety of cultures and experiences as well
as activities that are designed to be engaging and develop students’ love of reading. Afternoons
are dedicated to activities related to the themes included in the IRC. Social action and community
services are key components of CDF Freedom Schools. At the start of the program, staff and
students work together to identify issues affecting their community, and throughout the course of
the program, students develop and implement a social action plan to address the community issues
they identified. These social action projects embody a foundational idea that the CDF Freedom
Schools work to instill in students: I can and must make a difference. A multiyear evaluation
reported that participation in CDF Freedom Schools was associated with positive character
development outcomes and achievement on standardized reading tests.22
Expand the reach and duration of early learning programs

One critical way to expand learning time for children
is to ensure high-quality early learning. In addition,
Research shows that more
research shows that more daily learning time can
yield bigger benefits for preschool-age children daily learning time can yield
as well, many of whom attend preschool for only bigger benefits for preschool-
part of a day.23 While some part-day programs have
shown strong results, most of the highly effective
age children as well, many of
programs, especially for children from low-income whom attend preschool for
families, provide full-day preschool. An evaluation only part of a day.
of the long-term impact of the Chicago Child-Parent
Centers, for example, showed that children attending
the program for a full day scored better on measures
of social-emotional development, math and reading skills, and physical health than similar children
attending the same program for only part of a day.24 A national evaluation of Head Start also
suggests that children who enrolled in the full-day program performed better in reading and math.25

Enact policies that support expanded learning time
Several states and localities are leading the way by supporting districts and schools to provide
meaningful increases in learning time for students. For example, to expand early learning time,
Michigan’s state preschool program, Great Start Readiness Program (GSRP), allocates funds
based on part-day slots but provides a full-day option in which local grantees can use either two
part-day GSRP slots or blend a part-day GSRP and part-day Head Start slot together to create a
full-day slot. All Head Start and GSRP policies and regulations must be applied to the blended slots,
with the highest standard from either program given precedence, ensuring quality.26 As a result,
approximately 80% of children attend high-quality full-day GSRP programs that operate for at least
the same length of day as the local school district’s or charter school’s 1st-grade program.27
In 2005, the Massachusetts Legislature established the Expanded Learning Time Initiative. The
initiative provides grants for schools serving high-need students to provide an additional 300 hours
of instruction to their school year. Schools that received the grant were able to use funding to add
days to their school year, lengthen their school day, or both. The initiative requires that additional
time be used for high-quality learning opportunities that engage students in core subjects as
well, and that enrichment activities are aligned with state standards. Additionally, it directs
schools to set aside time for lesson planning for teachers as well as professional development
for teachers and staff from community-based organizations that partner with schools to provide
additional programming.28
In 2012, the Florida Legislature funded an additional hour per day of literacy instruction and
reading time in 100 elementary schools with the state’s lowest reading scores. Two years later, the
initiative was expanded to include 300 elementary schools (out of roughly 1,800 elementary schools
across the state). The Florida extended-day program requires that instructional approaches during
additional time are evidence-based, adapted for student ability, and cross-curricular (incorporating
reading material from other core subjects). During additional instructional time, students must
have opportunities for guided practice and instruction that includes vocabulary, fluency, phonemic
awareness, phonics, and comprehension. A rigorous evaluation found that the extended school day
had significant, positive effects on student reading achievement; in one school year, student test
scores improved by the equivalent of one month of extra learning.29 These findings are aligned with
research reviews of ELT, which suggest additional time will be most effective when it is aligned with
student needs.30
In its recently approved budget and reopening plan, Florida has already allocated $64 million
toward summer recovery in July and August for students with significant academic needs, and it has
allocated school-year funding toward the YMCA and the Boys & Girls Club.31 States can also provide
a suite of options even in the absence of additional funding. Oklahoma, for example, advocates for
modified scheduling with longer periods, longer days, and longer breaks to allow for Acceleration
Academies—a strategy that appears in many state plans. Even in times of fiscal crisis, communities
have options for learning beyond the traditional school day in order to ameliorate the negative
effects of the pandemic.
States can use a variety of federal programs for these purposes, including multiple funding streams
under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) (see Table 7.1).

Table 7.1
Examples of Federal Funding Streams Through ESSA That Can Support
Summer Programs
• Improving Basic Programs Operated by Local Educational Agencies (Title I, Part A)

• Migrant Education Program (Title I, Part C)
• Improving Teacher Quality State Grants (Title II, Part A)
• Literacy Education for All, Results for the Nation (LEARN) State Literacy Discretionary/
Competitive Grant (Title II, Part B)
• Student Support and Academic Enrichment Programs (Title IV, Part A)
• 21st Century Community Learning Centers Grants (Title IV, Part B)
• Promise Neighborhoods Discretionary/Competitive Grant (Title IV, Part F)
• Full Service Community Schools Program Discretionary/Competitive Grant (Title IV, Part F)
Source: McCombs, J. S., Augustine, C. H., Unlu, F., Ziol-Guest, K. M., Naftel, S., Gomez, C. J., Marsh, T., Akinniranye, G., &
Todd, I. (2019). Investing in successful summer programs: A review of evidence under the Every Student Succeeds Act.
Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR2836.html.
Resources
• A School Year Like No Other Demands a New Learning Day: A Blueprint for How Afterschool
Programs & Community Partners Can Help (Afterschool Alliance). This blueprint offers building
blocks for school–community partnerships to address equity and co-construct the learning day in
the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Afterschool Programs: A Review of Evidence Under the Every Student Succeeds Act (Research
for Action). Based on a literature review of studies published since 2000, this review summarizes
the effectiveness of specific after-school programs. The review uses the ESSA evidence
framework to assess the evidence of over 60 after-school programs. A companion guide
provides profiles of each after-school program included in the review as well as studies of each
program’s effectiveness.
• Getting to Work on Summer Learning: Recommended Practices for Success, 2nd Ed. (RAND
Corporation). Based on thousands of hours of observations, interviews, and surveys, this report
provides guidance for district leaders and their partners for launching, improving, and sustaining
effective summer learning programs.
• Investing in Successful Summer Programs: A Review of Evidence Under the Every Student
Succeeds Act (RAND Corporation). This report provides current information about the
effectiveness of summer programs for k–12 students to help practitioners, funders, and
policymakers make evidence-based investments. The review uses the ESSA evidence framework
to assess the effectiveness of summer programs and includes descriptions of 43 summer
programs that align with ESSA evidence standards.
• Time in Pursuit of Education Equity: Promoting Learning Time Reforms That Cross Ideological
Divides to Benefit Students Most in Need (AASA). This School Administrator article authored by
Jeannie Oakes provides implementation lessons that school leaders and policymakers can use
as they seek to expand learning time.

Endnotes
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17. Fehrer, K., & Leos-Urbel, J. (2016). “We’re on One Team”: Examining community school implementation
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18. Acaira, E., Vile, J., & Reisner, E. R. (2010). Citizen Schools: Achieving high school graduation: Citizen Schools’
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(accessed 06/27/20).
24. Reynolds, A. J., Richardson, B. A., Hayakawa, M., Lease, E. M., Warner-Richter, M., Englund, M. M., Ou,
S-R., & Sullivan, M. (2014). Association of a full-day vs part-day preschool intervention with school
readiness, attendance, and parent involvement. JAMA, 312(20), 2126–2134.
25. Walters, C. R. (2015). Inputs in the production of early childhood human capital: Evidence from Head
Start. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 7(4), 76–102.
26. Michigan Department of Education. (n.d.). GSRP/Head Start blend: Meeting the standards. Lansing, MI:
Author. http://www.michigan.gov/documents/mde/GSRP_Head_Start_Blend._Meeting_the_Standards._
July_2014_467921_7.pdf.
27. Wechsler, M., Kirp, D., Tinubu Ali, T., Gardner, M., Maier, A., Melnick, H., & Shields, P. (2016). The road to
high-quality early learning: Lessons from the states. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
28. Partnership for the Future of Learning. (2018). Community schools playbook. Washington, DC: Author.
https://communityschools.futureforlearning.org/assets/downloads/community-schools-playbook.pdf.
29. Figlio, D., Holden, K., & Ozek, U. (2018). Do students benefit from longer school days? Regression
discontinuity evidence from Florida’s additional hour of literacy instruction. Washington, DC: National Center
for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research.
31. Florida Department of Education. (2020). Reopening Florida’s schools and the CARES Act: Closing
achievement gaps and creating safe spaces for learning. Tallahassee, FL: Author. http://www.fldoe.org/core/
fileparse.php/19861/urlt/FLDOEReopeningCARESAct.pdf.

Priority 8: Establish Community Schools
and Wraparound Supports
To effectively meet the urgent needs of students and families as schools reopen, state and district
leaders should consider establishing and expanding community schools. Community schools
replace the fragmented, bureaucratic, social services gauntlet that families in need must often
navigate with a student-focused approach that organizes resources from community partners
where they can be most easily accessed: in school. In community schools, students and families are
engaged as partners in the educational process and have access to a broad range of well-coordinated
supports and services. These kinds of services will be even more necessary in the coming year, one
that will be traumatic for so many students and families.
While some community schools have school-based services, including health clinics, many
wraparound models coordinate services that exist in the community in addition to or in lieu of
housing them on-site. For example, students and families at Fannie Lou Hamer Freedom High
School in New York City have access to comprehensive health services (including a specialized teen
clinic) through a partnership with the Children’s Aid Society Bronx Family Center, located three
blocks from the school. Through a partnership with the Helen Keller Institute, free vision screenings
and eyeglasses are available to any student who needs them, while a health educator and a full-time
social worker provide support during the school day. An extended learning program focuses on
youth development, including culinary arts and a student government engaging with local officials.
When the school closed in response to COVID-19, staff were able to respond quickly and effectively.
Led by the community school director, they mobilized to distribute Chromebooks to students
and to set up systems to provide breakfast and lunch to up to 500 families daily. The community
school director, family engagement coordinator, social worker, and other staff offered virtual
tutoring, college coaching, and mental health support. They also helped families with housing and
immigration issues, which can be complex and difficult to navigate.
What Is a Community School?1

A community school is both a place and a set of partnerships between the education system, the
nonprofit sector, and local government agencies. While the specific programs and services vary
according to local context, there are four key pillars of the community school approach.
1. Integrated student supports. Includes mental and physical health care, nutrition support,
housing assistance, and other wraparound services.
2. Expanded and enriched learning time. Includes lengthening the school day and year, as well
as enriching the curriculum through real-world learning opportunities.
3. Active family and community engagement. Includes both service provision and meaningful
partnership with parents and family members to support children’s learning.
4. Collaborative leadership and practices. Includes coordination of community school services

as well as site-based leadership teams and teacher learning communities.

What Students Need
Skyrocketing unemployment rates and widespread school closures due to COVID-19 are creating
economic instability and food insecurity for many children and families. In addition, some parents
have expressed concerns that their families’ mental health will suffer and that their children will
fall behind in school, especially in lower-income communities. Even before COVID-19, more than
half of the nation’s schoolchildren (25 million) lived in low-income households.2 They and their
families have borne the brunt of a broken social safety net and long-term disinvestment in schools,
particularly in primarily Black and Latino/a neighborhoods.3 As the California School Boards
Association reopening guide notes, “equity” and “equality” are not equivalent. Some students need
extra supports—such as technology access, food assistance, and mental health services—in order to
access educational opportunities. It is important that plans for the new school year ensure that all
students have access to the supports that they need.
Community schools have emerged as a democratic and collaborative response to structural

inequities in the education system. These schools are designed to address systemic barriers to
education such as poverty or housing insecurity. They do so by drawing upon a community’s assets
and culture to bring powerful supports and learning opportunities to students and families.
For example, Oakland International High School supports newcomer students who have recently
immigrated to the California Bay Area by providing free legal representation, after-school tutoring,
English classes for parents, mental health and mentoring services, and after-school/weekend soccer
programming. Oakland International staff conduct home visits and participate in “community
walks” led by students and families to get to know the neighborhood better. A Community School
Advisory Committee (a site leadership team) and a Coordination of Services Team (a team linking
students with services) include community members in collaborative decision-making at the site.
Evidence shows that community schools can

improve outcomes for students, including
Evidence shows that community
attendance, academic achievement, high
school graduation rates, and reduced racial and schools can improve outcomes for
economic achievement gaps.4 A recent RAND students, including attendance,
study of New York City’s 250+ community
academic achievement, high
schools initiative shows that community schools
can work at scale.5 Promising results include a school graduation rates, and
drop in chronic absenteeism, with the biggest reduced racial and economic
effects on the most vulnerable students, and
achievement gaps.
a decline in disciplinary incidents.6 Students
were more likely to progress from grade to grade
on time, accumulate more course credits, and
graduate from high school at higher rates.
In the present moment, community schools offer a path forward for supporting children and
families during a stressful time and can be leveraged across the education spectrum, from early
childhood to high school. In the long term, this approach can offer a more inclusive and engaging
learning experience that is grounded in research and designed to respond effectively to student and
family needs.

The COVID-19 crisis has laid bare the fraying social safety net in the United States, as well as the
important role that schools play in filling current service gaps. Many schools have scrambled to
provide digital access to students and to-go meals to families in response to widespread closures.
Community schools are especially well positioned to meet the many needs of students and families
during this time. For example, community school leaders in Baltimore found that they have been
able to accomplish “at least 80%” of their normal school functions—despite school closures—thanks
to the partnerships they already had in place. Baltimore staff have spent hours on the phone
checking in with students and families, addressing needs from child care to emergency housing.
They have done so by relying on a network of community partners who can provide services to
families in crisis.
Similarly, at Duarte High School (which is part of the community schools pilot initiative led by
the Los Angeles County Office of Education), when schools were physically closed, the community
school coordinator ensured that the families of all 770 students received a call in their home
language to assess needs related to technology, food, and mental and physical health supports. This
task was distributed across school staff after the school shut down, with notes from each call entered
into a shared spreadsheet. Once school reopens, a similar process will help to pinpoint the needs of
individual students and families as well as prioritize services for the school community as a whole.
By supporting community schools through stronger policies, funding, and coordination of services,
state and local leaders have an opportunity to respond to the immediate needs of students and
families and to support teachers as schools reopen, while laying a lasting foundation for a student-
focused approach to learning.
Enact local policies that support well-designed community schools

Sound community school policies:
• provide a comprehensive definition of the approach;

• incorporate the four evidence-based pillars—integrated student supports, expanded
learning time, community partnerships, and collaborative practices;
• address key aspects of implementation (such as how schools can become community
schools, how coordinators will be funded, and how services will be accessed);
• invest in professional development for school staff (including principals); and
• identify collaborative leadership structures and practices (such as decision-making
committees that involve students, families, educators, and community partners).
At the local level, a number of different entities can pass policies in support of community schools.
Local school boards can pass resolutions in support of community schools that address important
elements of implementation, as New York City and Baltimore have done. For example, in 2016 the
Baltimore City Board of School Commissioners approved a community school strategy that lays out
a vision, describes key features of implementation, and establishes a Community Schools Steering
Committee to oversee the initiative. Both cities have been building comprehensive approaches
since then that have made a substantial difference in schools’ abilities to support students during
the pandemic.

Cincinnati has an especially strong policy infrastructure, with a 2009 Community Learning Center
(CLC) policy accompanied by a board-approved set of guiding principles, partnership parameters,
and community involvement policy. The master facilities plan aims to redesign all Cincinnati
public schools as CLCs through a community engagement process in which community members
and school stakeholders identify their needs and assets and develop a strategy for rebuilding the
school as a CLC. Each of these schools will have a resource coordinator funded by both Title I and
local philanthropic organizations. This CLC financing philosophy is unique, as CLCs are not wholly
dependent upon school budgets.
Enlist regional agencies that can provide technical assistance and help coordinate
local services
State leaders can support community schools by working with regional leaders (such as County
Offices of Education in California, Boards of Cooperative Educational Services in New York, or
Educational Service Districts in Washington State) to coordinate services and provide technical
assistance for district community school initiatives. Technical assistance in this context includes
the various supports needed to launch and sustain community school initiatives at scale, such
as professional development and coaching for district and school staff, support for strategic
planning, and partnership development that brings resources to schools (e.g., direct staffing, service
provision, and funding).
Technical assistance can also come from local organizations, including districts (as with the New
York City Office of Community Schools or Oakland’s Community Schools and Student Services
division); nonprofit partners (as with the Community Learning Center Institute in Cincinnati or
Children’s Aid in many cities); and universities (such as Binghamton University and Fordham
University, which operate two of the Technical Assistance Centers in New York State).
State leaders can play an important role in supporting and expanding these efforts by providing
funding, training, and guidance to regional leaders. For example, the West Virginia Board of
Education passed State Community Schools Policy 2425 to define and provide guidance for
implementing sustainable community schools. Local boards of education that decide to implement
the state guidance can receive technical assistance through the state education agency, which also
developed a resource guide for community schools.
Strong examples of regional support for community school initiatives can be found in different
parts of the country. For example:
• In California, the Los Angeles County Office of Education is leading a community schools
pilot that involves partnering with over a dozen Los Angeles county agencies to provide a
range of services—including counseling, mental health education, enrollment support and
case management of social services, parent workshops, after-school programming, and
field trips—to 15 pilot high schools. Funding from the state Mental Health Services Act
(administered in partnership with the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health)
supports a full-time coordinator and family outreach worker at each pilot site.
• New York State has funded three Community Schools Technical Assistance Centers to
provide a range of supports to community schools in their regions, including professional
development for community school practitioners via webinars and conferences; site visits
to provide in-person coaching; working with district and school leaders to build capacity

through implementation and improvement science approaches; and maintaining a database
of community partners, programs, and resources that can support community schools. In
addition, Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) in New York can support
community schools across districts through a cooperative service agreement, such as
the agreement established by the Rockland BOCES in partnership with Rockland 21C, a
nonprofit that operates a third Technical Assistance Center in New York State.
Many re-entry plans—including those from the Alliance for Excellent Education, Transcend
Education, and CASEL—emphasize the importance of coordinating local services to meet students’
basic needs (such as food and health care) and address trauma and loss to promote whole-child
well-being. As schools reopen, local leaders
(such as an administrator, a community partner,
The School Mental Health
or a community school coordinator) can start
by conducting a needs and assets assessment Collaborative offers a universal
as students return. The School Mental Health screener, which can identify
Collaborative offers a universal screener, which
high-priority areas of need as
can identify high-priority areas of need as well as
existing programs on the school campus or in the well as existing programs on
surrounding community that can help to meet those the school campus or in the
needs. Information for the assessment can come
from surveys; administrative data review; focus
surrounding community that
groups; and/or interviews of students, families, can help to meet those needs.
school staff, and community partners (including
early education providers).
Once the school community’s needs and assets are identified, local leaders can build on or expand
existing initiatives to coordinate services. These initiatives may include state-, district-, or school-level
efforts to help providers coordinate, deploy, and target their services efficiently. For example, multi-
tiered systems of support (MTSS) are part of a statewide initiative in California, and Coordination of
Services Teams have been central to Oakland Unified School District’s community schools initiative.
Initiatives may also build upon and include early education. The Los Angeles County Department
of Mental Health (DMH) has allocated funds to Los Angeles Unified School District for an effort
focused on early education and services for children from birth to age 8. Funding from multiple
sources supports this work, including First 5 and the Mental Health Services Act (allocated by
DMH). These funds are used to train social workers and resource navigators to coordinate services
at early childhood centers and nearby elementary schools, and to implement trauma-informed
practices, support the development of self-regulation skills in young children, and engage
families. The mental health team has also received extensive training in early childhood mental
health consultation.
Create reliable funding streams to support community school models

As states implement plans to reopen schools, some are addressing community schools as a key
support. For example, Maryland’s plan notes that community schools in the state have distributed
food, hygienic supplies, technology equipment, and school supplies during closures, and have
provided internet access, mental health services, housing information, and other crisis supports
to families. As schools reopen, the plan calls for community schools to draw on existing needs

assessment data, reach out to families, and leverage community partnerships to provide academic
enrichment and extended learning time, as well as family supports such as adult language classes
and employment and health services. Importantly, Maryland passed a 2019 bill that provides 2 years
of funding to ensure that all schools serving high concentrations of students living in poverty will
have a community schools coordinator and associated wraparound supports.
State and local leaders can blend and braid federal, state, and local funding streams to provide
integrated health, mental health, and social services alongside high-quality, supportive instruction
in community schools. In the short term, this can involve drawing on federal stimulus funds to
provide integrated student supports as schools reopen. For example, the CARES Act Elementary
and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) Fund awards grants to state education agencies
for the purpose of providing local education agencies with emergency relief funds to address the
impact of COVID-19. These grants can be used to support any activity authorized by the Elementary
and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), including community schools. Relevant activities that are
specifically named by ESSER include the provision of mental health services and supports, as well
as planning and coordination to meet the needs of students during school closures. Similarly,
the Governor’s Emergency Education Relief Fund can be used to support the community school
approach in districts that have been significantly impacted by COVID-19.
In the long term, funding for community schools can come from a combination of federal
(including Every Student Succeeds Act Titles I and IV, as well as Medicaid), state, and local sources.
Local funding can come from city or county government, school or district budgets, or private
philanthropy. For example, community schools in Lincoln, NE, were piloted using $100,000 in seed
funding from a local community foundation. In this early stage of the initiative, costs for site-based
coordinators were split between foundation resources and contributions from the lead agencies
partnering with each of the four pilot community schools. Now, 29 of the district’s 59 schools
are community learning centers. These schools are funded through a combination of 16 sources,
including district and city general funds, Title I, a federal 21st Century Community Learning Center
after-school programming grant, financial and in-kind contributions from lead agency partners, and
private foundation grants.
State policymakers can play an important role in reducing barriers to blending and braiding through
actions such as streamlining and aligning application and reporting requirements for different
funding sources, when possible.
States can also establish direct funding streams for community schools. Kentucky has long
supported Family Resource and Youth Services Centers (dating back to the Kentucky Education
Reform Act of 1990). Schools in which at least 20% of the student population is eligible for free or
reduced-price meals may compete for funding. In 2019, there were over 850 centers across the state,
providing vital programs, services, and referrals to students and their families. Also in 2019, New
Mexico approved a bill that created a community school framework and authorized $2 million for a
competitive grant program.
New York has annually set aside increasing amounts of its school funding formula to support
community schools in districts designated as high need. This went from $100 million in 2016–17 to
$250 million in 2019–20, which the state maintained in its enacted 2020–21 budget. In addition
to supporting new community school initiatives, set-aside dollars can be used to sustain existing
community school programs that had been funded under a prior community schools grant program.

Create Children’s Cabinets at the federal, state,
and county levels to coordinate, integrate, and Children’s Cabinets can start to
streamline services across agencies streamline and integrate partner
Leaders at multiple levels can help enable more programs, assist with managing
effective and efficiently provided resources for
services to children and youth by creating a
multiple funding streams, and
Children’s Cabinet or other vehicle to coordinate create efficiencies where there
services at the top of the system so that they are now bureaucratic barriers.
flow to districts and schools more seamlessly. A
centralizing approach can streamline the blizzard
of programs and expectations placed upon schools,
which can easily overwhelm school-based administrators and coordinators. Children’s Cabinets can
start to streamline and integrate partner programs, assist with managing multiple funding streams,
and create efficiencies where there are now bureaucratic barriers.
Children’s Cabinets at the state or local level are typically composed of agency heads who govern
a comprehensive range of child, youth, and family-serving programs. Some cabinets also have
community, philanthropic, education, and business stakeholders appointed by the governor or
mayor. These groups meet regularly to identify common outcomes, coordinate services, and
develop joint plans to support children’s healthy development. This approach is becoming
increasing popular, with the Forum for Youth Investment operating both local and state Children’s
Cabinet networks.
As one example, the Maryland Children’s Cabinet includes the secretaries from the Departments
of Budget and Management; Disabilities; Health; Human Services; Juvenile Services; as well as
the State Superintendent of Schools for the Maryland State Department of Education and the
Executive Director of the Governor’s Office of Crime Control and Prevention. According to the
current 3-year plan, the Cabinet’s strategic goals include improving outcomes for disconnected
youth and reducing childhood hunger and homelessness. In service of these goals, the Children’s
Cabinet Interagency Fund (authorized by Human Services administrative code) provides dedicated
grant funding for Local Management Boards to support wraparound services. Such structures are
essential to managing the multitude of health and human services desperately needed during the
COVID-19 pandemic.
Resources
• Community Schools Playbook (Partnership for the Future of Learning). This playbook provides
model legislation, real-world examples, and many additional resources for state and local leaders
who want to support community schools.
• Financing Community Schools: A Framework for Growth and Sustainability (Partnership for the
Future of Learning). This finance brief discusses community schools funding in depth. It provides
a framework for financing community schools and examples of how community schools at
varying stages of development can identify and implement financing strategies.

• Leveraging Resources Through Community Schools: The Role of Technical Assistance (Learning
Policy Institute). This brief provides information and examples of how local governments and
nonprofit agencies in counties can play an essential role in supporting and providing technical
assistance to community school initiatives in school districts.
• Planning for Re-Entry & Recovery: A Guide for Promoting Equity, Improvement, and Innovation
(FourPoint Education). This guide provides a planning tool that emphasizes the importance
of family, school, and community partnerships. Specifically, the guide suggests that district
and school leaders can maintain a list of key community partners to connect families with,
communicate with these partners about re-entry plans, and identify how partners can deploy
their resources to help with re-entry and recovery and create a more integrated support system
for students.
• The Whole Child: Building Systems of Integrated Student Support During and After COVID-19
(Center for Optimized Student Support at Boston College). This action guide offers practical steps
for schools to develop a system of integrated support.
Endnotes
1. Information in this text box comes from: Maier, A., Daniel, J., Oakes, J., & Lam, L. (2017). Community
schools as an effective school improvement strategy: A review of the evidence. Palo Alto, CA: Learning
Policy Institute.
2. Southern Education Foundation. (2015). A new majority: Low-income students now a majority in the nation’s
public schools [Research bulletin]. Atlanta, GA: Author. https://www.southerneducation.org/wp-content/
uploads/2019/02/New-Majority-Update-Bulletin.pdf.
3. Carter, P. L., & Welner, K. G. (2013). Closing the Opportunity Gap: What America Must Do to Give Every Child
an Even Chance. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; Darling-Hammond, L. (2010). The Flat World
and Education: How America’s Commitment to Equity Will Determine Our Future. New York, NY: Teachers
College Press; Duncan, G. J., & Murnane, R. J. (2011). Whither Opportunity? Rising Inequality, Schools, and
Children’s Life Chances. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation; The Leadership Conference Education
Fund & The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. (2015). Cheating our future: How decades
of disinvestment by states jeopardizes equal education opportunity. Washington, DC: The Leadership
Conference Education Fund.
4. Maier, A., Daniel, J., Oakes, J. & Lam, L. (2017). Community schools as an effective school improvement
5. Johnston, W. R., Engberg, J., Opper, I. M., Sontag-Padilla, L., & Xenakis, L. (2020). Illustrating the promise
of community schools: An assessment of the impact of the New York City Community Schools Initiative. New
York, NY: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR3245.html.
6. Johnston, W. R., Engberg, J., Opper, I. M., Sontag-Padilla, L., & Xenakis, L. (2020). What is the impact of
the New York City Community Schools Initiative? New York, NY: RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/
pubs/research_briefs/RB10107.html.

Priority 9: Prepare Educators for Reinventing Schools
Everything we have described here requires knowledgeable, skilled, dedicated educators; there is no
other way to get the kind of teaching we need. Meanwhile, for these educators, the expectations are
higher than they have ever been before.
What Educators Need

Even before the onset of COVID-19, an emerging consensus in the science of learning and
development highlighted the need to provide all students with access to deeper learning
experiences in ways that promote greater equity. This raised the bar for educators, and for educator
preparation.1 Now, even greater efforts are called for in meeting the social and emotional needs
of children and implementing trauma- and healing-informed practice, all while making up for
learning loss through unpredictable combinations of distance learning, blended learning, and
in-classroom learning.
This unbelievably complex scenario would challenge even the most well-prepared, stable, and
experienced teacher workforce. Unfortunately, most states do not have such a teacher workforce in
place. Education spending still has not recovered from the Great Recession, when layoff and salary
cuts shrank the number of teachers, discouraged aspiring educators from entering the classroom,
and reduced preparation program enrollment and capacity.
This attenuated pipeline into teaching, combined with inadequate salaries and poor working
conditions, has led to substantial shortages. As a result, more than 100,000 U.S. teaching positions
were left vacant or were filled by underprepared teachers in 2018–19. Moreover, these shortages,
concentrated in the STEM fields, special education, and English learner development, have been
most severe in communities serving students of color and those from low-income families.
Under-resourced, high-poverty schools have too often been staffed by a highly transient group of
inexperienced and untrained teachers.2
COVID-19 and ensuing state cuts to higher education will make it even harder for students from
low-income families to access higher education, including high-quality teacher preparation
programs. Already, the pandemic has had a disproportionate impact on the higher education plans
of people of color, with half of Latino/a students and about 40% of African American and Asian
American students canceling or otherwise changing their plans, including delaying enrollment,
reducing courses, or switching institutions. This raises concerns for efforts to increase the diversity
of the teacher workforce, which will be difficult to accomplish without additional higher education
and college affordability investments. As teachers of color have been found to boost achievement
and attainment for students of color,3 this is particularly problematic.
Now, with one out of five teachers saying they are unlikely to return if schools open physically in
the fall, we face the prospect of a new wave of resignations and retirements,4 which, combined with
potential staff cuts to meet budget shortfalls, and piled on top of preexisting workforce challenges,
may create the counterintuitive outcome of simultaneous shortages and layoffs in the educator
workforce. It is critically important that current educators be well-supported in meeting the
challenges that they face and that well-trained educators be recruited into the profession.

While the immediate needs of communities will create major pressures on budgets, it is important
for policymakers to recognize how critically important it is to recruit, develop, and retain a strong
educator workforce, so that other aspirations for education for our children can be realized. The
incentives needed to accomplish this reside at the federal, state, and local levels.
Invest in high-quality educator preparation, especially for high-need communities where

shortages continue to be problematic.
Strong educator preparation, which increases teacher efficacy and retention,5 is needed now
more than ever. While many of the demands being placed on teachers and school leaders are
new, the ingredients of high-quality educator preparation programs are not: They are built
around a coherent vision and well-defined standards and include the modeling of research-based,
effective practices in courses that are integrated with strong clinical experiences and performance
assessments.6 A policy agenda that supports such preparation incentivizes programs to provide it
and aspiring teachers to pursue it.
High-quality programs begin with strong, research-aligned standards for teaching and school
leadership, long recognized as a foundation of high-achieving education systems7 and as a key
feature for influencing preparation program quality and supporting student learning. Policymakers
can update and strengthen these standards to reflect the needs of today’s students—including
new knowledge about social, emotional, and cognitive development; culturally responsive
pedagogies; and trauma-informed practices—and then ensure that these standards are reflected
in licensure requirements, performance assessments for teacher and administrator candidates,
and performance-based accreditation for programs.8 California provides an example here, having
strengthened standards to address teacher and administrator knowledge and skills that are ever-
more important today9 and developed teacher and administrator performance assessments to
evaluate these skills.10 The state also incorporated performance-based aspects, such as candidate
assessment and survey results, into its new accreditation system.
Incentives for individuals to enter teaching

should address cost as a key barrier to Incentives for individuals to enter
quality preparation, particularly for teaching should address cost as a
candidates of color and those from low-
income backgrounds, as this is a problem
key barrier to quality preparation,
that will likely grow with the economic particularly for candidates of color and
effects of COVID-19. Service scholarships those from low-income backgrounds,
and loan forgiveness programs can help
candidates meet those costs and have as this is a problem that will likely grow
been shown to aid in teacher recruitment with the economic effects of COVID-19.
and retention for high-need locations and
subject areas (such as special education,
bilingual education, math, and science)
and especially for candidates of color.11 This should be a major agenda at the federal level, where
support for training needed medical personnel has long been a key factor in addressing shortages of
physicians in key fields and communities.

Policymakers can also support high-retention pathways such as teacher and leader residencies,
which not only address the cost issue through financial support for candidates but also show
promise in producing effective educators who work in high-need subject areas and schools and who
stay in the profession at higher rates.12 By ensuring these candidates get a top-flight preparation at
little or no cost through strong programs that arrange for excellent clinical preparation under the
wing of expert educators in high-need communities, these programs improve the quality of teaching
and school leadership for students furthest from opportunity. California, Delaware, Mississippi,
Pennsylvania, and Texas are among the states that have aimed to address existing shortages by
adopting such models.13 Federal funding for these programs as part of the Every Student Succeeds
Act (ESSA) and Higher Education Act (HEA) should be expanded to support state efforts.
In considering how to meet unprecedented needs in changing times, state and local leaders should
also seek ways to leverage innovation that is currently underway in educator preparation. They
could support communities already seeking localized solutions to existing shortages through
Grow-Your-Own (GYO) programs, which recruit teacher candidates from local communities,
including paraprofessionals, who are more likely to reflect local diversity and to continue teaching
in their communities over the long term.14 To ameliorate its shortages, Tennessee is using CARES
Act funding to expand GYO programs that train teachers for special education or English learner
development along with an additional credential, such as elementary education. The funds will
allow candidates to engage in paid paraprofessional roles during their preparation and experience
strong clinical training alongside their credential coursework.
Transform educator learning opportunities to match current needs

The new skills needed by teachers and school leaders are many. It will be critically important for
both incoming and current educators to learn how to engage productively in distance learning as
well as blended and hybrid learning models. Educators also need to be increasingly knowledgeable
about how to engender authentic learning supported by formative assessments, enable social and
emotional learning, and engage in trauma-informed and healing-informed practice.
To accomplish this learning, we will need even more effective ways of developing and sharing
expertise across the profession. Innovative teacher and leader preparation programs, such as
those that are part of the Educator Preparation Laboratory (EdPrepLab) network—which is focused
on supporting deeper learning and equity—are developing means to share their practices with
each other and with other programs in the field through affiliation groups, site visits, webinars, a
practice-based website, and partnerships with other organizations that reach the field. EdPrepLab
members are also sharing strategies for responding to the challenges of COVID-19, demonstrating
how institutions can support each other in learning to meet emerging needs.
Similarly, educators in the field need means to learn from one another so that innovative practices
developed in one school or classroom can travel to others. As districts figure out how to structure
intense, effective professional learning and recognize those educators who can lead the way for
others, micro-credentialing may become increasingly important. Micro-credentials recognize
specific areas of skills teachers have acquired based on demonstrated performance, rather than
seat time. These may range from areas such as distance learning or competencies in designing
performance-based assessments to skills for supporting social and emotional learning and trauma-
informed practice to more general skills of mentoring.

Some states are developing systems of micro-credentialing for both pre- and in-service educators.
Digital Promise offers a wide range of micro-credentials for teachers and school leaders, including a
number that are focused on concerns that are prominent as a result of the pandemic, such as securing
digital access for students and working effectively with parents during distance learning. Districts
may want to use micro-credentialing as a means to identify mentors and professional development
leaders so that they can more quickly develop the expertise of colleagues in particular areas.
Support mentoring and new teacher roles

With the probability that teachers in the
2020–21 school year will face a mix of online,
Policymakers and school leaders will
hybrid, and in-person instruction, and with need to consider new teaching roles
some teachers unable to staff in-person and arrangements. These new roles
classrooms for health reasons while schools
adjust to social distancing arrangements,
could apply to novice and experienced
policymakers and school leaders will teachers as well as student-teachers
need to consider new teaching roles and and could be built around both
arrangements. These new roles could apply
to novice and experienced teachers as well as the challenges and the emerging
student-teachers and could be built around opportunities presented by COVID-19.
both the challenges and the emerging
opportunities presented by COVID-19.
For example, some veteran teachers who might be considering retirement due to health concerns
associated with in-person teaching could, with strong professional development, support online
instruction for the students who will not be able to return to school due to school designs or
their own health considerations. These veteran teachers may also be able to provide mentoring
and support for colleagues, including new teachers.15 New teachers whose student-teaching was
altered by COVID-19 in the spring of 2020 may need additional support as they begin their careers,
but they may also bring new perspectives and practices informed by their experiences, including
an awareness of the equity issues raised by the pandemic.16 Student-teachers may be able to take
on new roles, functioning as assets to districts by working with small groups of students through
remote settings, bringing knowledge of technology to bear in supporting virtual instruction, and
making unique contributions even as they themselves are learning.17
The most expert teachers can support other teachers in a variety of ways. Long Beach Unified
School District in California capitalized on the opportunities provided by distance learning to
enable students and teachers from across the district to tune in to the lessons offered by expert
teachers so that they could learn both the content and the teaching strategies these teachers used.18
In some cases, as many as 2,000 students and dozens of teachers tuned in to watch lessons taught
by teachers famous for their abilities to teach particular content or in particular ways. Some of
these teachers will be livestreamed and video recorded during the coming school year as part of
demonstration classes used both for professional development and student learning.
New models of professional expertise sharing, such as the Instructional Leadership Corps (ILC) in
California, can be adapted to these needs as well. The ILC was created by the California Teachers
Association, the National Board Resource Center at Stanford University, and the Stanford Center
for Opportunity Policy in Education to enable accomplished teachers to support professional

development for implementing new state standards in their home districts. This network of just
over 250 teachers and administrators has served over 100,000 educators in more than half of the
state’s districts since 2014, offering job-embedded learning to rave reviews from colleagues and
adapting their supports to contemporary needs.
Create collaboration time

Factory model school designs have meant that U.S. educators have had much more time
during which they are responsible for students and much less time for collaboration than their
counterparts in other countries. The international TALIS surveys found that U.S. middle school
teachers teach more students on average and are responsible for student instruction about 8 hours
more per week (40% more on average) than their peers internationally—ranking first in the world
for instructional hours and near the bottom of all countries for planning and collaboration time.
Thus, it is not surprising that U.S. teachers were less likely than the TALIS average teacher to report
that they ever observe other teachers’ classes and provide feedback, ever teach as a team, or ever
take part in collaborative professional learning. Yet collaboration time is ranked by teachers as
among the most important variables for their learning and retention in the profession, and research
finds that those who work in collegial work settings grow more rapidly in effectiveness.19
In many districts this has changed overnight with distance learning, with more teaming and
collaboration time organized among teachers than ever before. And many states and districts are
thinking very differently about the use of time for the return in the fall. The notion of a 4-day
teaching week, with a fifth day for collaborative planning among teachers, is widespread among the
proposals for the coming year. As we consider innovative teaching and learning schedules, securing
that time for U.S. teachers—the 8 hours on average that their international colleagues experience—
should become part of the new normal.
As one example, in Iowa, the Johnston Community School District has released a draft proposal
with Fridays reserved not only for deep cleaning but also for a full day of professional learning (see
Figure 9.1). Wednesdays can serve a similar purpose if a day is needed for cleaning between two
groups of students within the same week. These modified schedules present an unprecedented
opportunity for educators’ professional development and to enhance their ability to collaborate
and deliver hybrid instruction. With a day every week designed for planning and collaboration, this
change may quadruple the amount of time teachers previously had, when many districts offered
professional learning only during monthly meetings on early-dismissal half-days.

Monday
Group A (On‐
Site)
Group B
Figure
Example

Draft
Tuesday
Group A (On‐
Site)
Group B
9.1 (Remote)
(Remote)
A/B Schedule
Wednesday
School Cleaning/
Teacher Planning/Office
Hours/Professional Learning
A/B Week Rotations of Groups of Students

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday
Thursday
Group B (On‐
Site)
Group A
(Remote)
Friday
Friday
Group B (On‐
Site)
Group A
(Remote)
Week Group A Group A Group A (On‐ Group A School Cleaning/

1 (On‐Site) (On‐Site) Site) (On‐Site) Teacher Planning/Office
Hours/Professional Learning
Group B Group B Group B Group B
(Remote) (Remote) (Remote) (Remote)
Week Group B Group B Group B (On‐ Group B

2 (On‐Site) (On‐Site) Site) (On‐Site)

Group A Group A Group A Group A
(Remote) (Remote) (Remote) (Remote)

Source: Johnston Community School District. (2020). Return to Learn: Hybrid Learning Model (Draft).

Take the long view 7

Policymakers can also use this time to plan
ahead to ensure that, as resources come back Policymakers can also use this
into the system, they are spent to leverage
time to plan ahead to ensure that,
greater teaching expertise. States (and
countries) that have made substantial gains and as resources come back into the
closed achievement gaps have made systemic system, they are spent to leverage
investments in educator quality.20 There is
greater teaching expertise.
no reason why preparation to make such
investments cannot begin now, informed by the
changing needs of today’s students and schools.
California, which has transformed its system of educator certification and preparation program
accreditation over the past decade, began this work at a low point in funding and capacity caused
by the Great Recession of 2007–08. The state’s education budget dropped 14% from 2007–08 to
2010–11, and the teacher workforce declined by almost 10% by 2012. At the same time, the
state’s Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC) began looking ahead, launching a new
strategic plan in December 2014 and collaborating with the California Department of Education
and State Board of Education to produce a report, Greatness by Design, which laid out cross-
agency priorities for improving the state’s educator quality system. For the remainder of the
decade, the state has built upon this foundation, transforming state standards and expectations,
implementing them through performance-based assessment and accreditation, and monitoring
progress through new data systems and dashboards. As the state invested more money more
equitably in its education system and moved to incorporate emphasis on deeper learning
within a whole child framework, the transformations in preparation supported strong gains in
achievement and attainment for students.

Other efforts, undertaken earlier, show similar results. For example, during the 1980s and 1990s,
in response to desegregation litigation, Connecticut launched ambitious efforts to equalize
educational opportunity while improving teaching. Its Education Enhancement Act coupled major
increases in teacher salaries with higher standards for teacher education and licensing. Funds were
allocated based on district need and the number of fully certified teachers, creating incentives for
districts to recruit those who met the new certification standards and for individuals to meet those
standards. With these incentives, plus service scholarships to underwrite preparation for high-
need candidates, the state eliminated emergency credentials and attracted high-ability teacher
candidates. Connecticut also invested deeply in training for principals and ongoing professional
development for teachers, while it enacted new standards and performance-based assessments
for students, focused on higher-order thinking skills. By 1998 Connecticut 4th-graders ranked
first in the nation in reading and mathematics, and its 8th-graders topped the rankings in writing
and science on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, despite increasing numbers of
students from low-income families, students of color, and new immigrant students in its public
schools during the decade. The achievement gap between White students and students of color
decreased, and Connecticut’s Black and Hispanic students substantially outperformed their
counterparts nationally.
Similarly, during the 1980s and 1990s, North Carolina made substantial investments in its
teaching force—increasing standards for entering teaching and school administration, requiring
improvements in educator preparation, boosting salaries, and investing in high-quality mentoring
and professional development. Importantly, the state invested in greater expertise throughout
teachers’ careers, authorizing a noted service scholarship program—the North Carolina Teaching
Fellows—to recruit talented individuals and prepare them well for teaching while also enacting a
12% salary increase for teachers who achieved National Board Certification, an accomplishment
that has been associated with greater teacher effectiveness. It also substantially upgraded principal
training, including support for intensive internships, another move associated with greater
effectiveness. During the 1990s, North Carolina posted the largest student achievement gains of any
state in mathematics (see Figure 9.2) and realized substantial progress in reading. It was also the
most successful state in the nation in narrowing the achievement gap between White students and
students of color.

Figure 9.2
North
NorthCarolina
Carolina Achievement Trends(NAEP
Achievement Trends (NAEP8th
8th-Grade Mathematics
Grade Mathematics Scores)
Scores)
290 286 286
284 284
285 281 282 281 282
280
280 283 284
282 281 282
280
275 271 278
276
270 267 274
265 262 268
260
255 258
250
250
245
1990 1992 1996 2000 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015 2017
National Public North Carolina
Data Source: National Assessment of Educational Progress. (n.d.). Data tools: State profiles.
Source: Darling-Hammond, L. (2019). Investing for student success: Lessons from state school finance reforms. Palo Alto,
https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/profiles/stateprofile.
CA: Learning Policy Institute. Based on data from National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). (n.d.). Data tools:
State profiles.
These efforts show that purposeful action to support teaching can make a major difference in the
long-term learning opportunities of children.
Resources
• EdPrepLab (EdPrepLab Network). This network of leading-edge teacher and leader preparation
programs supports research, policy, and practice aimed at helping practitioners use the science
of learning and development to support equitable deeper learning. EdPrepLab offers a practice-
based website that provides teaching resources and policy exemplars that enable improvements
in educator preparation policy and practice, including strategies for responding to the challenges
of COVID-19.
• Effective Teacher Professional Development (Learning Policy Institute). This brief and report
summarize seven widely shared features of effective teacher professional development (based
on a review of methodologically rigorous studies) and can be used to guide professional
development design and investments.
• Micro-Credentials and COVID-19 (Digital Promise). This curated library of micro-credentials that
can be earned outside of the classroom and without students can be used to help educators
continue their professional learning during social distancing and beyond.

Endnotes
1. Darling-Hammond, L., Oakes, J., Wojcikiewicz, S. K., Hyler, M. E., Guha, R., Podolsky, A., Kini, T.,
Cook-Harvey, C. M., Jackson Mercer, C. N., & Harrell, A. (2019). Preparing Teachers for Deeper Learning.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.
2. Garcia, E., & Weiss, E. (2019). The teacher shortage is real, large and growing, and worse than
we thought. Washington, DC: Economic Policy Institute. https://www.epi.org/publication/
the-teacher-shortage-is-real-large-and-growing-and-worse-than-we-thought-the-first-report-in-the-
perfect-storm-in-the-teacher-labor-market-series/; Sutcher, L., Darling-Hammond, L., & Carver-Thomas,
D. (2016). A coming crisis in teaching? Teacher supply, demand, and shortages in the U.S. Palo Alto, CA:
Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/sites/default/files/product-files/A_Coming_
Crisis_in_Teaching_REPORT.pdf.
3. Carver-Thomas, D. (2018). Diversifying the teaching profession: How to recruit and retain teachers of color.
Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/diversifying-
teaching-profession-report.
4. Bailey, J. P., & Schurz, J. (2020). COVID-19 is creating a school personnel crisis. Washington, DC: American
Enterprise Institute. https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/COVID-19-Is-Creating-a-School-
Personnel-Crisis.pdf; Will, M. (2020, May 7). Teachers at higher risk of COVID-19 wonder: Should I even
go back? Education Week. https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2020/05/07/teachers-at-higher-risk-for-
covid-19-worry.html.
5. Podolsky, A., Kini, T., Bishop, J., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2016). Solving the teacher shortage: How to attract
and retain excellent educators. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/
product/solving-teacher-shortage.
7. Darling-Hammond, L., Burns, D., Campbell, C., Goodwin, A. L., Hammerness, K., Low, E. L., McIntyre, A.,
& Zeichner, K. (2017). Empowered Educators: How High-Performing Systems Shape Teaching Quality Around
the World. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
9. California Commission on Teacher Credentialing. (2016). California teacher performance expectations.
Sacramento, CA: Author. https://www.ctc.ca.gov/docs/default-source/educator-prep/standards/adopted-
tpes-2016.pdf?sfvrsn=8cb2c410_0.
10. Darling-Hammond, L. (2010). Evaluating teacher effectiveness: How teacher performance assessments can
measure and improve teaching. Washington, DC: Center for American Progress.
11. Podolsky, A., & Kini, T. (2016). How effective are loan forgiveness and service scholarships for recruiting
teachers? Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/how-
effective-are-loan-forgiveness-and-service-scholarships-recruiting-teachers; Steele, J. L., Murnane, R. J.,
& Willett, J. B. (2010). Do financial incentives help low-performing schools attract and keep academically
talented teachers? Evidence from California. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 29(3), 451–478.
12. Guha, R., Hyler, M. E., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2016). The teacher residency: An innovative model for
preparing teachers. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/
teacher-residency; National Center for Teacher Residencies. (2018). NCTR 2017–18 network partner report.
Chicago, IL: Author; Perlstein, L., Jerald, C., & Duffrin, E. (2014). Building effective teacher residencies.
Chicago, IL: Urban Teacher Residency United; Podolsky, A., Kini, T., Bishop, J., & Darling-Hammond, L.
(2016). Solving the teacher shortage: How to attract and retain excellent educators. Palo Alto, CA: Learning
Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/solving-teacher-shortage.
13. Espinoza, D., Saunders, R., Kini, T., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2018). Taking the long view: State efforts to
solve teacher shortages by strengthening the profession. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/long-view.

14. Clewell, B. C., & Villegas, A. M. (2001). Absence unexcused: Ending teacher shortages in high-need areas:
Evaluating the Pathways to Teaching Careers program. Washington, DC: Urban Institute; Espinoza, D.,
Saunders, R., Kini, T., & Darling-Hammond, L. (2018). Taking the long view: State efforts to solve teacher
shortages by strengthening the profession. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/long-view.
15. Bailey, J. P. & Schurz, J. (2020). COVID-19 is creating a school personnel crisis. Washington, DC: American
Enterprise Institute. https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/COVID-19-Is-Creating-a-School-
Personnel-Crisis.pdf.
16. California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (2020, April 6). Variable term waivers due to emergency
health and safety restrictions (COVID-19). Sacramento, CA: Author. https://www.ctc.ca.gov/docs/
default-source/commission/files/covid-19-vtw-guidance.pdf?sfvrsn=a8502cb1_18; Glenn, S., Kall, K., &
Ruebenson, K. (2020). COVID-19, equity, and the future of education: A conversation between teacher
candidates. Northwest Journal of Teacher Education, 15(1), 1–8. https://doi.org/10.15760/nwjte.2020.15.1.1.
17. Bailey, J. P., & Schurz, J. (2020). COVID-19 is creating a school personnel crisis. Washington, DC: American
Enterprise Institute. https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/COVID-19-Is-Creating-a-
School-Personnel-Crisis.pdf (p. 9); Mason-Williams, L., Rosenberg, M., Kimmel, L., & Sindelar, P. (2020).
Addressing shortages of educators in an uncertain COVID-19 landscape: Viewing teacher candidates as
assets. Gainesville, FL: CEEDAR Center. https://ceedar.education.ufl.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/
Addressing-Shortages-COVID-Landscape.pdf.
18. Darling-Hammond, L. (2020, June 16). Informational Hearing: Reopening California’s Public Schools for the
2020–21 School Year. Testimony. California Assembly Education Committee. https://www.assembly.ca.gov/
media/assembly-education-committee-20200616/video (accessed 07/22/20).
19. Papay, J. P., & Kraft, M. A. (2016). The myth of the performance plateau. Educational Leadership, 73(8), 36–42.
20. Darling-Hammond, L. (2019). Investing for student success: Lessons from state school finance reforms. Palo
Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/investing-student-
success-school-finance-reforms.

Priority 10: Leverage More Adequate
and Equitable School Funding
COVID-19’s impact on our economy has been unprecedented: Since mid-March, one in five
employed Americans has either temporarily or permanently lost their jobs. The downturn in our
economy has dramatically impacted state revenue: According to the most recent estimates by
the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, state revenue shortfalls will likely reach about 10% in
the current year and more than 25% in the next. On top of this, states are facing additional costs
related to health care, unemployment, and education. Even conservative estimates of state funding
cuts to schools suggest that states will need between $200 billion and $300 billion to stabilize
their k–12 education budgets over the next year and a half. Because states cannot engage in deficit
spending, and education accounts for a large share of state budgets, substantial cuts are inevitable
without federal assistance.
These budget reductions are coming at a time when school districts and early childhood programs
are also seeing increased costs because of COVID-19, including additional costs for providing
devices and connectivity for distance learning, resources for expanded learning time, and additional
food services for students from low-income families and students with special needs; costs to meet
COVID-19 health and safety guidelines; and costs for additional staff to support physical distancing.
Altogether these costs could total $370 billion over the coming year.
The communities most impacted by these budget shortfalls are those that serve the students from
low-income families and students of color who have been and will be most affected by the health,
employment, and housing impacts of COVID-19. Prior to the pandemic, school districts serving
the largest proportions of Black, Latino/a, and Native American students already received about
$1,800 less per pupil than those serving the fewest students of color. Declines in state revenue
and increased costs will disproportionately hit schools in communities with high proportions of
students from low-income families and low property wealth, which rely more on state education
funding from sales and income taxes than on more stable local property taxes, thus furthering
the divide.
This is because the United States’ reliance on local revenues has produced one of the most unequal
school funding systems in the industrialized world. Despite strong evidence that money matters for
student achievement and other important life outcomes, especially for students from low-income
families, relatively few states have yet redesigned their systems to create more adequate and
equitable funding. Those that have made such changes show much stronger outcomes.
Without a determined effort to produce a

different outcome, funding cuts made to Without a determined effort to
education now could be as long-lasting produce a different outcome, funding
as they were during and after the Great
Recession. While we are now several cuts made to education now could
years removed from the end of the last be as long-lasting as they were
recession, we still have 40,000 fewer public
during and after the Great Recession.
school teachers than we did in 2008 (see
Figure 10.1).

Figure 10.1
School Elementary
Public School Elementary and
andSecondary
SecondaryTeachers
Teachers
3.30
3.222
3.210
NUMBER OF TEACHERS
3.20 3.182
(MILLIONS)
3.157 3.160
3.152
3.143
3.132
3.109 3.114
3.100 3.103
3.10
3.00
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
Data source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center on Education Statistics
Furthermore, with the exception of those few states that seized the moment to transform
their funding systems, school resources became more inequitable over that period of time.1
However, as we describe below, states such as California and Rhode Island used the event of the
recession to create new funding formulas that were designed to distribute funds more equitably
as resources returned to the system—and they emerged from that era with more equitable and
higher-performing systems. This is something that both federal and state policymakers should be
considering as they take a long view to the years ahead.
What Students Need

Even before COVID-19, most state education finance systems were not working for students
from low-income families, students of color, and those with a range of needs—many of which are
exacerbated in high-poverty communities where food and housing insecurity, lack of health care,
and inadequate community services are commonplace. Given the great inequalities in our society,
including the highest rates of child poverty in the industrialized world, schools should be providing
more intensive services for children in high-poverty areas than in more affluent areas. However, the
opposite is true. In most states, districts serving affluent students receive as much or more money
than those serving children in poverty, and only a handful have funding systems that provide
resources that are both adequate and equitable.
Funding inequities are even more apparent when it comes to access to high-quality early learning.
Based upon the Transforming the Financing of Early Care and Education consensus study report, early
childhood programs only received approximately 37% of the public funding estimated to be needed
to provide high-quality care and education to children. As a result, the burden to cover the costs falls
upon parents, an expense few can afford. Due to the lack of affordability, too few infants of working
families have access to the early care and education they need, and just 53% of 3- to 5-year-olds
attend preschool—making the United States an outlier among economically developed countries.

Without robust public funding, programs often operate on shoestring budgets, with teachers
paid one third to one half as much as their k–12 colleagues. The COVID-19 pandemic threatens
to set our early childhood education system back even further financially. State-subsidized
early education programs are likely to take dramatic hits, given current projections for major
decreases in state funding, and private pre-k programs may close permanently due to increased
costs and decreased revenue. The combination could mean the loss of up to 4.5 million child care
slots, according to one estimate.2 Part of what makes state early childhood education budgets so
vulnerable is that early childhood programs rely on a patchwork of funding streams to make ends
meet, many of which are vulnerable to cuts in bad economic times.
Students who live in poverty, those who are homeless or in foster care, those who are English learners,
and those with learning disabilities cost more to educate and should be recognized in school funding
formulas with greater per-pupil spending weights. And districts with concentrations of such pupils carry
more responsibility to provide wraparound services and intensive teaching and learning opportunities,
which need to be recognized in school funding systems as well. Until the United States repairs its
tattered safety net for children, so that poverty, hunger, and housing instability are not constant
companions for many young people, it should fund their schools and early childhood programs at much
higher rates and in more purposeful ways to support their healthy learning and development.
When students receive these kinds of supports, society benefits. As educational attainment
FIGUREincreases
A with investments in schools, so does state economic productivity.3 (See Figure 10.2.)
Productivity has grown more in states with greater growth in the educational
Figure 10.2
attainment of their workforce
Relationship Between State Productivity Growth and Increase in College
Relationship between From
Attainment state productivity
1979 to 2012growth and increase in college attainment from 1979 to 2012
Source: EPISource:
analysis of unpublished
Berger, total
N., & Fisher, P. economy
(2013). productivity
A well-educated data from
workforce is key the Bureau
to state of Labor
prosperity. StatisticsDC:
Washington, (BLS) Labor Productivity
Economic Policy and
Institute. https://files.epi.org/2013/A%20well-educated%20workforce%20is%20key%20to%20state%20prosperity.pdf.
Costs program, state employment data from BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics, and college attainment data from the Current
Population Survey basic monthly microdata

in productivity experienced larger increases in median It should be the goal of state development policy to
worker compensation. raise the standard of living, which requires both
Two of our highest-achieving states bear this out. Massachusetts assumed its No. 1 ranking in state
student achievement—held for more than 2 decades—after adopting a more progressive funding
formula in 1993 as a result of litigation. The formula provided additional weights for funding
to students from low-income backgrounds and English learners; funding for early childhood
programs increased fivefold in the first years of the reforms as well. Importantly, the changes in
school funding led to greater investments in educators in high-poverty areas, which research
suggests may leverage the largest gains in student performance. The state expanded access to
high-quality professional learning for teachers and school leaders and created a program to
attract qualified teachers into high-need fields and locations. The state also funds community
schools and wraparound supports for students, working in multiple ways to support child health
and development.
New Jersey—a state now serving a majority of students of color—ranks No. 2 in the nation on
achievement and graduation rates, following a similar school finance reform that began in the
late 1990s. It is one of the nation’s top-spending states, with one of the most progressive funding
formulas. It allocates roughly 20% more per pupil in districts in which at least 30% of students
are in poverty. It changed its funding formula after a series of court decisions starting in the mid-
1990s that called for more equal funding for urban districts serving predominantly low-income
families. Funds were allocated to support whole school reform, which included reductions in
class size; investments in technology; improvements to facilities; and supports for health, social
services, and summer programs to help students catch up. Added resources were directed largely
to instructional personnel in the highest-need districts, and there were noticeable improvements
to the achievement of all students—including students from low-income families and students
of color—on statewide and national tests. One of the most prominent reforms was the funding of
2 years of high-quality, universal preschool for 3- and 4-year-old children in the poorest districts.
Studies show that students who received 2 years of preschool showed sustained and significant
achievement gains in 4th- and 5th-grade math, literacy, and science far exceeding those of students
who did not experience preschool.

Policymakers at the federal and state levels can use this moment to dramatically increase the
equitable allocation of school resources by:
• Allocating federal funds in the recovery acts and, ultimately, in other federal programs in
more equitable ways—including supports for the investments in technology, wraparound
supports, and educator development that are needed to enable successful education.
• Adopting more equitable state funding formulas and phasing them in as resources return to
the system.
• Including preschool in equitable school funding formulas, streamlining sources of funding
to ensure that those with greater needs receive the resources that will help them thrive.
Leverage federal funds for equity

In the near term, federal recovery aid can be used to enhance equity at the state and local levels.
The federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act provided early childhood
settings, schools, and districts with nearly $16.75 billion in initial funding to help respond to the

crisis. Additional aid is under debate in Congress at the time of this writing. States and districts
have an opportunity to use the funds provided through the CARES Act and any subsequent federal
aid to invest in strategies that have been shown to advance equity and support the academic success
of students.
Federal funds can be used to close the

digital divide by purchasing technology
(including hardware, software, and
Technology investments should be
connectivity) that supports substantive paired with investments in research-
educational interaction between students based professional development on
and teachers, focusing on the needs
of students from low-income families the uses of technology for high-quality
and, for students with disabilities, learning. Additional school staff, such
the use of assistive technology or
as guidance counselors and social
adaptive equipment. But new devices or
internet connections will be of limited workers, also need support to learn
effectiveness in closing opportunity gaps if how to effectively use technology to
teachers are not supported in learning how
deliver services to students.
to shift their instruction and adapt lessons
to a distance learning environment.
Technology investments should be paired
with investments in research-based
professional development on the uses of technology for high-quality learning. Additional school
staff, such as guidance counselors and social workers, also need support to learn how to effectively
use technology to deliver services to students.
States and districts can also use these funds to invest in wraparound services through community
schools, which can serve as an effective long-term strategy for meeting the ongoing academic,
health, and wellness needs of our country’s most marginalized students and families. In times of
crisis, when the already frayed social safety net is insufficient to meet the basic needs of students
and families, these multipurpose schools are stepping in to fill the gap. (See “Priority 8: Establish
Community Schools and Wraparound Supports.”) States and districts can use dollars to jump-start
the development of community school models that provide health, mental health, and social
services to children and families alongside supportive instruction; these funds can also be used
to build the infrastructure and expertise for technical assistance to schools implementing this
approach, so that a more permanent capacity for meeting students’ needs will exist even after the
pandemic is over.
If and when more funds are allocated, it will be critically important for state and local governments
to make strategic investments that build local capacity to support all students—and especially the
most marginalized—throughout the school year and in times of crisis. These high-impact strategies
at the k–12 level include investing in a high-quality teacher workforce in high-need schools (see
“Priority 9: Prepare Educators for Reinventing Schools”), especially given the disparities in access to
a stable group of well-prepared educators in these schools, which undermines all other reforms that
may be attempted.

Looking ahead, the federal government will have opportunities to support these kinds of
investments beyond the pandemic through the regular congressional appropriations process, the
next reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), and administrative
action. These opportunities include:
• Expanding and equitably allocating federal education funding across states. The
federal government invests less than 2% of its budget across all levels of education and has
not maintained its commitments to local schools. For example, the 2002 reauthorization of
ESEA promised nearly $26 billion for Title I, Part A programs and school improvement by
fiscal year 2007, yet today funding is at $16.3 billion. Title I funding should be substantially
increased and allocated more equitably to the states based on pupil needs rather than state
spending levels.
• Investing in strategies to close the digital opportunity gap. This includes policies and
resources across agencies ranging from the Departments of Education and Commerce to the
Federal Communications Commission to ensure access and make investments that provide
all schools and households with the technology and the broadband capacity necessary
to access information and support learning. To develop a deeper understanding of needs
and successful strategies for digital access and instruction, the federal government could
establish a national research center to monitor access and track, evaluate, and disseminate
successful practices.
• Supporting and providing incentives to states to provide adequate and equitable
resources to districts. To ensure school finance reforms are grounded in research-based
practices that will deliver adequate and equitable resources, a federal commission on school
finance could be established to examine federal, state, and local school funding and provide
ongoing research, recommendations, examples, monitoring, and support. A competitive
grant program could be designed to support state efforts to restructure their school finance
systems and make the shift to a new system.
Adopt more equitable state school funding formulas

Meanwhile, states should be examining how to better account for pupil needs in their funding
formulas. One way to do this is to fund schools based on equal dollars per student, adjusted or
weighted for specific student needs such as poverty, limited English proficiency, foster care or
homeless status, or special education status. In large states, this might be further adjusted for
geographic cost differentials, while also taking into account the transportation and other needs of
sparse, rural districts.
Use the moment of the economic downturn to support rethinking. While states are in the
middle of both a recession and a pandemic, it may sound unrealistic to suggest that now is the time
for states to consider changing their school funding system. However, in the past, some states have
taken the opportunity to revise their school funding formulas during a recession, with funding
flowing into the new formula as it gradually increases.
There are at least two reasons why a state may want to consider changing its funding formula now:
1. Formulas will be changing in most states anyway: As states start to adjust their school
funding to take into account reduced revenue, they will most likely be making changes to
their education funding system. The changes that states will be making are born out of

a necessity to cut—not on a plan to help students. If major changes will happen anyway,
it may be possible to design some of them to aid students in the longer term, even if the
change will take some time to implement.
2. Eventual growth in funding will help to raise all ships, making change easier: Some states
wait to change their funding system until they have additional dollars to do so. However,
some states have found that the best time to change their funding system is when they
have hit the bottom of an economic cycle. Once state budgets begin to improve, and as new
money eventually flows to schools, a revised formula could ensure that all districts receive
increased funding while those with greater need receive more.
Maryland adopted a new funding formula in 2002, during the post-9/11 economic downturn.
The formula, enacted in the Bridge to Excellence in Public Schools Act, was designed to provide
districts with more adequate and equitable funding while implementing a new assessment and
accountability system. The formula increased state spending on education and also equalized
funding based on a district’s wealth and targeted more funding to high-need student groups. The
Bridge to Excellence in Public Schools Act also reshaped accountability around the state’s new
learning standards, eventually leading to comprehensive yearly master plans that describe “the
goals, objectives, and strategies that will be used to improve student achievement,”4 and increased
the number of students meeting state and local performance standards. Maryland’s achievement on
the National Assessment of Educational Progress increased sharply in reading and math over the
following decade, with reduced achievement gaps. Although the rate of improvement slowed during
the cutbacks of the Great Recession, the state has just enacted another round of equity-oriented
funding reforms.
Rhode Island acted to adopt a new school funding formula in 2010, in the immediate wake of the
Great Recession. The new formula was designed to provide more significant equity in the school
funding system while also aligning with the state’s preexisting accountability system, known as the
Basic Education Program. According to a report from the Center for American Progress, the formula
was implemented without any additional funding initially. Instead, all districts were held harmless
from financial loss for up to 10 years. As new funding became available, it was slowly distributed
through the new formula. This slow phase-in approach created relatively little political discord,
and 70% of students ultimately received more state aid. In the wake of the formula change, the
state’s 4th- and 8th-grade students climbed from below to above the national average in reading
achievement and saw modest gains in math.
California is another case in point. In 2013, after years of severe budget cuts, and while still
experiencing the effects of the Great Recession, California began to implement a new, more
equitable Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) with a plan for achieving targeted funding
increases over 8 years—a span of time that was ultimately shortened when the economy improved.
(Full funding was achieved by 2018–19.) The plan:
• eliminated the majority of the state’s categorical programs;

• instituted uniform per-pupil “base” grants to school districts, charter schools, and county
offices of education, adjusted by grade level;
• created “supplemental” grants equal to 20% of the adjusted base grant for each English
learner, student in foster care, and student from a low-income family; and

• established “concentration” grants for local education agencies with enrollments of more
than 55% English learners, students in foster care, and students from low-income families.
Students who meet more than one eligibility criteria are only counted once.
The new formula allocated billions of new dollars to districts serving high-need students and
provided all districts with broad flexibility to develop—in partnership with parents, students, and
staff—spending plans aligned to state and local priorities and needs. As part of these Local Control
and Accountability Plans, districts must annually evaluate student progress for all student groups in
relation to the state’s eight priorities, expressed in a multiple-measures accountability system that
takes into account key inputs (such as rich curriculum, positive climate, and qualified educators) as
well as a range of outcomes (attendance, graduation rates, and college and career readiness, as well
as tested achievement). Budget decisions must be made transparently and reported in terms of how
they will move the needle on these important priorities for all students.
These structural reforms coincided with the state’s implementation of the Common Core State
Standards and Next Generation Science Standards, implementation of the Smarter Balanced
Assessment System, and development of new educator preparation and licensure standards to
support the more rigorous academic goals. Within only a few years, the LCFF positively impacted
student outcomes, especially for students from low-income families, and shrank achievement gaps.
These results showed up in significant gains for the state’s students on the National Assessment
of Educational Progress as well, moving the state from 48th and 49th in reading and math,
respectively, to near the national average in reading and halfway to the national average in math.
In this past year, California also used an equity-based formula similar to the LCFF to allocate
$5.3 billion in additional federal funds to schools, going well beyond the portion of the CARES Act
specifically identified for k–12 education, thus doubling down on equity and seeking to maintain
the gains it has achieved.
Use equity principles to allocate

funds within districts and schools. Once funding reaches districts, it is also
Once funding reaches districts, it is also important for it to be spent equitably
important for it to be spent equitably
to meet student needs. A key principle
to meet student needs. A key principle
of continuous improvement is that it of continuous improvement is that it
requires continuous transparency. In requires continuous transparency.
California, districts must explain in their
Local Control and Accountability Plans
how they will use their supplemental and
concentration grant funding to meet the needs of the students who generated the funding. In Los
Angeles Unified School District, community advocates proposed an Equity Index, which is now used
to help guide those allocations to the schools with the highest needs.
Include preschool in school funding formulas

Another key change that states can make to promote equity is to add preschool to their school
funding formulas. Two states, Oklahoma and West Virginia, have school funding formulas that
fund preschool for 4-year-olds as an additional grade of school.5 The District of Columbia funds
preschool for 3-year-olds as well as 4 year-olds through its formula, with an additional weight that

accounts for the higher staffing levels needed for young children. These states have some of the
highest levels of enrollment in preschool or Head Start in the country, with 69% of all 4-year-olds
served in West Virginia and 85% in both Oklahoma and Washington, DC.6 West Virginia was able to
add preschool to its funding formula in 2002, in the midst of the post-9/11 downturn, despite the
legislature’s concerns about the cost. Policymakers did so by agreeing to a 10-year phase-in period
and tying the agreement to a larger bill related to k–12 school funding.
The funding changes in California, Maryland, and Rhode Island have all led to increased equity in
their education finance systems over time (see Figure 10.3). As revenue increased in states after the
recession, the new funding formulas were able to close the gap between wealthy and poor districts.
Education Week’s annual Quality Counts report showed that all three states’ finance systems
warranted increased equity scores between 2014 and 2020, with each of them now having scores
that exceed the national average.
Figure 10.3
Education
EducationWeek
Week Equity
EquityScores
Scores
92
91
90
89
EQUITY SCORE
88
87
86
85
84
2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
National Rhode Island California Maryland
Note: Education Week calculates equity scores using a combined indicator of the degree to which a school district’s revenue
is correlated with property wealth, per-pupil expenditures below the state median, the level of variability in funding across a
state, and the difference between the 5th and 95th percentile of districts.
Data Source: Education Week Quality Counts School Finance Report Cards.
In sum, changing how we fund schools is never easy, and it might seem like it is an impossible task
during a recession. However, this pandemic has raised equity issues to a new level of consciousness
that may allow innovative policy responses to emerge in many contexts, from preschool through high
school. In the past, some states have changed their systems during difficult economic times in ways
that have led to improved equity and adequacy in funding while also supporting strategies for higher
student achievement. While it may appear to be counterintuitive on the surface, policymakers should
take advantage of this recession to redesign both federal aid and state and local funding systems.

Resources
• How Much Will COVID-19 Cost Schools? (Learning Policy Institute). This state-level tool calculates
the effects of declines in state revenues on education budgets, along with the increased COVID-
19-related costs for those estimating needed spending increases or state finance measures.
• Restart & Recovery: Considerations for Teaching and Learning: State Policies and Actions
(Council of Chief State School Officers). This document outlines the critical state-level policies
and actions that align with each section of the guidance, which include System Conditions,
Wellness and Connection, and Academics.
• Lead With Equity: What California’s Leaders Must Do Next to Advance Student Learning During
COVID-19 (Policy Analysis for California Education). This policy brief provides research-based
policy recommendations to ensure adequate monitoring, support, and resources that prioritize
equity in learning for state leaders in California and other states.
• Making School Budgets Whole and Equitable During and After COVID-19 (Learning Policy
Institute). Michael DiNapoli Jr. outlines the magnitude of need with cost estimates and strategies
that policymakers can use for their upcoming school year budgets.
• State Education Funding: The Poverty Equation (FutureEd). This article delves into the reasoning
behind poverty measures in funding formulas and shows how different definitions of poverty (either
at the student or district level) can lead to more or less adequate funding of those most in need.
• 5 Things to Advance Equity in State Funding Systems (The Education Trust). This fact sheet
provides weights and other equity measures that states can better incorporate in post-
COVID-19 funding formulas.
Endnotes
1. Evans, W. N., Schwab, R. M., & Wagner, K. L. (2019). The Great Recession and public education. Education
Finance and Policy, 14(2), 298–326.
2. Jessen-Howard, S., & Workman, S. (2020). Coronavirus pandemic could lead to permanent loss of nearly
4.5 million child care slots. Washington, DC: Center for American Progress.
3. Berger, N., & Fisher, P. (2013). A well-educated workforce is key to state prosperity. Washington, DC:
Economic Policy Institute. https://files.epi.org/2013/A%20well-educated%20workforce%20is%20key%20
to%20state%20prosperity.pdf.
4. Maryland State Department of Education and Office of Finance. (2018). Maryland’s reform
plan bridge to excellence in public schools: 2018 guidance annual update. Baltimore, MD:
Author. (p. iii). http://marylandpublicschools.org/about/Documents/DSFSS/BridgeExcellence/
TPCPT2018/2018BridgeExcellenceAnnualUpdateGuidance.pdf.
5. Maine also includes preschool in its school funding formula, but programs are run for a minimum of just
2 hours, so preschool funding per pupil is low compared to k–12; Barnett, W. S., & Kasmin, R. (2016).
Funding landscape for preschool with a highly qualified workforce. Washington, DC: National Institute for
Early Education Research. https://sites.nationalacademies.org/cs/groups/dbassesite/documents/webpage/
dbasse_175816.pdf.
6. Friedman-Krauss, A. H., Barnett, W. S., Garver, K. A., Hodges, K. S., Weisenfeld, G. G., & DiCrecchio, N.
(2018). The state of preschool 2018. New Brunswick, NJ: National Institute for Early Education Research.

Conclusion
As policymakers and educators prepare to restart schools in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, it
is imperative that we transform our ideas of school to match the demands of this historic moment.
It is clear that returning to business as usual in education is not possible and that we must think of
“school” in deeply different ways. Irrespective of the approach taken to instruction or the medium
through which it takes place—online, in person, or a hybrid—policymakers and educators need
to ensure that all children, regardless of income, can participate in supportive and meaningful
learning experiences. To accomplish this, our education system needs to transform our ideas of
school to match the demands of this moment, focusing on authentic learning and equity and
harnessing the knowledge of human development, learning, and effective teaching accumulated
over the last century and needed for the next.
This report provides an overarching framework to inform the restart of schools for the 2020–21 school
year while also providing a long-term vision that can guide leaders toward new and enduring ways
to address educational quality and inequity. Building upon other student-centered, equity-oriented
guidance that has been developed, this framework synthesizes key ideas, evidence, state and local
examples, and policy recommendations and organizes them within a broader framework focused on
authentic learning and equity and grounded in research spanning early childhood through secondary
schooling. It is our hope that this work will help enable state, district, and school leaders along with
educators to seize this moment to strengthen learning opportunities and close opportunity and
achievement gaps.

About the Authors
Linda Darling-Hammond is the Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus at

Stanford University and founding president of LPI, created to provide high-quality research for
policies that enable equitable and empowering education for each and every child. She is past
president of the American Educational Research Association and author of more than 30 books and
600 other publications on educational quality and equity, including the award-winning book The
Flat World and Education: How America’s Commitment to Equity Will Determine Our Future. In 2006,
she was named one of the nation’s 10 most influential people affecting educational policy, and in
2008, she directed the education policy transition team for President Obama.
Abby Schachner is a Senior Researcher at LPI, where she co-leads the Early Childhood Learning
team and is a member of the Deeper Learning team. Her work focuses on translating research
on children’s social, emotional, and academic development and the contexts that support such
development to inform policy and practice. Schachner has more than 13 years of experience in
conducting policy-relevant research on learning and development to better understand what
works for whom and under what circumstances so that all children can succeed. She holds a Ph.D.
in Human Development from the University of California, Davis, and a B.A. in Psychology from
Georgetown University.
Adam Edgerton is a Senior Researcher at LPI, where he is a member of the Educator Quality team.
His work focuses on teacher and principal professional development and the implementation of
k–12 standards at federal, state, district, school, and classroom levels. Edgerton has 7 years of
experience as a teacher and administrator and 4 years of experience as a Researcher at the Center
on Standards, Alignment, Instruction, and Learning (C-SAIL). He holds a Ph.D. in Education Policy
from the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, an Ed.M. in Teaching and
Curriculum from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and a B.A. in English/Creative Writing
from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Aneesha Badrinarayan supports LPI projects related to performance assessments. For the
last decade, her work has focused on supporting states, districts, and educators to develop and
implement student-centered systems of assessment that support all learners. Her passion for
coherent and balanced systems of assessment stems from a commitment to high-quality teaching
and learning for all and a deep interest in helping practitioners and leaders navigate their systems
to achieve that vision. Badrinarayan earned an M.S. in Neuroscience at the University of Michigan,
where she served as a research fellow for the National Institute of Mental Health, and a B.A. in
Biology from Cornell University.
Jessica Cardichon is the Director of LPI’s Washington, DC, office and the Director for Federal
Policy. She is also a member of LPI’s Educator Quality, Deeper Learning, Equitable Resources and
Access, and Early Childhood Education teams. She is the lead author of Protecting Students’ Civil
Rights: The Federal Role in School Discipline and Advancing Educational Equity for Underserved Youth
and is co-author of Making ESSA’s Equity Promise Real: State Strategies to Close the Opportunity
Gap, Investing in Effective School Leadership: How States Are Taking Advantage of Opportunities
Under ESSA, and Identifying Schools for Support and Intervention: Using Decision Rules to Support
Accountability and Improvement Under ESSA.

Peter W. Cookson Jr. co-leads LPI’s Equitable Resources and Access team and provides leadership
for several equity initiatives. In addition to teaching sociology at Georgetown University, he
co-leads the American Voices Project, a joint research project of Stanford University, Princeton
University, and the American Institutes for Research. Cookson began his career as a caseworker in
New York City and then worked as a teacher in rural Massachusetts. Most recently, he was Managing
Director of the think tank Education Sector and founded the Equity Project at the American
Institutes for Research. He is the author of 16 books and numerous articles on education and
inequality, social stratification, school choice, and 21st-century education.
Michael Griffith is a Senior Researcher and Policy Analyst at LPI. He is part of LPI’s Equitable
Resources and Access team, focusing on school funding issues. Before joining the LPI team,
Griffith was a school finance expert, first with the Education Commission of the States and then
as an independent contractor. Over the past 20 years, he has worked with policymakers in all
50 states to help them reshape and reform their school funding systems, always to improve student
achievement and education equity. His research work has focused on the condition of state and
district budgets, the adequacy and equity of state finance formulas, and promising practices in
funding programs for high-need students.
Sarah Klevan is a member of LPI’s Deeper Learning team, working on projects focused on whole
child education. Prior to joining LPI, Klevan was a Research Associate for the Research Alliance
for New York City Schools, where she led several research projects focused on the New York City
school system. An overarching question frames Klevan’s research: How and in what ways do
schools simultaneously reproduce and disrupt patterns of inequality? Situated within this broader
interest, she has conducted research studies on a variety of topic areas, including best practices for
immigrant youth, college-readiness initiatives, anti-racism education for teachers, and restorative
approaches to school discipline.
Anna Maier is a Research Analyst and Policy Advisor at the Learning Policy Institute. She co-leads
the Deeper Learning team, with a focus on community schools and performance assessment.
She oversees the California Performance Assessment Collaborative. She is also the lead author
of Community Schools as an Effective School Improvement Strategy: A Review of the Evidence and
Leveraging Resources Through Community Schools: The Role of Technical Assistance. Maier has
experience with a variety of roles in k–12 education. She began her career managing an afterschool
program for elementary school students in Oakland and went on to teach 2nd and 3rd grade in the
Oakland Unified School District and Aspire Public Schools. She was also a member of the research
and evaluation team at Coaching Corps, a youth sports nonprofit in Oakland. As a graduate student
fellow with the Center for Cities & Schools at UC Berkeley, she worked with West Contra Costa
Unified School District on implementing a full-service community school initiative.
Monica Martinez provides strategic direction and support for multiple initiatives across LPI,
most specifically focused on performance assessment. Martinez has spent her career focused on
addressing college success at both the higher education level and the k–12 level. She has served
as a President Obama appointee to the White House Commission on Educational Excellence for
Hispanics, the President of the New Tech Network, the Vice President for Education Strategy at
KnowledgeWorks, and a Senior Associate at the Institute for Educational Leadership. Martinez holds
a Ph.D. in Higher Education from the Steinhardt School of Education at New York University and a
B.A. in Sociology from Baylor University.

Hanna Melnick is a Research Analyst and Policy Advisor at LPI, where she co-leads the Early
Childhood Learning team. Her research has focused on school climate, social and emotional
learning, and accountability, as well as building effective early learning systems. Previously, Melnick
conducted research on California’s Local Control Funding Formula and early learning programs. She
began her career in education as an elementary school teacher. Melnick holds an M.P.P. from the
Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and received her B.A. from
Harvard University.
Natalie Truong is a member of the State Policy and Whole Child Education teams at LPI, where
she works to connect research and evidence-based policies to support state policymakers and
leaders toward whole child student success. Prior to joining LPI, Truong was Policy Director at
the Aurora Institute (formerly iNACOL), where she provided research and technical assistance to
state policymakers on transforming k–12 education. Truong holds a master’s in Education from
Johns Hopkins University and a B.A. in English and Political Science from Grinnell College. She is
currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Education Policy and Research Methods at George Mason University.
Steve Wojcikiewicz is a member of LPI’s Educator Quality team. He is a co-author of the book
Preparing Teachers for Deeper Learning and of several case studies of educator preparation programs
that are part of that project. His focus is on initiatives related to educator preparation research,
practice, and policy, including the Educator Preparation Laboratory (EdPrepLab), an initiative of LPI
and the Bank Street Graduate School of Education focused on teacher and leader preparation for
deeper learning and equity.

1530 Page Mill Road, Suite 200
Palo Alto, CA 94304
p: 650.332.9797
1301 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 500

Washington, DC 20036
p: 202.830.0079
@LPI_Learning | learningpolicyinstitute.org
The Learning Policy Institute conducts and communicates independent, high-quality research to improve education
policy and practice. Working with policymakers, researchers, educators, community groups, and others, the Institute
seeks to advance evidence-based policies that support empowering and equitable learning for each and every child.
Nonprofit and nonpartisan, the Institute connects policymakers and stakeholders at the local, state, and federal
levels with the evidence, ideas, and actions needed to strengthen the education system from preschool through
college and career readiness.

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Restarting and Reinventing School

Learning in the Time of COVID and Beyond

in collaboration with Aneesha Badrinarayan, Jessica Cardichon,

This report can be found online at

ii LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

List of Figures and Tables

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School iii

1. Close the digital divide

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School v

Priority 2: Strengthen Distance and Blended Learning

vi LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Priority 3: Assess What Students Need

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School vii

Priority 4: Ensure Supports for Social and Emotional Learning

1. Implement a comprehensive system of support. Effective school environments take a

viii LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Priority 5: Redesign Schools for Stronger Relationships

Priority 6: Emphasize Authentic, Culturally Responsive Learning

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School ix

Priority 7: Provide Expanded Learning Time

x LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Priority 8: Establish Community Schools and Wraparound Supports

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School xi

Priority 9: Prepare Educators for Reinventing School

1. Invest in high-quality educator preparation, especially for high-need communities

xii LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School xiii

Why We Should Aim for Reinvention

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 1

The Purpose of This Framework

2 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 3

Strategies for Reopening

4 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

What Students Need

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 5

What Policymakers and Educators Can Do

6 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Prioritize federal efforts to close the digital divide

Expand broadband access through state and city initiatives

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 7

Wyoming has also established itself as a leader in

Organize access to devices and connectivity

8 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 9

What Students Need

What Policymakers and Educators Can Do

Share pioneering efforts among districts

10 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

• Well-designed online or blended instruction can be as or more effective than

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 11

12 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School 13

Give special consideration to early childhood learning

• modeling everything that is being taught;

• Focus on relationships and social-emotional development. When technology is used, it

14 LEARNING POLICY INSTITUTE | Restarting and Reinventing School

Develop standards for digital learning that