school reopening essay in english

Policy Actions for School Reopening and Learning Recovery

The global COVID-19 pandemic closed schools around the world, leaving more than 1.6 billion children out of school in the early months of the pandemic. According to a recent UNICEF calculation , around 214 million children – or 1 in 7 globally – have missed more than three-quarters of their in-person learning. The learning loss associated with these school closures is predicted to cost the equivalent of $10 trillion in these children’s future earnings.

Presently schools in 141 countries have reopened for some in-person instruction, but students in two-thirds of countries are not fully back in school. While some countries have been able to organize remote instruction, children learn more when they are in school. Schools also provide a place for many students to interact with their peers, receive nutritious meals and vaccinations, and get psychosocial support. A return to in-person operations in the middle of a global health pandemic, however, will require considerations of both what is in the best interests of students and teachers, as well as the risks to public health.

To aid in reopening schools and stemming learning losses, UNICEF, UNESCO, the World Bank, the World Food Programme, and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) published a joint framework for reopening schools that provides high-level guidance around safe operations, stemming learning loss, ensuring the wellbeing of students and teachers, and reaching the most marginalized children.

How exactly should countries implement these recommendations? How can they move from high-level guidance to specific investments and activities? How much will these additional activities cost and which specific resources will be required? Is there any evidence on the effectiveness of approaches that countries and education systems have been using to support children’s learning inside and outside of school?

To tackle these sorts of questions, the World Bank’s Education Global Practice has (i) created short notes to curate evidence and examples and provide links to materials that countries have used to support various stakeholders (students, teachers, parents, school management) during both remote and in-person instruction, (ii) developed excel-based costing tools to identify the resources required for delivering remote instruction, including social-emotional learning, and for implementing the activities implied by the joint framework, and (iii) invested in randomized control trials around the world to test different approaches that employ digital technologies to support learning at home or to assist educators in the classroom.

The short notes are meant to be “living documents” that offer a start point for implementing recommendations related to health and safety, modifications that might be required in education systems’ pedagogical approach to get children back to learning, and the management of all these activities.

Health and Safety

Is it safe to reopen schools? ( English | French | Spanish )

Minimizing disease transmission in schools ( English | French | Spanish )

Modifying pedagogy

Restructuring the academic calendar ( English | French | Spanish )

Adapting the curriculum ( English | French | Spanish )

Encouraging re-enrollment ( English | French | Spanish )

Preparing and supporting teachers ( English | French | Spanish )

Supporting learning at home ( English | French | Spanish )

Learning assessment and exams ( English | French | Spanish )

Accelerating Learning Recovery ( English | French | Spanish )

Preparing and supporting school leaders ( English | French | Spanish )

Communicating with stakeholders ( English | French | Spanish )

Mission: Recovering Education in 2021
Framework for reopening schools
World Bank Education and COVID-19

Essay: School reopening plans must meet safety, needs of students

When my 17 year-old son heard high schools would be all remote this year he told me he felt cheated. As a junior in the Rochester City School District (RCSD), he is worried he will finish high school unprepared for college.

Remote learning has been a poor substitute for in-person instruction. Live instruction time is very limited during the week, and there has not been the same consistent support for his disability. More than that he misses his friends, and school is one of the few safe places he can go in our neighborhood.

In-person instruction is vitally important for the over 100,000 school-aged children in Monroe County. Many children in our community have fallen dangerously behind in their academic and social-emotional development. Safety comes first for students, parents, and teachers, but if there is way to reopen schools safely we must do it as soon as possible.

Our community’s child care system has largely remained open during the pandemic and has avoided widespread transmission among young children and their educators. This suggests that, with proper precautions and limited group sizes, young children can safely receive in-person instruction.

The disparities in who has access to in-person instruction may deepen existing educational inequities in our community. Every district in Monroe County except RCSD intends to offer at least two days of in-person instruction for all grade levels, and some as much as five days for elementary students. The conflicting guidelines only adds to the distrust and anxiety of many parents, teachers, and students.

Broad and conflicting guidelines for reopening schools by national and state leaders have put the responsibility on school districts to completely redesign their operations in a matter of weeks.

Meanwhile, national and state governments have not fully funded the costs of reopening safely. School districts are approaching reopening in widely different ways as a result, with underfunded and highly segregated school districts like Rochester being the least able to adapt.

What we need is a gold standard for in-person and virtual instruction that emphasizes equity during the pandemic. To ensure these standards are implemented, state and federal leaders must provide the funding schools so desperately need. Standards for safety should be clear and widely understood, and parents and teachers deserve choices about virtual versus in-person instruction.

Equity means ensuring additional supports for the students falling the farthest behind. One positive trend in reopening plans has been the prioritization of young children, students with disabilities, and English language learners, who research shows are the most in need of in-person instruction. Even so, to make up for the learning loss during the pandemic will require a huge investment in public education that goes beyond where we started in March.

Reopening plans should be about the safety and needs of students, period. We cannot let children be cheated out of their education because of the failures of adults.

Valerie Stribling is an RCSD Parent. Eamonn Scanlon is Education Policy Director at The Children’s Agenda.

Reopening schools amid the COVID-19 pandemic: Your questions, our answers

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, daniel a. domenech , daniel a. domenech executive director - american association of school administrators @aasadan michael hansen , michael hansen senior fellow - brown center on education policy , the herman and george r. brown chair - governance studies @drmikehansen heather j. hough , and heather j. hough executive director - pace @hjhough emiliana vegas emiliana vegas former co-director - center for universal education , former senior fellow - global economy and development @emivegasv.

June 3, 2020

With the arrival of summer break, school systems across the country have mostly signed off of their remote teaching, and school leaders’ focus now shifts to reopening schools for live instruction in the next academic year. On May 21, the Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings hosted a webinar that addressed how schools in the United States should approach questions around reopening in the midst of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Brown Center Director Michael Hansen led the discussion among three panelists: Heather Hough (executive director of Policy Analysis for California Education, PACE), Daniel Domenech (executive director of The School Superintendents Association, AASA), and Emiliana Vegas (co-director of Brookings’s Center for Universal Education). You can watch video of the event here .

Although we fielded several questions from viewers during the event, we didn’t have time to get to everyone. Here are answers to some of the questions we didn’t get a chance to answer.

Responses from Heather Hough

Q: The panelists talked about expected learning losses during current school closures and strategies to help students academically once they’re back in school. Can you offer guidance on how schools can help meet students’ non-academic needs next year?

A: When students come back to school after closures, whenever that may be, they will bring with them an incredibly high level of need. In the most dire cases, students will have experienced trauma as issues of housing access and food insecurity are compounded by grief, loss, and even abuse. To meet these needs, schools should be prepared to offer a comprehensive set of services that address the needs of children and their families. Good examples of this approach can be found in “community schools,” in which schools partner with community agencies and allocate resources to provide an integrated focus on academics, health and social services, youth and community development, and community engagement. Community schools invest in programs, systems and practices to provide students with a wide array of supports that will help them succeed in school. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis, this “whole child” approach can be seen as a comprehensive way to ensure that students and their families are able to secure essential services, and reduce disparities in access and enrichment . Additionally, teachers should be supported in learning how to effectively build classroom communities and relationships in blended/remote learning contexts.

Q: What will schooling look like for the most vulnerable student groups, or students who need individualized services that will require closer contact and potentially making them more vulnerable to viral transmission?

A: Currently schools are considering a wide range of scenarios for reopening that range from fully in-person to fully remote, with many hybrids in between designed to have fewer students in the building at any given time. Under any of these scenarios we should be planning for distance learning for two key reasons: 1) Models of the spread of COVID-19 show that the virus will certainly be present in the fall, although the impact of the virus will vary by locale, and 2) individual teachers and parents/students may opt for distance learning due to personal or family risk if exposed to the virus. Given this unprecedented context of schooling, how do schools ensure that student needs are met, particularly students with special needs, students learning English, and students who have fallen behind during school closures? In planning for the fall, school leaders should start with learning needs rather than technology, focusing on how to provide targeted support to address individual needs regardless of the instructional setting. Instructional plans should prioritize interactive (kids working together) and active (kids doing a task) learning in synchronous (in-person or remote) instruction for all students and consider how to deploy educators to ensure small-group and 1:1 instruction for students who need it most. Ensuring parent voice in decisions requiring balancing health risks with educational and social-emotional benefits of in-person instruction will be critical to developing appropriate plans.

Responses from Daniel Domenech

Q: Do states or school districts have flexibility in their implementation of CDC guidelines for reopening schools? Can some practices be dropped if they are too onerous to implement or if students or staff are unwilling to comply?

A: The CDC guidelines are very specific and provide the guidance that school superintendents were looking for. It is already apparent that implementing them will be very costly and significantly change the education landscape. The question becomes, how much are we willing to stray from them for the sake of expediency and/or reducing the costs involved? The social spacing issue is a key element. We see that not just for schools but basically for every phase for reopening all aspects of public gatherings. It would be difficult to ignore that for schools. It is social spacing that will, in most cases, require schools to open for some students but not all. This is where the hybrid, or blended learning approach will come in. We can anticipate that this is what most districts will do. It will require more busing and the continuation of remote learning and there will be costs for protective equipment, school sanitizing and many of the other items in the guidelines. Ultimately, each locality will be faced with a very hard decision. Six of the superintendents in the largest California districts have already indicated that they may not be able to open schools at all. Instruction may have to continue exclusively online.

Q: Do schools face greater legal liability from failing to provide an adequate education to students or from students getting sick from the virus? And is the balance between these two competing interests appropriate, in your opinion?

A: There is significant liability for school districts already. Many have not been able to fulfill the IEP requirements under IDEA. Although we have been asking U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos for flexibility on this matter, she has refused to do so. Initially, some governors had indicated that the safest approach would be to provide no services to any student. Superintendents rejected that and provided services to as many students as they could safely and remotely. There is liability in providing inadequate services, or no services at all, and there will be liability if children or adults get sick in a school that has opened. Would we rather be sued for providing inadequate services or for the death of students and staff? It’s a lose-lose situation either way, but superintendents will do their very best to provide adequate services in a safe and healthy environment.

Responses from Emiliana Vegas

Q: Are there country-level factors that appear to help or hinder the reopening of schools in other countries?

A: It is too early to fully answer this question. Nevertheless, countries that have reopened thus far are those that have been able to control the pandemic. So, the first issue is to ensure that the benefits from reopening schools outweigh the potential health risks for students and adults. A second factor appears to be the commitment of the country to ensuring educational opportunity for all. Once the health risks are under control, governments that have reopened schools show a very high commitment to education and to reduce inequality. Things are a little different in the U.S., since it is the state-level government that runs schools, not the federal government as is common in most other countries. Consequently, there will likely be a lot of variation across states in how they manage reopening and the triggers for closing again if a second wave requires it.

Responses from Michael Hansen

Q: What will be the triggers for closing schools again in the fall after reopening? How should nurses provide care for students who may potentially be carrying the virus?

A: Multiple participants during the event submitted questions like these regarding school decisions that would need critical information from public health experts. Those on the panel are not public health experts, and thus could not directly respond to these questions, and encourage school leaders and policymakers to work with relevant national and local health authorities to tackle questions such as these. The National Association of School Nurses, for example, has curated resources and offered guidance to school nurses as they assist their schools in planning for reopening. In general, though, a minimum precaution that schools should have in place is ready access to COVID-19 testing for any students and staff that come to school with symptoms aligning with the disease. Quick results will be critical in determining whether schools should be shutting down to minimize viral spread among the student body.

Q: If remote learning continues to be an important element of public education next year, as the panelists assert, what can schools and districts be doing now to ensure its success next year?

A: The digital divide was a significant barrier to providing equal access to education in some of our neediest schools and communities three months ago when schools were still holding all instruction in person. When the extended school closures over the spring pushed all learning online, the transition revealed the extent of these connectivity problems and exacerbated opportunity gaps. Schools and districts should take the summer to make efforts to ensure students can connect to schools when classes resume in the fall. Connectivity challenges in some districts have required creative efforts , including WiFi on school buses or utilizing other public resources , that will be needed to surmount these critical gaps. Also, students are not participating in remote learning at rates that are higher than we should expect based on digital divide estimates alone; thus, schools should also use the summer to reach out and learn what else may be preventing students from engaging with remote learning and implement solutions to overcome those barriers.

For more, watch the full event, “ Reopening schools in the fall amid the COVID-19 pandemic .”

Reopening K-12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Prioritizing health, equity, and communities.

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented unprecedented challenges to the nation’s K-12 education system. The rush to slow the spread of the virus led to closures of schools across the country, with little time to ensure continuity of instruction or to create a framework for deciding when and how to reopen schools. States, districts, and schools are now grappling with the complex and high-stakes questions of whether to reopen school buildings and how to operate them safely if they do reopen. These decisions need to be informed by the most up-to-date evidence about the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19; about the impacts of school closures on students and families; and about the complexities of operating school buildings as the pandemic persists.

In response to this need for evidence-based guidance, the Board on Science Education of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, in collaboration with the Academies’ Board on Children, Youth, and Families (BCYF) and Standing Committee on Emerging Infectious Disease, convened the Committee on Guidance for K-12 Education on Responding to COVID-19. The committee was tasked with providing guidance on the reopening and operation of elementary and secondary schools for the 2020–2021 school year. This report documents the committee’s findings, conclusions, and recommendations with respect to (1) what is known (and not known) about COVID-19, (2) what is necessary to know about schools in order to make decisions related to COVID-19, (3) how determinations about reopening schools and staying open can best be made, and (4) strategies for mitigating the spread of COVID-19 in schools.

Equity and Reopening Schools

The committee was particularly concerned about how the persistent inequities of the education system might interact with similar disparities in health outcomes and access in ways that could devastate some communities more than others. Every choice facing states, districts, and schools is being made against the backdrop of entrenched economic and social inequities made more visible by the disparate impacts of the pandemic on Black, LatinX and Indigenous communities. Without careful attention, plans to reopen schools could exacerbate these inequities.

COVID-19, Children and Transmission

Evidence to date suggests that children and youth (aged 18 and younger) are at low risk of serious, long-term consequences or death as a result of contracting COVID-19. However, there is insufficient evidence with which to determine how easily children and youth contract the virus and how contagious they are once they do. Similarly, while some measures—such as physical distancing, avoiding large gatherings, handwashing, and wearing masks—are clearly important for limiting transmission, there is no definitive evidence about what suite of strategies is most effective for limiting transmission within a school setting when students, teachers, and other staff are present. The fact that evidence is inadequate in both of these areas—transmission and mitigation—makes it extremely difficult for decision-makers to gauge the health risks of physically opening schools and to create plans for operating them in ways that reduce transmission of the virus.

Weighing the Risks of Building Closures

Keeping schools closed to in-person learning in Fall 2020 poses potential educational risks. Students of all ages benefit from in-person learning experiences in ways that cannot be fully replicated through distance learning. The educational risks of extended distance learning may be higher for young children and children with disabilities. In addition, without careful implementation, virtual learning alone runs the risk of exacerbating disparities in access to high-quality education across different demographic groups and communities.

Opening school buildings to some extent in Fall 2020 may provide benefits for families beyond educating children and youth. Working caregivers would have affordable, reliable childcare for school-age children, and families would be better able to access services offered through the school, such as provision of meals and other family supports (e.g. mental health services, school-based health services).

If and when schools reopen, staffing is likely to be a major challenge. A significant portion of school staff are in high-risk age groups or are hesitant to return to in-person schooling because of the health risks. In addition, some of the strategies for limiting the transmission of COVID-19 within schools, such as maintaining smaller class sizes and delivering both in-person and virtual learning, will require additional instructional staff.

The Decision to Reopen

While many guidance documents for reopening schools exist, many state-level guidance documents do not explicitly call on districts to reopen schools; rather they pose a series of questions for districts to consider in making decisions about reopening. This approach to providing guidance allows for regional variation and flexibility. However, it also leaves district leaders with a tremendous responsibility for making judgments about the risks of reopening while also responding to the needs of students, families, and staff.

Weighing all of the relevant factors to arrive at a decision about reopening and staying open involves simultaneously considering the public health risks, the educational risks, and other potential risks to the community. This kind of risk assessment requires expertise in public health, infectious disease, and education as well as clear articulation of the community’s values and priorities. It also requires a protocol for monitoring data on the virus to track community spread. To ensure that the process of reopening schools is reflective of the community’s needs and values and attends effectively to the multiple (and often conflicting) priorities of the numerous stakeholders, schools and districts will need to take care to engage a range of perspectives in the decision-making process.

Implementing Mitigation Strategies

Reopening school buildings will be contingent on implementing a set of mitigation strategies that limits transmission of the virus. The existing guidance documents offer an extensive list of potential strategies but little guidance on how districts and schools can or should prioritize them. Many of the mitigation strategies currently under consideration (such as limiting classes to small cohorts of students or implementing physical distancing between students and staff) require substantial reconfiguring of space, purchase of additional equipment, adjustments to staffing patterns, and upgrades to school buildings. The financial costs of consistently implementing a number of potential mitigation strategies is considerable. While some highly resourced districts with well-maintained buildings may be able to implement most of the strategies, many schools and districts will need additional financial support to institute and maintain mitigation measures. Costs are a particular concern due to the budget cuts resulting from the economic impact of the pandemic.

Poor-quality school buildings (i.e., those that have bad indoor air quality, are not clean, or have inadequate bathroom facilities) complicate reopening and may make it difficult for school districts to implement the recommended health and safety measures. This poses a problem for equitable implementation of the strategies as children and youth from low-income families disproportionately attend schools with poor-quality facilities.

Finally, even if all of the mitigation strategies are in place and well implemented, it is impossible to completely eliminate the risk of COVID-19 in schools. Therefore, it is incumbent on school officials, in association with local public health authorities, to plan for the possibility that one or more students, teachers or staff will contract COVID-19.

Recommendations

The committee formulated a set of recommendations designed to help districts and schools successfully navigate the complex decisions around reopening school buildings, keeping them open, and operating them safely. In its final recommendation, the committee identifies four areas of research that are urgently needed to fill the existing gaps in evidence: (1) the role of children in transmission of SARS-CoV-2, (2) the role of reopening schools in the spread of SARSCoV- 2 in communities, (3) the role of airborne transmission of COVID-19, and (4) the relative effectiveness of different mitigation strategies in schools.

Districts should weigh the relative health risks of reopening against the educational risks of providing no in-person instruction in Fall 2020. Given the importance of in-person interaction for learning and development, districts should prioritize reopening with an emphasis on providing fulltime, in-person instruction in grades K-5 and for students with special needs who would be best served by in-person instruction.

To reopen during the pandemic, schools and districts should provide surgical masks for all teachers and staff, as well as supplies for effective hand hygiene for all people who enter school buildings.

Local public health officials should partner with districts to:

States should ensure that in portions of the state where public health offices are short-staffed or lack personnel with expertise in infectious disease, districts have access to the ongoing support from public health officials that is needed to monitor and maintain the health of students and staff.

State and local decision-makers and education leaders should develop a mechanism, such as a local task force, that allows for input from representatives of school staff, families, local health officials, and other community interests to inform decisions related to reopening schools. Such a cross-sector task force should:

In developing plans for reopening schools and implementing mitigation strategies, districts should take into account existing disparities within and across schools. Across schools, plans need to address disparities in school facilities, staffing shortages, overcrowding, and remote learning infrastructures. Within schools, plans should address disparities in resources for students and families. These issues might include access to technology, health care services, ability to provide masks for students, and other considerations.

Schools will not be able to take on the entire financial burden of implementing the mitigation strategies. Federal and state governments should provide significant resources to districts and schools to enable them to implement the suite of measures required to maintain individual and community health and allow schools to remain open. Under-resourced districts with aging facilities in poor condition will need additional financial support to bring facilities to basic health and safety standards. In addition, State Departments of Education should not penalize schools by withholding state-wide school funding formula monies for student absences during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Based on what is currently known about the spread of COVID-19, districts should prioritize mask wearing, providing healthy hand hygiene solutions, physical distancing, and limiting large gatherings. Cleaning, ventilation, and air filtration are also important, but attending to those strategies alone will not sufficiently lower the risk of transmission. Creating small cohorts of students is another promising strategy.

The research community should immediately conduct research that will provide the evidence needed to make informed decisions about school reopening and safe operation. The most urgent areas for inquiry are:

COMMITTEE ON GUIDANCE FOR K-12 EDUCATION ON COVID-19

Enriqueta C. Bond (Chair, NAM), Founding Partner, QE Philanthropic Advisors; Dimitri A. Christakis, Pediatrician and Epidemiologist, University of Washington School of Medicine; Michael Lach, Assistant Superintendent, Township High School District 113, Illinois; Phyllis D. Meadows, Senior Fellow, The Kresge Foundation; Kathleen Moore, Owner, Kathleen Moore and Associates; Caitlin Rivers, Senior Scholar, Johns Hopkins Center of Health Security; Keisha Scarlett, Chief of Equity, Partnerships, and Engagement, Seattle Public Schools; Nathaniel Schwartz, Professor, Annenberg Institute for School Reform, Brown University; Jeff Vincent, Director and Cofounder, Center for Cities & Schools, University of California, Berkeley; Kenne Dibner, Study Director; Heidi Schweingruber, Director, Board on Science Education; Natacha Blain, Director, Board on Children, Youth, and Families; Lisa Brown, Director, Standing Committee on Emerging Infectious Disease; Leticia Garcilazo Green, Research Associate; Matthew Lammers, Program Coordinator For this report, the National Academies appointed a committee with expertise in education administration, education policy, child development, learning sciences, school facilities, public health, and epidemiology.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of any organization or agency that provided support for the project.

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http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6658-502X Dan Li 1 ,
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5397-2303 Kate Nyhan 2 ,
Xin Zhou 3 ,
Yunxu Zhu 1 ,
Danielle Castro 1 ,
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7289-8698 Sten H Vermund 1 ,
Marie Brault 4
1 Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases , Yale University School of Public Health , New Haven , Connecticut , USA
2 Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library , Yale University , New Haven , Connecticut , USA
3 Biostatistics , Yale School of Public Health , New Haven , Connecticut , USA
4 Social and Behavioral Sciences , Yale School of Public Health , New Haven , Connecticut , USA
Correspondence to Dan Li; dan.li{at}yale.edu

Objective The objective of this scoping review is to provide an overview of existing studies and evidence on the impact of school closures and reopenings during the pandemic.

Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has necessitated widespread school closures, and reopening schools safely has a pivotal role in the well-being of children and teachers, SARS-CoV-2 transmission control and optimal societal functioning. Widespread school closures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic have caused adverse effects on the education, physical health and mental well-being of children. An understanding of the impact of school closures and reopenings as well as factors influencing school safety is critical to bringing schools’ operational status back to normal. Despite the implication of individual concerns and knowledge on disease prevention practices, there is a paucity of research on individual knowledge, needs and behaviours in the context of school reopenings. In the proposed study, we will conduct a scoping review to identify and provide inventory of the current research and evidence on the impact of COVID-19 on K-12 schools (primary and secondary schools) and vice versa.

Methods and analysis Eligible studies/literature include members of K-12 (primary and secondary) schools (students, parents, staff, faculty, COVID-19 coordinator, school nurses) in countries affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. We will exclude university or college students. There will be no exclusion based on methods, timing or school operational status.

All concepts regarding school closures and reopenings will be considered, and all types of research will be considered.

This scoping review will follow the Joanna Briggs Institute methodology for scoping reviews. Sources of evidence published from 2020 to 31 October 2021 will be included. The search will include PubMed, preprints in EuropePMC, ERIC, Scopus, Web of Science Core Collection, PsycINFO, Embase, CINAHL and VHL. We will cover grey literature in Harvard Think Tank Database, COVID-19 Evidence Hub like COVID-END and Google Scholar. The abstract and title screening, full-text screening and data extraction will be done by two independent reviewers.

Disagreements will be resolved by an independent third reviewer. Data extract will be done on Qualtrics form to ensure accurate extraction. Citation chaining will be performed on key articles identified. A critical appraisal will be performed.

The scoping review will take place from 1 August 2021 to 15 November 2021. We will perform a final round of updated search and citation chaining.

Ethics and dissemination The review will be based on published works and grey literature, thus it is exempt from formal ethical approval. This protocol cannot be registered in the Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews because this registry is not for scoping reviews. We will register it in OSF Registration. The paper will appear in a peer-reviewed, open-access journal to ensure a broad dissemination.

community child health
child protection
education & training (see medical education & training)
epidemiology
infectious diseases

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ .

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-054292

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Strengths and limitations of this study

The proposed study is the first and only scoping review to thoroughly provide inventory of current studies on the impact of COVID-19 on K-12 schools’ (primary and secondary schools) closures and reopenings.

The scoping review is reviewing literature from a comprehensive set of databases and grey literature hubs. A strength of the proposed review is that the author group can read at least three languages and we also will use translating software to review articles that are not written in English.

The scoping review methodology will not allow us to directly assess safety strategies and make conclusions on safety interventions.

We rely on the subject index and English titles and abstracts to retrieve foreign-language papers.

Introduction

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic is the worst global respiratory viral emergency since the influenza pandemic of 1918–1919. 1 2 Schools worldwide were forced to close due to absenteeism, prevent disease transmission and limit risk to vulnerable members of the school community. Due to the unique social dynamics of educational settings, in-person schooling increases the risk of viral transmission to more vulnerable individuals, particularly in lower-income areas where crowding is more likely. 3 4 Schools are a major concern for novel coronavirus transmission given the social dynamics among schoolchildren, crowding in institutional environments and extracurricular events that may increase risk. 5 6 Children and adolescents often have closer interactions with each other than adults, and younger children may struggle to follow mask use and hand hygiene guidance. To promote adherence to recommended COVID-19 prevention practices, adult supervision, student buy-in/engagement and regular encouragement of safe personal behaviours are essential.

In-person school plays a vital role in the societal function and children’s well-being. School closures have had clear detrimental effects on student well-being. 7–11 Children, especially those from vulnerable communities, 3 10 are exposed to educational deficits, lack of resources, isolation and domestic violence. 5 7–9 11–15 According to a national survey, 4 out of 10 US teens did not use online learning portals during the first semester following the start of the pandemic. 16–19 Without access to customary channels of support, such as schools and doctors’ offices, school shutdowns have made some children more vulnerable to abuse and neglect. 8 In addition, working parents from all societal sectors are more likely to miss work due to added childcare burden during school closures. 20–22 As a result, local governments have prioritised school reopenings given the large individual and societal costs of closures, particularly for students whose parents have essential jobs in healthcare, transportation and other key societal services. 5 Controlling outbreaks among children is crucial to keeping schools open and protecting the well-being of the community at large. 23 24 Many secondary teachers reported concerns about both environmental safety and student well-being. 25 There are many factors that play a critical role in school safety during the pandemic. First of all, school members’ (students, teachers, staff and parents) attitudes, perceptions and knowledge will influence the practise of safety behaviours. Individual protective behaviours play an important role in limiting the spread of infectious diseases. These include preventive measures (such as hand hygiene, wearing face masks and physical distancing) and illness management measures (such as medical consultation, testing and infection control). 26 Second, school-directed initiatives are also crucial to develop a safe environment. Some of the commonly practised school-directed initiatives include engineering control, contact tracing, quarantine/isolation systems, scheduled disinfection and occupancy control. Finally, school members deserve a definitive answer on the impact of school reopening status on viral transmission and school members’ physical and mental health.

Despite the importance of the topic, to date, there is no comprehensive review that provides inventories of the impact of COVID-19 on K-12 schools (primary and secondary schools) and vice versa. In this scoping review, we will provide an overview of existing studies and evidence on the impact of school closures and reopenings during the pandemic. We present research from or on K-12 schools (primary and secondary schools), which include students, teachers, faculty, staff, parents, COVID-19 coordinators and school nurses (or other school clinic staff). We will include studies from any country that has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this study is to identify the contents and themes that have been researched, and to analyse the quality of evidence. The goal of the scoping review is to identify and analyse the existing knowledge gaps regarding school reopenings and safety during a viral respiratory pandemic and to serve as a precursor to future research in this field. Finally, we hope to guide future areas of research and recommend policies to support school safety during a pandemic.

Review question/objective

What is known about school closures and reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic? What research questions and themes have been covered in the current studies? What methods have been used to explore this issue? What types of studies have been done on investigating the impact of COVID-19 on school members’ physical and mental health? What are the knowledge gaps in the impact of COVID-19 on primary and secondary schools and school members?

Inclusion criteria

Types of participants.

Target participants for this review are school members in K-12 schools (primary and secondary schools). Members include students, teachers, faculty, staff, parents, COVID-19 coordinators and school nurses (or other school clinic staff).

A summary of the topics that have been studied and published on school reopenings.

The types of research studies and publications on primary and secondary schools and COVID-19.

Knowledge gaps regarding the impact of COVID-19 on primary and secondary schools and school members.

The context in this review includes all countries that have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Source of evidence

In this review, the following databases will be searched for the year 2020 or 2021: PubMed, preprints in EuropePMC, ERIC, Scopus, Web of Science Core Collection, PsycINFO, Embase, CINAHL and VHL. We will cover grey literature in Harvard Think Tank Database, COVID-19 Evidence Hub like COVID-END and Google Scholar. Through the data extraction process, we will identify key articles to perform citation chaining. Citation chaining to identify additional relevant publications will be conducted following the screening process.

Keywords and PubMed/Scopus search strategy for literature on safe school reopenings during the COVID-19 pandemic

("sars cov 2"[MeSH Terms] OR "sars cov 2"[All Fields] OR "covid"[All Fields] OR covid19[All Fields] OR "covid 19"[MeSH Terms] OR "covid 19"[All Fields] OR ("pandemic"[Title/Abstract] AND 2020:3000[pdat])) AND ((School[tw] OR schools[tw] OR schools[mh:noexp] OR return to school[mh] OR student[mh:noexp] OR student*[tw] OR teacher*[tw] OR school teachers[mh] OR educational personnel[mh:noexp] OR kindergarten*[tw] OR schoolchildren[tw]) NOT (Schools, health occupations[mh] OR universities[mh] OR college*[tw]))

(TITLE-ABS-KEY (school* OR student* OR teacher* OR kindergarten* OR “educational personnel”) AND NOT TITLE-ABS-KEY (college* OR university* OR “medical school*” OR “nursing school*” OR “dental school*”)) AND

(TITLE-ABS-KEY (covid OR covid OR covid OR “sars cov 2” OR pandemic)) AND (LIMIT-TO (PUBYEAR, 2021) OR LIMIT-TO (PUBYEAR, 2020))

We will conduct two rounds of screening. Two independent reviewers will screen the title and abstract, as well as the full text of the manuscript retrieved by our search strategy. Conflicts will be resolved by a third reviewer.

Extracting and charting the results

The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) flow chart will be used to visualise the numerical outputs from scoping reviews and the inclusion decision process. In our flow chart, we will clearly illustrate the process for finding studies, removing duplicates, selecting the right research, retrieving the full article from the library and presenting the final analysis. To assist us in processing foreign-language manuscripts, Google Translator and DeepL will be used. In scoping review, ‘charting the results’ is an iterative process that involves the extraction of relevant data from all the studies included in the review. In order to address the issue of spin, we will have the data extractors read key meta-research articles about spin (in both intervention and observational studies) to ‘prime’ them to be aware of common spin that may be present in included articles. 27 28 We developed a charting template to facilitate the extraction of data across reviewers regarding characteristics of articles included in our review and key details pertinent to our objectives. The form will be refined (or consolidated) once a sample of studies has been charted independently by two or more reviewers. Both quantitative and qualitative data are expected to be included in the results of the review. These findings will be presented in the form of narratives and visuals, such as evidence ‘maps’ and tabular presentations.

In order to address the objective of the paper, the following data will be extracted: first author; title; journal; year of publication; type of publication; academic discipline; field and profession of the authors; sample size; study objective; author’s main conclusion; funder; conflict of interest; method and design; country; school type; participant age; roles in school; school status; duration/start and end day; viral strains; safety protocols; transmission; physical health; educational outcomes; mental health; social outcomes; attitudes/beliefs; behaviours; gaps in research. Extraction instructions are detailed in the data extraction chart ( table 1 ).

View inline

Data extraction chart

Assessment of methodological quality

PRISMA extension for scoping reviews does not mandate scoping reviews to assess the methodological quality of evidence identified through literature search. To provide a structured and detailed method of critically analysing the characteristics of the evidence, it was decided that an assessment of methodological quality would be incorporated into the proposed scoping review. Critical appraisal of the methodological quality of all relevant studies will be assessed using the Joanna Briggs Institute critical appraisal tools. 29 Two independent reviewers will conduct the critical appraisal. A third independent reviewer will evaluate disagreements. All foreign-language manuscripts will be translated using Google Translator and DeepL, and then a critical appraisal will be conducted.

The results of the critical appraisal will be presented in the Results section.

Ethics and dissemination

The study is not subject to ethics approval since it is based on published works. This protocol cannot be registered in the Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews, since this registry is not intended for scoping reviews. It has been registered with OSF Registration. The article will be published in a peer-reviewed, open-access journal to ensure wide distribution.

Ethics statements

Patient consent for publication.

Not required.

↵ Connecticut COVID-19 response daily data report for Connecticut . Available: https://portal.ct.gov/coronavirus/covid-19-data- tracker [Accessed 29 Nov 2020 ].
Brault MA ,
Kerkhoff AD ,
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Twitter @SVermund

Contributors The study was conceived by DL, SHV, KN and MB. The protocol was first drafted by DL and KN. The manuscript has been revised by KN, DL, YZ, XZ, DC, SHV and MB for important intellectual content.

Funding This study was funded by Yale COVID-19 Rapid Release Fund.

Disclaimer There was no involvement of the funders in the design and writing of the protocol or in the decision to submit it for publication.

Competing interests None declared.

Patient and public involvement Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, or conduct, or reporting, or dissemination plans of this research.

Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

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Reopening K-12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education; Board on Children, Youth, and Families; Board on Science Education; Standing Committee on Emerging Infectious Diseases and 21st Century Health Threats; Committee on Guidance for K-12 Education on Responding to COVID-19 ; Editors: Heidi Schweingruber , Kenne Dibner , and Enriqueta C. Bond .

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented unprecedented challenges to the nation's K-12 education system. The rush to slow the spread of the virus led to closures of schools across the country, with little time to ensure continuity of instruction or to create a framework for deciding when and how to reopen schools. States, districts, and schools are now grappling with the complex and high-stakes questions of whether to reopen school buildings and how to operate them safely if they do reopen. These decisions need to be informed by the most up-to-date evidence about the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19; about the impacts of school closures on students and families; and about the complexities of operating school buildings as the pandemic persists. Reopening K-12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Prioritizing Health, Equity, and Communities provides guidance on the reopening and operation of elementary and secondary schools for the 2020-2021 school year. The recommendations of this report are designed to help districts and schools successfully navigate the complex decisions around reopening school buildings, keeping them open, and operating them safely.

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The National Academies of SCIENCES • ENGINEERING • MEDICINE
COMMITTEE ON GUIDANCE FOR K–12 EDUCATION ON RESPONDING TO COVID-19
BOARD ON SCIENCE EDUCATION
BOARD ON CHILDREN, YOUTH, AND FAMILIES
STANDING COMMITTEE ON EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES AND 21ST CENTURY HEALTH THREATS
Acknowledgments
EQUITY AND REOPENING SCHOOLS
COVID-19, CHILDREN, AND TRANSMISSION
WEIGHING THE RISKS OF BUILDING CLOSURES
THE DECISION TO REOPEN
IMPLEMENTING MITIGATION STRATEGIES
RECOMMENDATIONS
STUDY SCOPE AND APPROACH
EQUITY AND COVID-19
THE QUESTION OF REOPENING
REPORT PURPOSE AND AUDIENCES
REPORT ORGANIZATION
PRELIMINARY HISTORY OF COVID-19
PREVALENCE AND DISTRIBUTION
TRANSMISSION
IMPACT ON CHILDREN
IMPACT ON ADULTS
DISPRORTIONATE IMPACTS ON MARGINALIZED COMMUNITIES
PRELIMINARY MITIGATION EFFORTS
CONCLUSIONS
THE MULTIPLE PURPOSES OF SCHOOLS
INEQUITY IN AMERICAN EDUCATION
RISKS OF EXTENDED BUILDING CLOSURES
CONSIDERATIONS FOR OPENING AND OPERATING SCHOOLS DURING COVID-19
UNDERSTANDING RISK AND DECISION-MAKING DURING COVID-19
EXISTING GUIDANCE FOR SCHOOLS
A FRAMEWORK FOR DECIDING WHEN TO REOPEN SCHOOLS FOR IN-PERSON LEARNING
APPROACHES TO COLLECTIVE DECISION-MAKING
MONITORING COVID-19 CONDITIONS
CREATING A CULTURE FOR MAINTAINING HEALTH
WHAT TO DO WHEN SOMEONE GETS SICK
Children and Transmission of COVID-19
The Role of Reopening Schools in Contributing to the Spread of COVID-19 in Communities
The Role of Airborne Transmission of COVID-19
Effectiveness of Mitigation Strategies
Appendix A. The Committee's Review of Existing Evidence
Appendix B. Guidance Documents Collected by the Committee
Appendix C. Example District Plans for Reopening Schools
Appendix D. Biographical Sketches of Committee Members and Staff

Suggested citation:

Reopening K–12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Prioritizing Health, Equity, and Communities . (2020). Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25858 .

Digital Object Identifier: https://doi.org/10.17226/25858

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020944328

Additional copies of this publication are available from the National Academies Press, 500 Fifth Street, NW, Keck 360, Washington, DC 20001; (800) 624-6242 or (202) 334-3313; http://www.nap.edu .

Printed in the United States of America

Cite this Page National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education; Board on Children, Youth, and Families; Board on Science Education; Standing Committee on Emerging Infectious Diseases and 21st Century Health Threats; Committee on Guidance for K-12 Education on Responding to COVID-19; Schweingruber H, Dibner K, Bond EC, editors. Reopening K-12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Prioritizing Health, Equity, and Communities. Washington (DC): National Academies Press (US); 2020 Jul 15. doi: 10.17226/25858
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FACT SHEET: Reopening Schools and Rebuilding With Equity

The Administration has taken decisive action to support the safe reopening of schools for in-person instruction and to address the pandemic’s disparate impact on students of color and other underserved students . As families across the country eagerly anticipate a return to school, the Administration is determined to ensure that our schools and students not only recover from the pandemic, but that we Build Back Better for the future. Prioritizing safe reopening The President made clear on Day One of this Administration that safely reopening schools was a national priority, signing the Executive Order on Supporting the Reopening and Continuing Operation of Schools and Early Childhood Education Providers, which launched a comprehensive effort across the White House, Department of Education, and Department of Health and Human Services to safely reopen schools for in-person instruction. The Department released two volumes of its COVID-19 Handbook focused on safely reopening schools and meeting the needs of students, and launched a clearinghouse of best practices for safely operating in-person and addressing the needs of students and staff. Secretary Cardona’s National Safe School Reopening Summit highlighted best practices from districts across the country to support safe in-person learning. Vaccination is our leading strategy to end the pandemic, and—combined with the layered mitigation strategies recommended by the CDC—has the greatest potential to allow schools to reopen fully this fall and stay open for in-person learning. That’s why, in March the President prioritized teachers and school staff for access to the COVID vaccine. As a result, almost 90 percent of educators and school staff are now vaccinated. To get more of our students ages 12 and older vaccinated, the President is now calling on school districts nationwide to host at least one pop-up vaccination clinic over the coming weeks and directing pharmacies in the federal pharmacy program to prioritize this and to work with school districts across the country to host vaccination clinics at schools and colleges. Heroic efforts from teachers, parents, and school staff, combined with the Administration’s aggressive vaccination push, has demonstrated that safe in-person learning is possible. Since January, the percentage of K-8 schools offering remote-only instruction decreased from 23 percent in January to only 2 percent in May. However, there is still work to be done. During the pandemic, students of color have been less likely to be enrolled in in-person instruction . Data shows that on average students in remote learning report poorer well-being than those in in-person instruction . A continued reliance on remote learning threatens to further widen disparities. The Administration will continue to address the concerns of families, and provide support to states in creating safe, inclusive, and supportive learning environments. Investing historic resources in equitable reopening With the passage of the American Rescue Plan, the Biden-Harris Administration has invested a historic $130 billion to support schools safely reopening and addressing the needs of students, including $122 billion through the American Rescue Plan’s Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ARP ESSER). ARP ESSER funding supports efforts to get students back in the classroom safely for in-person learning, to safely keep schools open once students are back, and to address the social, emotional, mental health, and academic needs of all students. This funding is being used to help schools safely operate, implement high-quality summer learning and enrichment programs, hire nurses and counselors, support the vaccination of students and staff, and invest in other measures to take care of students. Ensuring funds address the needs of students. Districts and states must spend a combined minimum of 25 percent of the state’s total ARP ESSER funds, totaling nearly $30.5 billion, to address the impact of lost instructional time through summer learning or enrichment, extended day instruction, comprehensive afterschool programs, or other evidence-based practices. Funded strategies must also respond to students’ social and emotional needs and account for the disproportionate impact of the coronavirus on underserved students. The Administration recognizes that the communities that support our students have a critical understanding of what their students need and are key to ensuring funds have the greatest impact on students. As they put together their plans for the use of funds, states and school districts are required to engage a wide range of stakeholders during the planning process, including educators, school leaders and staff, students, families, civil rights organizations, and stakeholders representing the interests of students with disabilities, English learners, students experiencing homelessness, children in foster care, migratory students, students who are incarcerated and other underserved students. Protecting high-poverty districts from funding cuts. The American Rescue Plan’s ARP ESSER program includes a first-of-its-kind maintenance of equity requirement to ensure that high-poverty school districts and schools are protected in the event of funding cuts. These requirements will ensure that school districts and schools serving a large share of students from low-income backgrounds will not experience disproportionate budget cuts—and that the school districts with the highest poverty levels do not experience any decrease in state per-pupil funding below their pre-pandemic level. Ensuring states continue to fund education . The Department has emphasized the importance of the American Rescue Plan’s maintenance of effort requirement , which ensures that states continue to fulfill their commitments to fund their education systems, and has worked with states to ensure that they meet these requirements. The maintenance of effort requirement helps protect students by making sure that federal pandemic relief funds are used to meet the immediate needs and impacts of the pandemic on students and schools to the greatest extent possible, rather than to supplant general state funding for K-12 education.

Supporting effective implementation. The Department of Education has worked aggressively to support states and school districts in implementing education relief funding. This includes providing resources on how ARP ESSER funds can be used , including to support effective ventilation in schools , vaccination efforts , creating and expand full-service community schools , hiring nurses and counselors, and providing high-quality summer programs and high-dosage tutoring to students. With critical partners like the National Governors Association and Council of Chief State School Officers, the Department launched the Summer Learning and Enrichment Collaborative to support states providing high-quality summer learning and enrichment. Stabilizing and ensuring access to child care. High-quality early care and education helps ensure that children can take full advantage of education and training opportunities later in life. The pandemic significantly disrupted the child care sector, threatening access to this critical support and threatening economic security for childcare workers, who are disproportionately women of color. The American Rescue Plan invested $24 billion in stabilizing the child care sector, and is helping to provide this essential industry—which provides vital opportunities for children—with more flexible funding to help more low-income working families access high-quality care, increase compensation for early childhood workers, and help parents to work. Addressing the needs of students experiencing homelessness. The pandemic increased housing insecurity , and disproportionately impacted the education of students experiencing homelessness, who were less likely to be able to successfully engage in remote learning due to lack of reliable access to the internet. The Department of Education has released all $800 million in American Rescue Plan funds for identifying and addressing the needs of students experiencing homelessness , including by providing wraparound services and support ranging from afterschool to mental health services. Supporting students with disabilities. The pandemic created serious challenges for many students with disabilities, who struggled to access special education and related services according to their individualized services plan. The American Rescue Plan provides support to students with disabilities and infants and toddlers with disabilities through the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. To ensure states can deliver the necessary services and supports to young children and youth with disabilities, the American Rescue Plan devotes nearly $2.6 billion in grants to states to support elementary and secondary education students with disabilities, $200 million for preschool children with disabilities, and $250 million for infants and toddlers with disabilities and their families. Bolstering Tribal education. The Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) is using $535 million in American Rescue Plan funds to support 183 BIE-funded K-12 schools, providing much-needed financial support to help Tribal communities recover more quickly from the pandemic’s wide-ranging impact. Funding COVID testing. The American Rescue Plan includes $10 billion to support COVID-19 testing in schools. This funding will help to reopen schools, including in communities of color, which have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Protecting the rights of students. Protecting the rights of students to equal opportunity is an essential part of ensuring educational equity. The Department of Education has provided resources to school leaders, students, families and other stakeholders to ensure students’ rights are protected, including information about civil rights and school reopening and confronting COVID-19-related harassment against AAPI students. The Department of Education has moved swiftly to implement the President’s Executive Order on Guaranteeing an Educational Environment Free from Discrimination on the Basis of Sex, Including Sexual Orientation or Gender Identity ; implement a comprehensive plan to address sexual harassment, including sexual violence, in schools; and make clear that it will enforce Title IX to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity , including for LGBTQ+ students . The Department has also worked to address the disproportionately high rates of school discipline for students of color and students with disabilities that removes them from the classroom . The Department held a public convening on school discipline in May and launched a major, ongoing effort to address racial, disability-based and other disparities in the administration of school discipline . Closing the digital divide. The American Rescue Plan included $7.2 billion for the E-Rate program, which helps support American schools by funding programs to help ensure K-12 students and teachers have the appropriate internet connections and devices for distance learning, a particular challenge in low-income and rural communities. Supporting nutrition security. It is hard for students to learn successfully when they are experiencing hunger. Black and Latino households face food insecurity at twice the rate of white households. The American Rescue Plan guards against food hardship among students this summer by allowing states to continue the Pandemic-EBT program, which provides grocery benefits to replace meals for students who are eligible for free and reduced priced meals when schools are closed. It also increases SNAP benefits by 15 percent through September 2021, maintaining the increase through the summer, when childhood hunger spikes due to a lack of school meals. The U.S. Department of Agriculture likewise acted to offer flexibility for the 2021-2022 school year by providing waivers that allow schools to serve free meals to all students. For more information on how President Biden’s Build Back Better agenda builds on this work by investing historic and vitally-needed resources that unlock opportunity for millions of Americans, please see the White House Fact Sheet on How the Biden-Harris Administration is Advancing Educational Equity .

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Back to school: On reopening of schools post lockdown

Reopening will prevent a washout year for students but the pandemic is not past.

Updated - November 03, 2020 01:10 pm IST

Published - November 03, 2020 12:15 am IST

The most significant aspect of continued unlocking of public activity during the COVID-19 pandemic is the decision of many States to reopen schools in November . While some, such as Andhra Pradesh and Assam, have allowed pupils back on campus from November 2, many others are waiting until Deepavali to resume classes. Attendance at schools remains voluntary, since the Centre’s guidelines, which now extend until the end of November, specify that parents can decide what their wards should do. Existing regulations allow research scholars and students who have to take up practical work to resume from October 15, but colleges remain understandably cautious and want to adopt a staggered approach to reopening. India’s revitalised public sphere outside containment zones, with shops and restaurants open, and buses and urban trains on stream, is set to widen its scope as cinemas also open at half capacity. These activities will restore the sinews of the economy, but they come with the risk of exposing more people to the coronavirus. At the end of several fatiguing months of restrictions, the belief that India has crossed peak infections and reduced its transmission rate could well prompt citizens to become lax about safe behaviour — proper, universal use of face coverings, personal hygiene and distancing norms. This could pose an unprecedented risk, since children who are believed to be less affected by the infection could bring the virus home to vulnerable individuals, a phenomenon experienced after reopening schools in Israel. Minimising negative impacts during the unlock and pre-vaccine phase, therefore, requires unwavering adherence to safety protocols, and additional vigilance on the part of State health authorities who must monitor the situation in educational institutions.

Globally, reopening of schools has elicited mixed reactions, but governments have deferred to the learning needs of children in Europe where lockdowns have been reimposed due to a fresh wave of cases. In any case, data published in August show that children represented less than 5% of all infections in 27 European countries. Teachers’ unions in Britain are calling for limited classes to help disadvantaged children and those with parental commitments; public schools in many U.S. States remain closed while some private institutions have reopened; France is asking even small children to wear masks along with teachers. The consensus is to prevent crowding, mandate masks, and allow natural air to ventilate rooms. Such precautions have universal applicability as preventive measures. A reopening will revive the economy, but it need not impose a deadly price in the form of avoidable and invisible deaths among the elderly and the vulnerable.

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How Does the Delta Variant Figure Into Schools’ Opening Plans?

Even the best-laid plans to reopen in-person instruction for the 2021-22 school year likely will need to adapt to the reality of a rapidly changing pandemic virus.

The Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes the fatal respiratory disease COVID-19, made up 1 in 10 new U.S. infections as of the two-week period ending July 5. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, predicted the strain, first identified in India, will overtake the Alpha variant from the United Kingdom to become the most common variant in the country within a few weeks.

Alpha and Delta are just two of four new varieties of the constantly mutating pandemic virus that are considered to be “ of concern ” by the CDC, meaning they cause faster infection, more-severe illness, and/or reduce the effectiveness of treatments or vaccines.

Here’s what educators need to know about Delta.

Why is the Delta strain so different?

Delta is one of several new strains whose differences in the so-called “spike proteins"—which give the virus its signature pin cushion appearance—help the virus bind better to the surface of a cell. The variant is roughly 50 percent more infectious than the most-common current variant, Alpha, which was in turn about 50 percent more infectious than the original pandemic coronavirus. That could lead to an exponential growth in outbreaks in communities with limited vaccinations and lax masking.

Chart of figures showing how transmission rates differ among the different strains of COVID-19.

Is the Delta variant worse for children?

Children now make up just over 1 in 10 new COVID-19 infections, with nearly 8,500 children infected in the week ending June 24, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics tracker. Since the pandemic began, children have made up more than 14 percent of all infections. One study in the British Medical Journal suggests the Delta variant is driving outbreaks in primary schools in the United Kingdom.

However, children are becoming a more visibly vulnerable group in the pandemic, both because more-infectious strains lead to more overall cases and because fewer children have been or are able to be vaccinated. While 58 percent of adults ages 18 and older have been fully immunized, only about 55 percent of those 12 and older have been fully vaccinated. And so far, there is no vaccine approved for children under 12, though Anthony Fauci, the director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the chief medical adviser to the president, has said he expects at least some vaccines to be available later this fall or in early 2022.

At this point, the Delta variant has not been found to cause more-severe illness in children than do other strains of the virus. About a third to half of children with COVID-19, including the Delta variant, have no symptoms, and “mortality in the 5- to 17-year-old bracket is extremely low with COVID. We’re talking on the order of two per 100,000,” said Danny Benjamin, a professor of pediatrics in the Duke School of Medicine and the chairman of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development’s Pediatric Trials Network.

“Two per 100,000 doesn’t seem like much until you take into account that there 1.5 million, 5- to 17-year-olds in K-12 education” in North Carolina, for example, he said. “So now we’re starting to talk about nontrivial numbers.”

What role will vaccines play in controlling the new variants?

One reason certain variants like Delta are considered “of concern” is because they can limit the effectiveness of some treatments and vaccines. For example, while the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, one of the most widely used in the United States, is found to be 91 percent to 95 percent effective in protecting against the original strain of SARS-CoV-2 two weeks after the second dose, Fauci noted , the vaccine is 79 percent effective in guarding against the Delta variant, and 88 percent effective in preventing those who do get infected from developing symptoms. Similarly, two doses of the Oxford-AstaZeneca vaccine were 60 percent effective in preventing infections and symptoms from the Delta strain. That could lengthen the time it takes for communities to develop herd immunity from vaccination, particularly in schools with children under 12, who do not yet have an approved vaccine.

How should school leaders account for variants when planning for school reopening in the fall?

The Delta variant’s higher transmissibility means that district leaders will need to keep a closer eye on infection rates in both the community and on campus, because outbreaks in either place can balloon much more rapidly.

While the CDC has relaxed overall masking recommendations for adults who are vaccinated, many states still require schools to use masks for adults and children if they hold in-person instruction.

“If the children have either widespread vaccination or widespread masking, then I would not make any substantive changes to plans for school. Children should be in-person, face-to-face,” Benjamin said. By contrast, he said, “If I’m in a situation, whether I’m in North Carolina or Alaska, or Texas, where I’m in a school setting where the majority of the humans in the building are not vaccinated and not masked, then I can anticipate with the Delta variant a pretty substantial increase in transmission. And the types of things that I need to do are ... to focus on ventilation, to focus on testing, to have people outside as much as possible, and to look at some of the other mitigation strategies.”

Benjamin and Kanecia Obie Zimmerman, an associate professor of pediatrics in the Division of Critical Care Medicine at Duke and co-head of the National Institutes of Health pilot program that is studying safe school reopening, noted that in a yearlong study of 11 school districts in North Carolina that reopened in-person learning this year, those who used universal masking policies did not show an increase in infections.

“In fact, in the mask-on-mask environment or among vaccinated students, the risk of death from acquiring COVID in North Carolina this past year was less than the risk of riding to school in your parents’ automobile,” Benjamin said.

Zimmerman also noted that while some lab studies have found coronavirus could be transmitted on the surfaces of school supplies like pens, paper, or desks, in practice, constant surface cleaning has proven not as critical as vaccinations and masking when reopening schools.

“In the setting of masking, in the setting of hand-washing, the risk of transmission from those types of elements [like school supplies] is extremely, extremely low,” she said. Schools in the North Carolina study that rigorously enforced masking did not have higher infection rates even if they did not clean outdoor playground equipment as frequently, for example.

However, medically fragile children—those who have asthma, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, suppressed immune systems, or other severe or chronic medical conditions—are at higher risk from complications from COVID-19. Leaders of schools with high concentrations of these students may need a more stringent protocol for cleaning and distancing, even with lower community infection rates, and Benjamin noted that school leaders should consider how to adapt protections for groups of students with neurological or other problems who are not able to wear masks.

A version of this article appeared in the July 14, 2021 edition of Education Week as How Does the Delta Variant Figure Into Schools’ Opening Plans?

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Reopening schools cannot wait, statement by unicef executive director henrietta fore and unesco director-general audrey azoulay.

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PARIS/NEW YORK, 12 July 2021 – “It’s been 18 months since the COVID-19 outbreak started and education for millions of children is still disrupted. As of today, primary and secondary schools are shuttered in 19 countries, affecting over 156 million students.

“This should not go on. Schools should be the last to close and the first to reopen.

“In their efforts to limit transmission, governments have too often shut down schools and kept them closed for prolonged periods, even when the epidemiological situation didn’t warrant it. These actions were frequently taken as a first recourse rather than a last measure. In many cases, schools were closed while bars and restaurants remained open.

“The losses that children and young people will incur from not being in school may never be recouped. From learning loss, mental distress, exposure to violence and abuse, to missed school-based meals and vaccinations or reduced development of social skills, the consequences for children will be felt in their academic achievement and societal engagement as well as physical and mental health. The most affected are often children in low-resource settings who do not have access to remote learning tools, and the youngest children who are at key developmental stages.

“The losses for parents and caretakers are equally heavy. Keeping children at home is forcing parents around the world to leave their jobs, especially in countries with no or limited family leave policies.

“That’s why reopening schools for in-person learning cannot wait.

“It cannot wait for cases to go to zero. There is clear evidence that primary and secondary schools are not among the main drivers of transmission. Meanwhile, the risk of COVID-19 transmission in schools is manageable with appropriate mitigation strategies in most settings. The decision to open or close schools should be based on risk analysis and the epidemiological considerations in the communities where they are situated.

“Reopening schools cannot wait for all teachers and students to be vaccinated. With the global vaccine shortages plaguing low and middle-income countries, vaccinating frontline workers and those most at risk of severe illness and death will remain a priority. All schools should provide in-person learning as soon as possible, without barriers to access, including not mandating vaccination prior to school entry.

“Ahead of the Global Education Meeting on July 13, we urge decisionmakers and governments to prioritize the safe reopening of schools to avoid a generational catastrophe.

“Closing schools mortgages our future for unclear benefits to our present. We must prioritize better. We can reopen schools safely, and we must.”

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Best Anchoring Script for School Assembly in English

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Ideal Morning Assembly Script for Schools

Engaging in a Dynamic School Assembly: Are you hosting a school morning assembly? Break free from the routine with our engaging and dynamic anchoring script. This guide will show you how to infuse life into your school’s morning assemblies, ensuring a vibrant start to the day.

The Essence of School Morning Assemblies:

School morning assemblies stand as pivotal moments in a school day, uniting students, teachers, and the principal. They set the tone for the day with positive energy and communal spirit.

Crafting a Perfect School Assembly Script:

While spontaneous anchoring can be exciting, it’s safer to rely on a well-prepared script. Our article provides comprehensive insights into creating the best anchoring script for school assembly , ensuring a smooth and memorable assembly experience.

Question: What is the Best Anchoring Script for a School Morning Assembly?

Sample School Morning Assembly Script in English:

We offer a sample script to enhance your anchoring skills. This script serves as a practical guide for those tasked with conducting the school morning assembly.

Structuring the Morning Assembly Script:

A successful school morning assembly strikes a balance between timeliness and engagement. Your morning assembly anchoring script should cover all assembly segments, respecting the theme of the day. For more details on morning assembly content and structure read below given anchoring tips and suggestions.

Launching the Assembly: How to Starting Anchoring Script?

Start your daily school assembly with a warm welcome and a brief introduction. Tailor your opening remarks to fit the day’s significance. Whether it’s a special occasion like Teacher’s Day or a regular school day, just start with energy and optimism.

Example : “Good morning to one and all present here. I am [Your Name] class XI (Change with your class) and it’s my honor to welcome you to today’s school assembly. As we gather to start another day filled with learning and opportunity, let’s begin with a positive spirit and an open heart. Let us embrace the day ahead with enthusiasm and a commitment to do our best. Welcome again, and let’s make this day a memorable one!”

Guiding Through Assembly Activities:

After the introduction, you may guide the audience through the assembly’s activities. Inject enthusiasm into your announcements and boosting the performers’ confidence. Your anchoring script should navigate seamlessly through the various segments, adding a unique touch to each transition.

How to Invite or Call the School Principal in Morning Assembly for Speech?

Inviting the principal for a speech adds a note of wisdom to the assembly. Introduce them with brief praise, allowing their speech to uplift the assembly’s atmosphere.

Example: To invite the school principal in the morning assembly, approach the announcement with respect and enthusiasm.

Say something like, “Now, I would like to invite our esteemed principal sir, [Principal’s Name], to the stage for their invaluable words. Please join me in welcoming them with a big round of applause.”

This introduction shows both respect and excitement for their contribution.

Best Anchoring Script Sample for School Assembly

Sample Anchoring Script: Here’s a script example encompassing all these elements. Feel free to customize it to suit your school’s needs.

[ Beginning of the Assembly : Anchor walks towards the stage]

Anchor : “Good morning, esteemed faculty and my fellow students. I am [Your Name], and it’s a great honor to guide us through today’s assembly. Seeing your bright faces this morning fills me with joy. Let’s initiate our day with positivity and invoke divine blessings through our daily prayer.”

[ Prayer Session Starts ]

[ Conclusion of Prayer ]

Anchor : “Thank you for joining in that beautiful prayer, feeling the serenity it brings to our school. Today’s assembly is packed with enriching and exciting activities. To kickstart, I invite [Student’s Name] to lead us in our school pledge, and I urge everyone to join in with vigor.”

[ Students Recite the Pledge Together ]

[ Pledge Ends ]

Anchor : “Witnessing our school unite for the pledge is truly heartwarming. Next up, I’m delighted to welcome [Student’s Name] to share the thought of the day.”

[ Student Shares the Thought of the Day ]

Anchor : “That was an enlightening thought, thank you. Now, let’s proceed to the announcements of upcoming events by our school prefects.”

[ School Announces Events ]

Anchor : “It’s exciting to hear about our school’s activities. Up next, let’s broaden our horizons with some current news, presented by [Student’s Name].”

[ Student Reads the News ]

Anchor : “Thank you for that informative update. As we near the end of our assembly, I am honored to invite our respected principal, Mr./Mrs./Miss [Principal’s Name], to share their insights with us.”

[ Principal Delivers a Speech ]

Anchor : “Thank you, sir/ma’am, for those inspiring words. A heartfelt thanks to all participants for making today’s assembly meaningful. Let’s conclude with the national anthem, embracing our national pride and hoping for a day full of achievements and learning.”

[ National Anthem is Recited ]

[ End of Assembly ]

This script for school assembly anchoring balances respect, enthusiasm, and a smooth flow of activities, ensuring an engaging and successful start to the school day.

Morning Assembly Anchoring: Begin by leading the prayer, followed by the pledge. Introduce segments like the thought of the day, school announcements, and news reading. Conclude with the principal’s speech and the national anthem.

Final Thoughts: We hope this guide and script sample equip you with everything needed for the best anchoring script for school assembly . For further queries, drop your questions in the comments.

10 Expert Tips for an Engaging and Memorable School Morning Assembly

Here are some refined tips for hosting a morning school assembly, tailored to make the session more impactful and memorable:

Understand Your Audience : Tailor your content to resonate with the age group and interests of the students.

Incorporate Interactive Elements : Include interactive segments like quizzes or audience questions to keep the assembly lively and engaging.

Highlight Student Achievements : Regularly acknowledge student accomplishments, both academic and extracurricular, to foster a sense of pride and community.

Use Visual Aids : Employ visual elements like slideshows or videos to make the assembly more dynamic and visually appealing.

Incorporate Themes : Center your assembly around a theme, such as environmental awareness or historical events, to give it a focused and educational approach.

Promote School Values : Reinforce the school’s values and ethos in your speech to instill a sense of identity and unity among students.

Include Cultural Elements : Celebrate diversity by incorporating different cultural elements into the assembly, such as music, dance, or stories from various cultures.

Practice Good Stage Presence : Maintain eye contact, use appropriate gestures, and move confidently on stage to engage your audience effectively.

Keep it Brief and Impactful : Ensure the assembly is concise yet full of valuable content so that students stay attentive and take away key messages.

End on a High Note : Conclude with an uplifting or motivational message, leaving students inspired as they go about their school day.

Concluding with Gratitude:

End the assembly by thanking everyone, especially the participants, principal, and teachers. Leave the audience with a positive thought, setting a cheerful tone for the day.

Example: “As we bring our assembly to a close, I would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to everyone for their active participation and attention. Your presence and energy have truly made this morning special. Wishing you all a wonderful day filled with learning and success!”

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Discover our School Assembly Anchoring Guide with Morning Assembly Script Samples, tips on Effective School Assembly Conducting, Engaging School Assembly Ideas, School Anchor Speech Examples, Inspirational School Assembly Formats, and Creative Anchoring Scripts for Schools.

More Tips for School Assembly

Plan your Anchoring Script and activities ahead of time to ensure a smooth flow.
Begin the assembly punctually to set a respectful and professional tone.
Open with a friendly and inclusive greeting to engage the audience.
Use clear and concise language for effective communication.
Keep your energy high to engage and inspire the audience.
Plan a variety of segments like news, thoughts of the day, and cultural items to keep the assembly interesting.
Involve students and teachers in different roles to foster a sense of community.
Praise participants and the audience for their involvement and attention.
Keep track of time and transitions between different parts of the assembly.
End with a motivational quote or thought to leave the audience inspired for the day.

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Welcome Speech For School Opening Day After COVID-19 – Principal’s Address And Message to Motivate Students

The world lockdown of educational institutions has caused a major interruption in students’ learning process and almost every country decided to close their educational institutes, schools, colleges, and universities to stop the spread of COVID-19. These interruptions have not only been a short-term issue, and still can have long-term consequences for affected countries and seem to increase inequality. Fortunately, with the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccination program, some countries have decided to reopen their educational institutes, schools, colleges, and universities under SOPS. In this article, we have written a welcome speech for school opening day after COVID-19, address, and message to students and parents by the principal.

Welcome Speech For School Opening After COVID-19

Dear Teachers and students, good morning and welcome back to school. After many months of the silent hall and empty classrooms, I am so delighted today to welcome you all, our teachers and students back into the learning environment. I hope you have enjoyed your time with your family in the COVID-19 holidays and prepared yourselves well for the study of the new academic year.

As you know the COVID-19 Pandemic has affected the learning cycle worldwide and leading to almost total closures of schools, colleges, and universities. However, in some locations, schools welcome students back to brick and classrooms. We have also taken and extensive preparation and planning into making our school re-entry safe and secure with some safety precautions and safeguards.

For me personally, it really is quite awesome to see shinning eyes and faces glancing over the top of masks, and you all seem ready and back to track with full of enthusiasm and energy to be on your toes again. I should remind you that we still have protocols and routines to become familiar with, and we all have to be confident in being able to begin the comeback positively. In the coming times, there will be some communication protocols, with masks, physical distancing, and regular handwashing. Still, we believe that we have things to face in place to be successful with school re-entry. Together as responsible students and teachers, and one family we will make our school a safe, secure, and healthy place for all of us.

Dear students, keep in mind that the Future is now and what you do today will determine and affect your future. It means that your future and your destiny depend on what you are doing today. I believe everyone is talented in their own way and you all have your own great God-given unique potential. Hence, believe in yourselves, always dream high and fly towards your dreams.

Besides, we all know that the pandemic and lockdown of education institutions has caused major interruptions in your learning cycle. Now with re-entry to your school, you should have proper planning, arrangements and set clear and achievable goals for yourselves. Because if you have concrete planning, you are already on the road to success and prosperity.

A fresh and healthy mindset is also important. Despite how well you have planned, you should have the tenacity to accept failure. In some aspects, you may fail and become frustrated, but never give up and have persistence. Don’t forget your dream and goals and the reality that you still can have a smart choice which is to learn from the failure and find out the solution and then overcome it when it appears again.

Dear students, we comprehend how great pressure you have faced because of the pandemic and you are facing now too, but we always help you and stand by you. We will bestow ourselves, how about you? I hope we will appreciate the efforts the staff members and teachers paid and make better use of these school supporting measures to analyze and explore your talents in studying and learning something new.

Indeed, our school mission is to provide a quality education so you can explore your talents in different forms and develop different perceptions. I am happy to share with you that this summer our students have excelled in different extra-curricular activities and I appreciate their contribution to the community and you all should take them as your role models and participate in the coming activates.

Meanwhile, dear students, be self-disciplined and polite to everyone, to your instructors, your classmates, and your schoolmates, be sympathetic to the weak, say hello to everyone you meet every day, always show your smiles and concerns to people. We can aim for excellence, and meanwhile, we can live with love, respect, and concern. Dear student, I trust we can do it.

Thanks to all my colleagues, staff members and I think with their struggle and support, you will have a very pleasant and fruitful school life. Today is the first day we meet after long holidays and I felt glad to share with you my experiences and thoughts. Once again, be a warrior and be excellent. May God bless you all and help you in your future success. Thank you. In the end, an instructor will once again explain the important precautions and the school safeguards you all need to follow and become familiar with to make our campus a safe and healthy place.

You can read the school safeguards, precautions and policies in the given link below:

How to Welcome Students Back To School/College After Covid-19 with Policies, and Safeguards

Was the speech helpful? Please feel free to share your feedback in the comment section below. Moreover, check out the related articles in the given links below:

Welcome Speech for School Opening Day in English
Teacher’s Speech for School Opening Day in English – Motivational Speech
Anchoring Script | School/College Annual Day | Cultural Program | Compering Script

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Black Disney Princess Ride Replaces Splash Mountain and Its Racist History

The ride was closed last year because of its connection to a racist film. Disney overhauled it to focus on Tiana, Disney’s first Black princess, drawing praise and backlash.

Riders in a log flume raise their arms as they come down an incline.

By Brooks Barnes

Photographs by Todd Anderson

Reporting from Walt Disney World near Orlando, Fla.

In the summer of 2020, as a reckoning on racial justice swept the country, Disney said it would rip out Splash Mountain , a wildly popular flume ride with a racist back story.

Some people cheered, saying the move was long overdue: After 31 years at Disneyland in California and 28 at Walt Disney World in Florida, the attraction — with its animal minstrels from “Song of the South,” the radioactive 1946 movie — had to go.

But Disney also faced blowback. Last year, when Splash Mountain finally closed, someone started a makeshift memorial near its entrance — the kind that pops up at scenes of horrific crimes. Distraught fans spirited away jars of the water . More than 100,000 fans signed a petition calling on Disney to reverse its “absurd” decision.

Now, Disney is rolling out Splash Mountain’s replacement, which is based on “The Princess and the Frog,” the 2009 animated musical that introduced Disney’s first Black princess. The lighthearted new ride, Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, will open to the public on June 28 at Disney World, with a similar version expected to arrive at Disneyland by the end of the year.

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COMMENTS

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This script for school assembly anchoring balances respect, enthusiasm, and a smooth flow of activities, ensuring an engaging and successful start to the school day. Morning Assembly Anchoring: Begin by leading the prayer, followed by the pledge. Introduce segments like the thought of the day, school announcements, and news reading.
Welcome Speech For School Opening Day After COVID-19
Fortunately, with the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccination program, some countries have decided to reopen their educational institutes, schools, colleges, and universities under SOPS. In this article, we have written a welcome speech for school opening day after COVID-19, address, and message to students and parents by the principal.
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Policy Actions for School Reopening and Learning Recovery

Health and Safety

Modifying pedagogy

Essay: School reopening plans must meet safety, needs of students

Reopening schools amid the COVID-19 pandemic: Your questions, our answers

Responses from Heather Hough

Responses from Daniel Domenech

Responses from Emiliana Vegas

Responses from Michael Hansen

Reopening K-12 Schools During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Equity and Reopening Schools

COVID-19, Children and Transmission

Weighing the Risks of Building Closures

The Decision to Reopen

Implementing Mitigation Strategies

Recommendations

COMMITTEE ON GUIDANCE FOR K-12 EDUCATION ON COVID-19

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First-ever International Day of Play

Best Anchoring Script for School Assembly in English

Ideal Morning Assembly Script for Schools

The Essence of School Morning Assemblies:

Crafting a Perfect School Assembly Script:

Sample School Morning Assembly Script in English:

Structuring the Morning Assembly Script:

Launching the Assembly: How to Starting Anchoring Script?

Guiding Through Assembly Activities:

How to Invite or Call the School Principal in Morning Assembly for Speech?

Best Anchoring Script Sample for School Assembly

10 Expert Tips for an Engaging and Memorable School Morning Assembly

Concluding with Gratitude:

Some more example for the Best Anchoring Script for School Assembly

More Tips for School Assembly

Related Posts

Welcome Speech For School Opening Day After COVID-19 – Principal’s Address And Message to Motivate Students

Welcome Speech For School Opening After COVID-19

Related posts

Black Disney Princess Ride Replaces Splash Mountain and Its Racist History

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