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About 14% of U.S. public school students receive special education services. And as schools transition from the classroom to the computer, many of those students could get left behind.

(Image credit: Maria Fabrizio for NPR)

The United States is Leading the Humanitarian and Health Assistance Response to COVID-19

The U.S. government is leading the world’s humanitarian and health assistance response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We are mobilizing all necessary resources to respond rapidly, both at home and abroad. As part of this comprehensive and generous U.S. response, the State Department and USAID are providing an initial investment of nearly $274 million in emergency health and humanitarian assistance to help countries in need, on top of the funding we already provide to multilateral organizations such as the World Health Organization and UNICEF.

South Africa is now the epicenter of the pandemic in Africa, with more than 1,000 confirmed cases across the country’s nine provinces.

The coronavirus is taking a toll on New York City, including educators. NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to New York City Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza about how the virus is affecting the district.

Be realistic; be forgiving; remember to shake your sillies out. Education experts share tips for home-schooling during the coronavirus school closures.

Districts are scrambling to get remote learning lessons in place. But over half of students live near the poverty line, 14% have a learning disability, and some struggle just to find Internet access.

(Image credit: Chris Youssef for NPR)

A way to tap the wisdom and knowledge of our elders and keep our children from losing their minds.

Amid widespread public school and higher education closures, the Senate bill sets money aside for remote learning and gives Education Secretary Betsy DeVos new power.

(Image credit: Alex Edelman/AFP via Getty Images)

By Jenny Perlman Robinson, Molly Curtiss

For many of us, it has been a stunning experience to find ourselves adjusting our daily routines to take safety precautions to protect ourselves, loved ones, and neighbors.

In the midst of this global pandemic, we are reflecting in real-time on how systems undergo large-scale transformation—how government, businesses, schools, cities, and communities adapt and make fundamental changes to existing ways of working. This issue of systems change and, more specifically, how education initiatives scale and spread, is a topic that we at the Center for Universal Education (CUE) have been exploring in our Real-time Scaling Labs over the past year. These scaling labs—action research projects led by CUE and undertaken in partnership with local institutions across five countries—are an effort to learn how effective education practices scale across communities and countries. Through learning from, documenting, and supporting the process of expanding and deepening the impact of education initiatives around the world, the labs aim to develop concrete, practical guidance on key drivers that contribute to large-scale transformative change in education.

Prior to the spread of COVID-19, we had been reflecting with our partners on how difficult it is to change a system: Systems prefer the status quo and often require a crisis to transform. We are certainly watching this play out today—many countries have been slow to respond to the global pandemic despite significant data and advice from experts on what measures are needed—and have only leapt into action once the magnitude of the virus was apparent.

As the world grapples with responding to the current crisis, we are struck that some of the same key principles we have been studying in the Real-time Scaling Labs might also be relevant in responding to this pandemic. These include:

1. Iterative, adaptive learning. Flexibility and adaptive capacity are crucial at a time when events unfold rapidly, and households, communities, and leaders must constantly adjust to a new reality on a day-by-day basis. The situation has also brought to the forefront a deeper appreciation of the importance of reliable, high-quality, timely data for decisionmaking, while acknowledging the limitations of existing data in representing the true scope of a rapidly shifting crisis. At the same time, we are witnessing firsthand what behavioral science has long shown—that data alone are not always enough to spur change as attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors are deeply ingrained in people and institutions.
2. Engagement of multiple actors. This crisis has underscored the essential role of government in preparing for and responding to a crisis and ensuring that the basic needs of individuals, especially the most marginalized, are met. Now more than ever, the duty of government to provide social services, safety nets, and investments in global public goods is clear. At the same time, COVID-19 has also underscored that government is unable to address this crisis alone; managing a situation of this scope absolutely requires the collective efforts of actors across the system, bringing together non-usual suspects from the private sector, civil society, and community leadership to creatively collaborate. For example, to help millions of students continue to learn remotely while schools are closed due to COVID-19, China launched a national online learning platform for junior and senior high school students and broadcast primary school classes on public television. To make this digital solution work smoothly for millions of children at once, major telecommunications operators and technology companies collaborated with the government to back up servers and ensure sufficient bandwidth. And even before the platform was rolled out, Chinese tech companies had already been offering students free online courses.
3. Knowledge sharing and peer-to-peer learning. If ever there was a time to learn from one another and avoid repeating mistakes, it is now. We often say we are a global community, but the crisis has made these words all the more real. In some ways, COVID-19 has leveled the playing field; wealthy countries are unable to insulate themselves from a virus that does not respect borders or discriminate based on socio-economic status, gender, race, or religion. High-income countries have much to learn from the experiences of lower-income countries that have previously coped with the realities of massive displacement and crises such as the devastating Ebola outbreaks. At the same time, while COVID-19 can affect anyone, we do know its impact absolutely will discriminate. Those who are already furthest behind or marginalized are most at risk of suffering from this crisis—economically, physically, mentally, and educationally. During the Ebola crisis in West Africa, we know it was often girls who suffered the most, with spikes in teen pregnancy, sexual violence, and increased need to support family members, and consequent school dropouts and stigmatization. And we are seeing this play out firsthand in the schools in our own communities. My [Jenny] children in Connecticut were all given Chromebooks to continue their education virtually, while children in neighboring towns risk going hungry or losing critical physical and mental health services in the wake of school closures.
4. Innovation in education. One of the silver linings from this crisis may very well be reimagining what education can and should be in the 21st century. This may include the global community doubling down on investments to ensure continued educational opportunities in situations of instability and crisis, as well as further exploring distance learning possibilities. While technology will certainly play a role in reconsidering the possibilities for teaching and learning, especially in support of virtual learning opportunities, we also know that technology alone isn’t a panacea for future crises—and the risks of technology further exacerbating inequities must be addressed. The current situation provides an opportunity to think outside the box about how our education systems can best deliver quality learning opportunities for our children to survive and thrive in today’s rapidly changing and uncertain world.

The COVID-19 crisis is already having and will continue to have devastating consequences for individuals and communities across the globe, which must not be underestimated. At the same time, the crisis also provides a critical opportunity for us to learn more about the essential principles underpinning large-scale transformative change, as is needed in many education systems around the world. The hope is that we can come out on the other side of this pandemic with more evidence and lessons learned about how to expand the impact of effective social interventions and introduce new ways of working within our education systems to provide quality learning opportunities to all. In future posts, we will share stories from our scaling lab partners from around the world on how they are innovatively coping during this crisis to ensure that millions of children continue to receive an education.

       

A case will determine the extent to which religious groups are shielded from employee lawsuits.

Grab some earbuds, a mobile device and as many pillows as you can find. Here are five easy steps to making a great podcast from home.

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Those who have defaulted on their federal student loans will get a temporary reprieve from having their wages, Social Security benefits and tax refunds garnished by the federal government.

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To stop COVID-19, retired doctors are signing up to take clinical shifts. Specialists, including dentists, could move to front line care. And med students are fielding calls in overwhelmed clinics.

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COVID-19 has revealed compassion and courage and exposed human frailty and folly. A deadly virus that knows no borders and recognizes no divisions in the family of nations reminds us of our common humanity.

We have a deep desire for radical change because we see the broken path ahead.

As classes move online, many schools fear students with disabilities could be left behind, in violation of federal laws. The department calls this reading of the law "a serious misunderstanding."

(Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

The global health community is concerned that tuberculosis (TB) continues to disproportionately kill people living with HIV, despite the availability of TB preventive therapy. According to the World Health Organization’s Global Tuberculosis Report 2019, deaths attributed to TB among people living with HIV account for 17 percent of all TB deaths, even though people living... Read more »

The post How to prevent illness and death caused by tuberculosis among people living with HIV appeared first on Degrees.

During the outbreak, with schools closed, some districts are using bus drivers to deliver meals and a warm greeting, providing some comfort to students at their regular bus stops.

A Richmond, Va., mother talks about working from home and losing education services for her son with autism.

Superintendent Meria Carstarphen talks about coronavirus and school closures.