MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – A new survey is showing that people are mostly satisfied with how school districts are helping with distance learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, but there are still some issues being raised.
“”Schools weren’t planning for this any more than anyone else was…What we wanted to do was take a look across the state and get a picture of how that is going, how satisfied are parents, how are they receiving materials and things of that nature – from schools across the state,” says Dr. Will Flanders, “We actually found a very high satisfaction rate overall. About 83% of parents expressed satisfaction with how schools are providing materials for their kids.”
According to the statewide survey by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty – over 80% of respondents were also satisfied with the accessibility of teachers.
“Even though we do see some issues like getting new materials to kids and things of that nature, people are grading on a curve and giving the benefit of the doubt. At least in the short term,” Flanders says.
But the institute says there is concern about how much kids are actually learning.
“The most common response was between 11-20 hours, about 40% of folks said that. But a little bit less said they’re only spending about 1-10 hours on schoolwork a week,” Flanders says, “When you compare that to how much learning happens in a regular classroom, where you’re in school for 30 plus hours per week, brings into question the extent to which kids will be prepared.”
The survey also showed that about 16% of respondents have not covered any new material during the pandemic.
“These students are less likely to be prepared, they’re sort of missing out on half a semester of learning and it’s going to be really questionable if those kids are going to be ready to move on to a whole new set of material,” Flanders tells the WTAQ Morning News with Matt and Earl, “I think we’re going to see an even bigger gap, unfortunately, in the subsequent year as some of those problems we’re seeing over the summer are being expanded to several more months.”
About 9% of respondents say they’ve spent over $500 to supplement distance learning efforts. Flanders thinks those are mostly people who had to computers or tablets for online learning. But the survey also found that the lowest income respondents – making under $20,000 per year – were actually the most likely to have spent that money.
“These are the folks who can least afford to be spending money, also the folks who are most likely to have had their job impacted – and they’re having to go out and spend even more resources to provide educational materials and make sure students are ready to learn,” Flanders says.
That’s why the institute is proposing an emergency education savings account to help those families afford to keep their students on track for the time being.
“This would be a fund that would allow parents to use resources that would otherwise go to the district. With districts no longer open, there are some savings going on – not a lot because they’re still paying teachers – but some savings. Use some of that money and give it to parents for educational purposes,” Flanders says, “There’s an even greater argument for an education savings account to help parents cover some of these expenses. Let them take some supplemental classes, let them use that money to buy a new laptop and things of that nature to help their students stay on track when we already know there are going to be issues with keeping up.”
