It has certainly been an odd year for Georgia schools, teachers and students. It has been generations since schools, and their administrators, experienced disruption like that caused by COVID-19. They have had to make due with on-the-fly adjustments to lessons plans, schedules, technology and availability.
“Overnight, Georgia’s public schools transformed longstanding educational structures, forever changing how we prepare and deliver school meals, how we conduct bus routes, how we ensure the safety of our students in and out of school buildings, how we implement and leverage technology, how we counsel and console our students, and how we engage with our communities,” said Georgia Superintendent Richard Woods. “In these uncertain times, one thing has been certain: educators’ unwavering commitment to meeting the needs of Georgia’s 1.7 million students.”
It is also the kind of rare, shock-to-the-system that allows a look around and a review of the way things were done before. To that end, Superintendent Woods is proposing a new suite of reforms with the recognition that the old “normal” was not that great.
“Of course, we are all eager to go back to “normal” – to return to a time when handshakes and hugs fill our hallways and classrooms,” said Woods. “But there is a “normal” we should not and cannot go back to – a “normal” of data points determining destiny, scores oversimplifying a student’s worth, and blame and shame serving as the drivers of education reform.”
On Monday, Woods and the Georgia Department of Education released “A Roadmap to Reimagining K-12 Education in Georgia.”
The plan is a relatively simple 10 steps that has a few priorities:
- focusing on the whole child (meaning career planning, STEM or STEAM, arts, language and more);
- continued drawing down of high-stakes testing;
- adopting instruction aimed at the individual students rather than specific grade standards;
- a new accountability system for schools and a modernized K-12 funding formula;
- teachers that are “elevated, not demonized;”
- flexibility for every district, avoiding convoluted performance targets; and,
- a 21st century standard aimed at improving technology access for all schools across the state.
Woods is clear to say that this is not a shift in direction, but rather an opportunity further to build on what is already being done.
The Roadmap is not dense and something that will be very digestible even for busy parents. Only 8 pages, each of the 10 steps has a few recommendations or requirements that would seem to mostly be done at the school, or perhaps district, level. Whether there would be additional funding for some of these programs may remain up in the air. With a likely tight budget coming in the 2021 session, additional funding may be difficult to find but Woods is looking to reform whatever the outcome.
“What we cannot do is check these items off our list and consider our job done. There is work still to do, and our students deserve nothing less than our full efforts.”
To see the full plan: https://www.gadoe.org/External-Affairs-and-Policy/communications/Documents/A_Roadmap_to_Reimagining_K-12_Education.pdf
