***"Schoolhouse Locked" is three-part series examining the links between the COVID-19 crisis, education, and their outcomes for the Homelander Generation.***
In Part One of this series, I explained the link between the today's Homelander Generation (born 2005 to the present) and yesterday's Silent Generation, as part of the ARTIST generational archetype. Part One focused on employment outcomes for the Homelanders in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis. Part Two focused on social outcomes for the Homelanders who are quietly entering the public consciousness. Part Three is an examination of educational outcomes for Homelanders after a year of interrupted in-person school time.
Homelanders have been at the epicenter of the COVID-19 education crisis, as the majority of children (ages 16 and under) were enrolled in public school when national and state shutdowns began to require school closures in March 2020. This alone was an unwelcome disruption to the lives of many Americans, and school students in particular. There's a reason that truancy laws require consistent attendance at school, and 180 days--about half of a calendar year-- are the minimum mandated for public education in most states. But when those "two weeks to slow the spread" became an entire year or more of disrupted education, it was clear that COVID was going to have a very big and long-lasting effect on Homelanders.
WHAT HAPPENED?
So, what was school like for Homelanders in these last twelve to fifteen months?
At first, no one knew how long the shutdown would last, but no one wanted to admit that the school year was effectively over either. So America had the "pivot to digital learning." Classes were translated into Zoom meetings, packets of work were delivered via online platforms "generously" provided by Big Tech and Big Textbook (or in paper form, by an actually generous teacher bringing them to your house), and districts emptied out their inventory of laptops and portable routers to loan out in a desperate move to keep learning going. Or something.
It didn't work.
A kind critique would call it "well-intentioned, but glitchy". The Zoom meetings got "bombed" (interrupted by trolls or outsiders). The online platforms were incompatible with family-owned devices, when there were enough of them to go around (plenty of parents were using computers to work from home at the same time-- including the teachers themselves!). The assignments seemed irrelevant, and no one could figure out what was graded or not. After about a month, everyone started to get the idea that school was basically over for the year, and once formal announcements were issued, Americans gave up. There would be no clubs, no sports, no prom or passing around yearbooks, and probably no graduation ceremony.
Summer passed, a fever of fear, mask debates, violent protests, and tense campaign rhetoric.
America asked, Would there be school again this fall? In-person?
For some, the answer would be a qualified yes. Schools that did reopen had new COVID-19 Safety Protocols, issued by their local school boards and informed by a wide variety of inconsistent information and insufficient data. District leaders had to delicately cherry-pick among the recommendations and figure out a way to implement them (and budget for the cost). This could mean any of the following: mandatory masking for anyone over age 2, increased deep-cleaning of facilities, 6-foot or 3-foot social distancing in the classroom, plexiglass separators around desks, new air-scrubbing devices, temperature checks, sample COVID-19 testing, lunch in the classroom, closed school libraries, a "bubble", hybrid, rotation, or staggered schedule at school, no outside school supplies (to reduce viral transmission from home), no school sports, bell covers or plastic tents for wind instruments in band class, and no water fountains. Oh, and lots and lots of hand sanitizer. And if there's a positive COVID-19 case in the school? Quarantine and shut down-- maybe the class, maybe the cohort, maybe the whole school.
For others, the answer would be an argumentative no. In some cities, teachers protested being put on the front lines of the pandemic, their lives presumably at risk from this unknown, mysterious disease. Florida's statewide teacher's union sued the state to prevent mandatory openings. San Francisco sued its own school district to prevent schools staying closed. In New Jersey, the parents sued the school districts to get schools open again. Chicago teachers refused to show up when ordered to do so by the city. And so forth, and so on, in communities across the nation. Demonstrably, no one trusted each other to make the right call-- a true hallmark of the Crisis Era.
Meanwhile, last year's stopgap (digital learning) was becoming a permanent fixture. As of March 2021, some school districts still hadn't returned to full-time, in-person learning (find an up-to-date district map here). That's right-- a full year of doing school via a computer, by yourself, in your house. Moreover, some parents were choosing virtual learning over fears of virus transmission or concern about staggered schedules.
Now it's June 2021, and as the school year draws to an end, we have to ask: What are the long-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic protocols? How will these interruptions and changes to the traditional model of K-12 education affect college and career outcomes for Homelanders?
BACK TO THE FUTURE
In ten years, I think Homelanders will look back on this time in history with mixed feelings.
One one hand, it's likely that they'll have some appreciation of the decisions made by their parents and grandparents in an effort to keep them safe. Just like the Silent Generation was constantly reminded of the impending dangers of World War II, the Homelanders will understand that great sacrifices were being made to keep them healthy in the midst of COVID confusion.
However, I think the oldest of them will understand that these decisions had far-reaching effects, not all of which are positive.
The learning loss that has occurred due to certain states and cities keeping school digital-only for a year could result in widening gaps between well-resourced and poor families. While wealthier and well-educated parents can help close those gaps over time with private tutoring, summer camps, and dinner-table homework help, poorer families may not have those options or abilities. Poorer students may have struggled to get access to digital learning devices from the beginning, or may have been tasked with earning income or babysitting younger siblings to help the family make ends meet during the shutdown.
The economic effects of the shutdown and soaring inflation, if it continues, could exacerbate these trends. Likewise, children with IEPs and special accommodation needs may have lost access to those resources or effective alternatives during the shutdowns. As I discussed in Part Two, Homelanders have been conditioned to notice and care about these differences-- and they're going to be inclined to do something about it.
No doubt this will influence the careers they choose. In Strauss & Howe's Generations, the authors discuss how the Silent Generation was drawn to the "helping" professions: "teaching, medicine, ministry, government"*). Although the increase of vocational education is on the rise (as discussed in Part One) and college enrollment is currently trending downward, I have no doubt that higher and secondary education will continue to be transformed to accommodate new pathways to helpful careers such as these (and perhaps a few that haven't been invented yet).
Moreover, I believe Homelanders have also learned that technology does not automatically make everything better, and the human touch has meaning that cannot be numbered. Where the G.I. Generation put value on things being uniform, numerical, and orderly, the Silent Generation understood that starched shirts are uncomfortable, quality can defy quantity, and chaos in some form is always inescapable. The skills to negotiate the uncertainties of life may be soft, but they are important-- and necessary.
When the Crisis Era is over, the Homelanders will be here, ready to watch, listen, and help us rebuild trust again.
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*Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584-2069 by William Strauss and Neil Howe, p. 285.