Educators, stakeholders, moms and dads, and policymakers still wonder if remote knowing is working, how much knowing loss trainees will suffer, how schools can reduce the effect on students, and– maybe most pressing of all– what back-to-school will appear like in the fall.

When schools across the nation started closing down in-person instruction in March of 2020 in reaction to the COVID-19 virus, much of the nation focus relied on the influence on students.

Laura Ascione is the Editorial Director, Content Services at eSchool Media. She is a graduate of the University of Marylands prestigious Philip Merrill College of Journalism.

As schools finish up the 2020-2021 school year, researchers and executives at the not-for-profit NWEA are sharing predictions about the short- and long-lasting instructional effects we can anticipate to see.

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Back to school will not suggest “back to normal”: “If we expect back-to-school to be back to regular, then we missed the mark. Each student was affected by the pandemic in a different way so our approach to recovery should be as special as them. While the pandemic might be subsiding as more and more vaccines are offered, the long-lasting impacts of this past year are yet to be fully understood.

Back to school will not imply “back to normal”: “If we anticipate back-to-school to be back to normal, then we missed out on the mark. Each student was impacted by the pandemic differently so our method to healing must be as distinct as them. While the pandemic might be decreasing as more and more vaccines are offered, the long-term impacts of this past year are yet to be completely understood.