It had been seven months since I had stepped into a school building with actual children inside actual classrooms. Seven months since I had walked down a hallway and heard students laughing during a lunch break. Seven months since I stood outside in inclement weather greeting students as they entered our doors.
This week my school returned to (semi) normal.
For months we had been preparing for this day. We actually started preparing for it the day after school ended for the summer. We always knew we would eventually be going back to in-person teaching, we just didn’t know when. Then the date was announced.
And I have had mixed feelings about it ever since.
In terms of facts, we know that the school system in this country was not built to withstand the sudden closures that occurred in the Spring. We also know that, while we did the best we could to ensure our students were getting what they needed, we ultimately came up short; the effects of distance learning will impact our already vulnerable student populations in many devastating ways. On any given day we would only get between 60-70% of our students online, and then they would only have live teaching twice a week. Not to mention the fact that our zip code had some of the highest incidents and deaths in the city during that time. It felt like every other day we were learning about another student’s family member that died. The worst situation was when a student’s father had died and the mother asked the staff not to mention anything about it because she couldn’t figure out how to tell her children (the couple was estranged). It truly felt like the twilight zone.
But even with all of this disparity, I still had trouble being comfortable with the idea of being back in-person. I know that in-person teaching is what is best for our students, but I was nervous to be in a school building while our world is still very much in a global pandemic. How would I get to work safely? How would my students who also take public transit fare? How would our students be able to socialize in a distant manner? Would they be able to play? Would I be able to meet with the teachers in my office? Would I have an office?
For five weeks these questions plagued my brain. I went from calm, to nervous, to confident, to panicked every other week. But my school was smart. They enlisted the guidance of health experts, they worked with other school leaders who were planning to open, they followed the news, and they didn’t make decisions too quickly. When I walked into the building two days before students were set to enter I felt ready. I was still a bit nervous and apprehensive, but I was ready.
Then Thursday came and we opened our doors to 20 nervous and apprehensive seventh graders. The “Stand Here” stickers on the ground helped each child and family member maintain a safe distance while we surveyed everyone to ensure they had filled out their “Wellness Check” form online before they left the house. For those who hadn’t, we pulled them to the side and asked them (or their parents if present) a series of questions about their recent health and took their temperature. The masks made it hard to decipher their facial expressions, but their eerie quietness spoke volumes. There were so many new protocols and procedures they had to learn, all while sitting in classrooms with significantly fewer students and desks that were six-feet apart. We watched them try to digest this “new normal”.
But then something beautiful happened.
On the second day, I sat in the back of a classroom and observed a teacher giving a lesson on the impact of colonization on Native Americans. A student raised her hand and said that she was confused. After the teacher clarified the point she had just made, she was about to continue on with the lesson but I paused her and asked the child, “So, from what your teacher just said, what do you now understand?” The student then made eye contact with me and slowly attempted to process the information out loud. At that moment, it became clear to me what had been missing in those last seven months. Regardless of all the zoom calls, regardless of all the work completed and submitted through online platforms, this moment illuminated for me what is lost when teacher and student are separated by a screen.
True connection and direct witnessing of student growth and understanding.
It may seem like an obvious revelation, but when your mind is plagued with fear, doubt, and uncertainty the obvious isn’t always so clear. “Pandemic fatigue” is real, and people are taking small risks every day to help them start to feel more like their old selves. We are going out to restaurants, visiting family and friends, even taking long trips to be closer to those we love. And one could argue that these calculated risks are necessary for our emotional well-being. For me, that 90-second interaction helped put all these choices and risks into perspective. It regrounded me and helped me to better understand why my school and others have tried so hard to make this work. We are still in the midst of this pandemic, and therefore we have to continue to be cautious and to be smart. But given the implications of what interrupted education can mean for thousands of Black and Brown lives, we also have to make sure that we are taking these same risks in order to prevent our children from falling further behind.
But even with safety, there can still be joy.
Teachers have created hand-washing videos where they sing the chorus of a Beyonce song in order to enforce the importance of washing for at least 20 seconds. One teacher, after sensing the anxiety of the room, took to dancing at the front of the class in order to lighten the mood. By the end of the week, the “new normal” felt more comfortable and more natural.
Caution is still necessary, and safety is paramount, but my hope has been reignited in seeing that we can do these things and still maintain our humanity. Being safe, learning, and having fun don’t have to be mutually exclusive, and for the foreseeable future, it is actually imperative that we figure out how to ensure they can exist together.
For the sake of our health and for the sake of our progress.
"But even with safety, there can still be joy." The tagline that needs to be at the forefront of every school.
As always, very well done, always look forward to this👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾😄