 Aloha and welcome to this Think Tech Hawaii show on Thursday, August 16th, 2021. You are watching the State of the State of Hawaii. I'm your host, Stephanie Stahl Dalton. Our show topic today is about education. Education in the pandemic and its effect on Hawaii schools, classrooms, and students. Well, parents and teachers too actually. So everybody gets the same hit and the same success when it happens. So this show also takes questions from the public, which you would, and viewers. So you should send in your question now. And I want to screen for any that might come in. And it also responds to those that have already been received to get to reach out and connect with the viewership. The questions are from parents and students concerned about education and schooling because of the pandemic and because of other things too. So parents and public do know what their students need to learn over every day and year of their growing up. And they want to know what education is learning to make post pandemic classrooms when our time comes in all schools better for everyone. So we're still in it and we might be in it for a while longer, but it will eventually get better. We all hope. So what parents ask, for example, is in the first question. So we can look at the question listing. Parents ask how do students learn collaboration, resilience, responsibility. These are the skills that the workplace is demanding and that our students have missed in the past 18 months of no school open. What are schools going to provide? So for the past, as is mentioned in the question, 18 months, most American students lost the socializing experience of school, critical academic learning time and the benefit of teacher and student affiliation due to the school closings or participation in completely in online or virtual schooling. Now, we all know the pandemic plateaued and we looked forward to gaining some normal time again and maybe return to the normal schedule of schooling and life. Then and then the cases increased recently and Hawaii's health care is again in crisis with effects on our schools. So what do we know about this pandemic in Hawaii briefly? The community transmission level of COVID is high for every island except when I where it's substantial. So it's just below high. So last Friday, Hawaii reported to the talk of everyone over 1,000 cases, new corona cases and there were 1,167 and then there was sadly one new death. So on Oahu we have 837 cases and on Hawaii Island we've got 151 and Maui has 109, Kauai has 48 and Molokai has 6. Then there are 18 residents identified out of state. So what's really important to know is that about 61% of Hawaii residents are fully vaccinated and I was hoping that that was higher, but I guess it's going to climb as people take advantage of the opportunities to get vaccinated. But let's look at Hawaii's public and private schools reports of COVID data and their policies about it. First of course, I wanted to mention that on August 5th, the governor announced that all state and county workers would need to be vaccinated. So we have a mandate and if they don't vaccinate then they will undergo weekly testing and that's at their own expense. So that would apply to teachers and staff members as well, education staff members. So we recall that Hawaii gave teachers essential worker status in January, fortunately and correctly and that teachers could be vaccinated and many many were vaccinated with the first wave of vaccinations here in Hawaii at Blais don't end out at the at the Aloha Tower for the Pfizer and Moderna at Blais don't. But now at Hawaii's 257 public schools, the state has about 163,000 students who are not currently required to be inoculated unless they are involved in high school athletics and of course the young ones in the grades are not eligible for vaccination. Now at private schools, they like their public counterparts have worked hard to implement extra pandemic protocols all along and these include requirements for face masking, proper hand hygiene, staying home and social distancing were social distancing were possible. Now a month of private schools requiring a vaccine is the Elani school where all eligible students, faculty and staff must be vaccinated or ask for a health or religious exemption Elani spokeswoman Michelle, he said the faculty and staff already have a 99% vaccination rate while eligible students in the upper school that's grades seven through 12 or at 95%. So the school isn't requiring lower school vaccination because they would be in eligible for a shot. All eligible students and employees are required to either be vaccinated or to test on a weekly schedule. We have also they say implemented a vaccine requirement for all students participating in inter scholastic athletics with the exception of medical and religious exemptions. So at Putahoe more than 90% of their faculty a 12 faculty are vaccinated and more than 85% of eligible students those are the older levels are vaccinated too. So at Island Pacific Academy in Caballet faculty staff and administration are being required to receive COVID-19 vaccination or undergo weekly testing according to the school's newly released health and safety plan. As for the students the school strongly recommends they receive a vaccination if and when they become eligible. So the fact of the matter is that not every school has a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. Those that do not are Mid-Pak Institute which started classes October 9th. The school spokesperson Kevin Whitman said the faculty at Mid-Pak has a 97% vaccination rate Mid-Pak did not need to mandate vaccinations because their incredibly high vaccination rate is there. So at Kamehameha schools all campuses and preschools have returned to full person and in-person instruction after nearly a year and a half and there is no vaccine mandate at the schools. At St. Louis school there's also no such mandate. The faculty is already 95% vaccinated while the school is still trying to determine the vaccine rate for its student body of nearly 900. All right let's look a little bit closer into Hawaii's pandemic classrooms. Those are classrooms in the pandemic which have now social distancing and masking in place. So first we've seen many photos of COVID mitigation efforts in the schools where students are socially distanced, masked and have rules about inside-outside and hand washing and the like following Governor E. Gays urging people to take personal responsibilities, taking personal responsibility for their health. So what does that mean? The next slide is the slide of the yes world history class. In this slide of world history class we don't see actual masks and social distancing distancing but we can fill in the blanks but we do the effects of these rules guiding and limiting student behavior in the classroom as it was in years here to four certainly not recently although some may have seen this but the rules in the slide that the teacher is going to on the first day are guide and limit are there to guide and limit students but the slide but those imitate and give rise and they rise to create the same effects that responsible protections urged by the government it seems. So those those responsive protections are of course to reduce interaction among people with students to social distance in the classroom organizations of rows and columns and and also to mask and cover the face. These rules meant to control students interaction engagement in community for the purpose of increasing concentration which they believe would help to be to be increased by silence and close attention. It is the kind of setting what's thought to promote the best and highest level of individual learning. We've come to refer to this more as a model called the cemetery model of classroom organization because it is so silent and it is so organized in rows and columns just like the cemeteries are and there is no interaction at all in the cemetery model. Some of you may have parents that recall experiences in this sort of classroom social organization. As you know today some students under Medicaid using the mitigations find that masks are hard to breathe and the little ones are wonderfully brave to to work on getting that to to be okay for them and they're also hard to talk through so they are a little more quiet than maybe under the ordinary circumstances. Social distancing from three to six feet has students align like checkers on a board which constrains their interactivity and collaboration but these mitigations are really necessary to everybody's health now and as long as COVID is going to stay around it looks like it is for a while. So as you as you well know and have experience no doubt the classrooms have left today's classrooms have left behind the cemetery model of classroom organization we saw in the world history class and developed into a much more active and engaging activity setting for teaching and learning. Look at slide two the final cartoon that draws a picture of 30 students 24 to 30 students engaged in a variety of differentiated activities and what was considered and what was considered an ordinary kind of classroom social setting for today's schools. Um for for um if we take a look at this um in the class oops in that classroom organization we can see um that that there are numerous multi-level activities tasks and materials to support student learning interaction transaction and allow teacher and student engagement in small in small groups small instructional groups with fewer students than the whole class to to really focus in on on higher level thinking and critical thinking. The teachers moved away from traditional classroom organization to these kinds of more socially responsive settings and those that is just one variation of numerous ways teachers are socially organizing their classrooms but parents ask a second question I have on the the first question one the second question that parents ask is do schools want students to be creative and find their voices discover their passions what about academic learning goals effective communication in social settings and in academic writing and speaking. I think that that final that slide two with the cartoon slides show students interaction movement collaboration and engagement one classrooms um are more socially organized which most of our classrooms have been the schools providing such settings for classrooms to develop the student skills just as the parents asked um but the concern is that currently distancing social distancing practices may be inhibiting this level of um complicated more complicated more complex student participation at all grade levels and the advantages of this way of being in classrooms is is a tremendous support for teachers to have all other interaction supporting the work that the teacher's doing with students in various ways. So looking at the the show slide the slide three it's called big comparison in contrast so we can look at these two classrooms now the world history classroom of yesteryear and the more modern socially organized classroom of today this classroom diagram shows the two bottles with students placement as access um with social distancing separators and masking imposed on any classroom arrangement there are consequences for students learning opportunities in the diagram students can engage and interact and use um in the diagram of today's classrooms that they engage interact and use social and academic language according to their tasks and activities needs and requirements and uh in in the yesteryear or yesterday's classroom as you look at that diagram you can see that they're limited as to the movement in the interaction and and the collaboration but with anyone but someone close to them and these are opportunities lost that the newer version of social organization and classroom provides for students and for teachers to take advantage of for their students. Well what else do we know and um see in pandemic classrooms um we see virtual digital or online learning serve as the main frame of teaching in pandemic classrooms some students are engaged in in this work well and and do much of it at home but does online digital activity virtual all of you use of computers replace rich classroom settings with peers and teachers so one parent answers that question on the on the question one slide the parent comments with with the pandemic what the pandemic showed me is that my child did better with the homeschool program versus virtual teaching that became distant and boring as parents we sacrificed tried our best to teach and guide during pandemic during the pandemic if anyone deserves a bonus it's not the teachers it should be those parents they cared for their kids while students were closed I was um while the schools were closed I think that it's important to notice this parent is using um these words to describe the virtual teaching experiences making students feel distant and also students feeling bored so how can technology as we're going on here and it might be for a while how can technology be more encouraging of engagement with peers and teachers and what strategies and and tactics can can we use and also how to make sure the activities are compelling maybe that's something that technology does have a leg up on but how do we learn more about making virtual online as dynamic as possible for all students learning so parents also ask um on on question number four which is on the first page again is that the parent cites all of these programs um which um the parent considers corporate interests and says we need to consider you know the 20 percentary education p-21 common core and what for what what are these electronic pass passants but we need to consider the limiting nature of um subjects academic subjects shaped by corporate interests yes students are not readily afforded credit bearing work opportunities in high school to accomplish that task more links between schools and communities must be established for example if there were an unused an unused restaurant on on state land closed to a public high school the restaurant should be made available to the school in order to provide credit bearing work opportunities in the restaurant in industry such uh link thinking is required to offer more academic experiences in public high school especially so if if we are to continue in virtual schooling which i i fairly am certain we are with or without the pandemic we do need for virtual online learning to support these kind of goals and provide those circumstances for students to enjoy and learn from in the classroom um if it's by computer stim simulations um of such setting for students to work in or are we going to have more virtual reality needs met in our home schooling and or public classrooms so the next question is about what parents and public the public say they want in their schools and classrooms so if you can show question number two scan please readers comments are most people in hawaii now have a new appreciation for teachers that's good parents principles and teachers are working together probably closer than they ever have before as such we are in an optimal moment to look closely at our public education system and further develop our strengths as we discard the baggage that prevents us from providing a 21st century education to our p21 students i think this is interesting that parents know what they want and their standards are high and their goals are huge for their youngsters and they want the schools to deliver on these objectives parents also ask the question number six what does innovation in education look like so are we going to operate on yesterday's crisis or look forward to making significant changes so once again they're setting up those goalposts and taking them beyond the end of the field to make schools reach bigger the bigger picture and as long as social distancing and other of the mitigations are in place they may hinder hinder the human exchange and and transactions in classrooms but maybe technology has ways to help bring this along and it's it is important to continue to explore how to include as much as possible what we know the social context for learning can supply for teaching and learning in today's classrooms so another parent comment about what is to be done is the talk about the parents saying the talk about reinventing and transforming education really bothers me everything about education that needed to be invented has been invented and finessed a long time ago all we need to do is copy from the nation in schools that send the greatest numbers of graduates to the world's most academically rigorous university such as MIT Caltech and all the rest of the global institutions now this is this is without recognizing the transformation in teaching and classroom organization that we've already discussed and we have improved the work for all students and we know we certainly do know that imitation of what these other institutions do is one of the great instructors and the parent identifies excellent models and for teachers and policy makers to find matches in of programs and activities and and strategies to to meet the the US needs and Hawaii's needs especially so let's talk about the last question how do parents get what they want in Hawaii schools so the parent comment that leads to this question last one is that on top of all that we've already had to say we have resources given the news this week that that we can use grant money there's lots of grant money coming into Hawaii and the other states from the federal government so the federal funding Hawaii received recently includes federal allocations through the cares act of about 227 million dollars for the department of education and an additional 51 million dollars is coming from the governor the governor's allocations the lat the latest batch of federal funding to be distributed to the department of education is 412 million dollars under the american rescue plan elementary and secondary school emergency relief fund this is called esser this is a total for Hawaii of 690 million dollars more information is on the department's website and more information should be shared once it has been processed through that bureaucracy and made available to the schools in addition in on April 22nd 2020 Hawaii was awarded over nine almost 10 million dollars in federal relief funding which govern governor egay used to form the governor's emergency education relief advisory group the relief group it's called gear and this group he is he said designed to collaborate and design Hawaii's approach to reinventing and transforming education during this challenging time we are looking to fund programs he says that inspire and promote innovation and education and i think that fits right into what Hawaii does well when when it is released from impediments like the mitigation that is in place now but we can do even better with that and once we're free of that this these resources are really precious for making things happen in the way that we've talked about throughout this little chat and certainly for technology because to make technology meet the needs of our students and teachers in our schools it takes money it's expensive to develop those programs and software and get what it is that this this state students really need so keep an eye on the us department of education's website as well as looking at what governor is doing and the board of education on the website there too and let's read the reports and we'll get back and talk more about what's going on with these enormous resources that may be more than Hawaii has seen in a long long time so the pandemic stimulates thinking and action for innovation the advantage of us education in every state is of course that it's open to everyone the advantage of federal funding can make new insights become innovations and available to everybody including technology for all students benefit especially when the budget is there to do it well so it's aloha time for this this show and I'll wrap it up thanks so much for your attention and for all of the questions that have been available I am Stephanie Stoll Dalton hosting for the state of the state of Hawaii I'll see you next week seeing I'll see you in two weeks on Monday two weeks so mahalo everyone