Responding to an Emerging Epidemic Through Science Education

• In Event: National Studies on COVID-19's Effects on K–12 STEM Education Reported by Teachers, Students, and Families

Abstract

The Responding to an Emerging Epidemic through Science Education (REESE) project is pursuing two related goals as the COVID-19 pandemic unfolds. First, the project is working with high school science teachers to create COVID-related curriculum materials. Second, REESE is conducting research on how teachers enact COVID-related materials in the midst of the pandemic. REESE data and analyses provide a close view of teachers’ experiences as they navigate the numerous challenges presented by the pandemic. This focused examination of a small group of teachers (n=8) complements the other studies featured in this symposium by helping to explain some of the larger scale trends surfaced by the national surveys.
The REESE team conducted a multiple case study with the eight participating teachers serving as individual cases. The teachers, who work across four schools in three US school districts, collaborated with the project to develop COVID-19 curriculum materials with the intent of enacting the materials in spring 2020 (as the virus spread through the US). As a part of the symposium, the REESE team will share key findings that emerged through case comparisons.
The participating teachers and their students were very interested in learning about COVID-19 and strategies for stemming spread of the virus. Teachers wanted to introduce learning opportunities for their students to better understand the virus and the disease; however, they also had to work through significant concerns prior to doing so. The teachers were concerned about sharing inaccurate information with students given the evolving nature of the pandemic and, for some, their own knowledge gaps associated with virology and COVID-19 more specifically. Teachers were also concerned about how COVID-19 instruction would interact with the trauma students experienced as they lived through its effects. The project provided supports for addressing these concerns, and all teachers were committed to enacting a series of COVID-19 learning activities that they had co-developed.
Despite universally high levels of enthusiasm for enacting COVID-19 curricula, district level policies emerged as the major determinant for if/how teachers used the materials with their students. All three districts transitioned to remote learning mediated by online platforms. One district maintained high expectations for student engagement in remote learning, and both teachers from this district enacted the full complement of COVID materials. This district served the most diverse student population including a high proportion of students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. The second district encouraged student participation in online learning but removed some of its grade incentives. The two teachers from this district enacted about half of the designed materials. The third district decided to make student engagement with new content completely optional. The four teachers from this district ended up not enacting any of the COVID-19 materials. Interestingly, this was the district serving the most affluent of the three communities and had made significant investments in one-to-one technology initiatives. In the symposium, the project team will discuss how teachers’ personal concerns interacted with district level policy decisions to substantively shape opportunities to learn in the context of COVID-19.

Authors

• Troy D. Sadler, University Of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• Patricia Friedrichsen, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Laura Zangori, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Li Ke, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill