Individualized Choices in Unjust Contexts

• In Event: The Ethics of Pandemic Learning Pods

Abstract

This participant will share some insights from an emerging study of parents’ home learning practices and choices in the pandemic. Drawing on interviews with parents in one Colorado district, she’ll describe how parents negotiated their potential choices to participate in learning pods, including how they framed, understood (and agonized over) the equity concerns raised by these choices. Most parents were aware --and deeply conflicted about--how their choices exacerbated existing disparities in their district. Yet, rather than organizing for more systemic supports, parents pursued primarily individualized decisions, often under conditions of great strain. She argues that the inability of the district to organize more equitable and supportive options for parents was a missed opportunity, and problematic from a standpoint of justice. Drawing on these insights, she suggests that district-sponsored, smaller-scale in-person learning communities could better meet the challenges of pandemic schooling.

Author

• Terri S. Wilson, University of Colorado Boulder