Education
One Challenge To Reopening Schools: Finding Enough Teachers
Just after Thanksgiving, Falmouth High School Principal Mary Gans got a call: the school had a positive case. Twelve of her staff members were considered “close contacts” and had to quarantine immediately. “I just [did] not have the ability to cover all of their classes, even for the rest of the day,” Gans said. “There just weren’t the…
Read More‘As Scary As A Virus In Some Ways’: Mental Health Concerns Grow As Remote Schooling Continues
Across the country, there are middle and high school teachers begging their students to turn on their Zoom cameras. You can read their angst-ridden posts on Twitter and Facebook. I can hear their pleas coming from the laptop in my 14-year-old son’s bedroom (he rarely turns on his camera, by the way). The frustration and…
Read MoreThese Youth Mentors Search For Students Gone AWOL In A Pandemic
John Williams, who works on behalf of the public schools in Brockton, wanted to know why 16-year-old Glen hadn’t logged into his remote classes since the school year began in September. So he called Glen’s mother, who said she’s tried and tried to get her son out of bed and online, but he won’t listen.…
Read MoreEarly Indications Suggest Far Fewer Rural Maine Students Looking To Attend College
Between remote and hybrid classes, the pandemic has drastically altered education for high schoolers this fall and left many students and parents frustrated and dissatisfied. And those feelings could be having a major impact on how many students — particularly those from rural Maine — may choose to go on to college. As the school…
Read MoreMed Schools Are Seeing A Surge Of Applications. It’s Called The ‘Fauci Effect’
When COVID-19 restrictions reduced his work schedule, Sam Smith turned to another time-consuming task: applying to medical school. He’d always wanted to go into medicine, Smith said. But what was happening in the world had a big impact on the kind of medicine he hopes to practice. Now, Smith said, he wants to specialize in…
Read MoreHow One Student Juggles Work, College And A Pandemic
For a few days each week, Josh Knight goes to class on the subway. He has to: he’s on his way to work at the Charlestown YMCA. But he’s also a first-year student in the honors program at Framingham State University. It means that even as he boards an Orange Line car bound for North…
Read MoreTeens Fight For New Climate Change Curriculum in Massachusetts Schools
Every week, more than a dozen student activists from around Massachusetts call into a Zoom meeting. Behind them are glimpses into their lives – superhero posters and hot pink bedroom walls. “OK. So do we want to start off today’s meeting with an agenda?” asked Nico Gentile, the 17-year-old climate organizer running today’s meeting. The…
Read MoreNew Hampshire’s Private Schools See Uptick In Interest During Pandemic
The coronavirus pandemic is creating major problems in public schools in New Hampshire. But the picture for private schools is different. Most independent schools are reopening in person, and as NHPR’s Sarah Gibson reports, interest in At Building Block Commons, a private school in Exeter, farm animals are a major part of the morning routine.…
Read MoreAs More Four-Year Colleges Flip Online, Some Students Take A Second Look At Community Colleges
Sara Maria, the daughter of a school custodian in Ludlow, Massachusetts, didn’t receive as much financial as she needed last spring from her dream school, Syracuse University. “I was actually looking at it since my freshman year of high school,” Maria, 18, said. “I want to go into marketing and business management and communications, and…
Read MoreA First Day Of School Like No Other — Some Schools In Northern Maine Resume Classes
While most schools in Maine are still putting the finishing touches on reopening plans for September, a few communities in northern Maine that have to schedule a break for the potato harvest have already reopened this week. As part of Maine Public’s series, Deep Dive: Coronavirus, Robbie Feinberg visited one of those districts in Aroostook…
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