Like It or Not, K-12 Schools Are Doing a Digital Leapfrog During COVID-19

School districts are beginning to craft their strategies for what teaching and learning will look like for the 2020-21 academic year and beyond. Despite widespread frustrations with the downsides of remote teaching and learning, many teachers are seeing how online learning can make it easier to move students in the same class at different paces and provide one-on-one feedback for struggling students, when they’re not all in the same physical space. Plus, students are getting more opportunities for independent, self-directed learning, and the emphasis during COVID-19 has been more on projects and completion than assessments that demonstrate aptitude. The question is whether those approaches will continue and maybe even expand once school buildings reopen, or whether teachers will revert back to the ways they used technology to teach before school buildings were shut down. How much will the traditions that define the American school experience change to accommodate new technology, and a much higher level of teacher tech skills, once the dust settles? The answer will depend largely on some of the same factors that perpetuated inequities before the coronavirus: access to resources and professional development opportunities; willingness and capability to experiment; support from federal and state policymakers to rethink long-standing conventions; and a willingness to invest in transformation.