Springfield Business Journal_2020-04-06

SPRINGFIELD BUSINESS JOURNAL · 9 APRIL 6-12, 2020 ACCEPTANCE LETTER Drury’s Kevin Kropf says the university is refreshing its college admission requirements. PAGE 10 EDUCATION Virtual Learning by Christine Temple · ctemple@sbj.net Without realizing it, Springfield Public Schools had been preparing for the corona- virus pandemic for nearly a decade. The largest school district in the state had invested several millions of dollars and countless hours developing online learn- ing platforms and course content. When district leadership chose to extend spring break for a week following the COVID-19 outbreak and subsequently moved school online May 30-April 24, the stage already had been set. “While we didn’t know we were plan- ning for a pandemic, we had taken steps for years to provide digital resources to our students and teachers, which puts us uniquely in a po- sition to be ready for this,” said Nichole Lemmon, the district’s director of digital learning. Nearly 25,000 students began online instruction in the past week; fueled by roughly 3,600 educators, support staff, administration and nutrition services per- sonnel. Additionally, during the week of March 23, 67,000 free meals were distrib- uted through drive-thru pickups at SPS schools, said Superintendent John Jung- mann, and 96% of students received a per- sonal call from a nurse, counselor or teacher to evaluate needs. “Our No. 1 focus is taking care of students during this time through relationships with them on a daily basis – keeping our teach- ers connected with our kids,” Jungmann said. “Once that is established, [we’re] continuing to have high expectations for learning.” Lemmon said the district began the conversation on digi- tal learning in 2012. That’s when it adopt- ed Canvas, an online learning management platform. Six years ago, she said students and teachers were equipped with their own laptops or tablets. “Nothing is from scratch because they have been learning these tools,” Lemmon said. “What they will find is a really robust system of virtual labs, virtual field trips, short videos and lots of interaction.” She said teachers have been asked to host three hours of conferencing, class meetings or small-group instruction daily. Students can work through their own assignments on Canvas, and every elementary student also was mailed a workbook developed over the past few weeks for offline activities. She said the cancellation of statewide assess- ments has relieved some of the pres- sure from teachers and students as the end of the semester nears. At Weller El- ementary School, Principal Rebecca Donaldson said the technologies being deployed for virtual learning are familiar to students and teachers. “We are far, far ahead of the curve,” she said. “Our teachers have been creating courses, doing discussion boards even all the way down to first grade. … The kids have always gotten onto Canvas during their in- structional technology time.” But not all students have the infrastructure See VIRTUAL on page 14 Years of investing in technology pays off for Springfield schools during COVID-19 pandemic Teacher Ralene Graves hosts a class through Canvas for her first-grade class. provided by REBECCA DONALDSON I feel like my entire career has led to this moment.” —Nichole Lemmon Springfield Public Schools John Jungmann : Students are receiving personal calls from staff members.