PODCAST: Reinvesting in school improvement as a strategy for economic recovery from COVID-19
As school budgets were slashed in the wake of the Great Recession little more than a decade ago, the federal government funneled billions of dollars toward school improvement as part of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009.
With the global economy entering a recession brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, 爆走黑料 爆走黑料 Professor Min Sun says policymakers today would do well to learn from the past.
In a new podcast, Sun, who has studied the impact of $7 billion spent on School Improvement Grants starting in 2010, discussed why reinvesting in disadvantaged schools is a key strategy for economic recovery. Sun, director of the UW鈥檚 , recently wrote a offering lessons to policymakers.
鈥淪chool and district leaders are now understandably swamped with the tasks at hand, such as satisfying the basic needs of students and staff, and engaging parents and communities to plan school reopenings in the fall,鈥 Sun said. 鈥淗owever, we must not overlook the value of more strategic investments that help build schools鈥 long-term capacity. If we make strategic plans now, we may have both a better chance to recover from the disruptions of student learning this spring and even harness the power of new innovations and adaptations due to the pandemic for long-term benefits.鈥
Sun鈥檚 key lessons for policymakers are:
- Rebuilding our school system should be regarded as an investment in upgrading the basic infrastructure of our economy.
- Reinvestment should encourage bold innovations that build long-term capacity of public schools.
- Sustainable pathways should focus on rebuilding the educator workforce, using data to drive continuous improvement cycles, and from a systemic perspective.
to listen to more interviews with researchers, practitioners, community leaders and policymakers who are working to transform inequitable systems of education and make learning come alive for all students.
Contact
Min Sun, Associate Professor of Education
206-221-1625, misun@uw.edu
Dustin Wunderlich, Director of Marketing and Communications
206-543-1035, dwunder@uw.edu