The Last Kid in the School: Teenagers are Staging a Quiet Boycott of Hybrid Education

~ Laura

The latest newsletter post is a re-write of this blog post…

As we walked through the strangely quiet streets of Manhattan last week, we were awed by the semi-permanent structures erected by restaurants to shield customers from the cold. Outside Chelsea Market, a Chinese restaurant installed an ingenious system of tubes that piped hot air onto the diners, who ate their pork dumplings in 20-degree weather. Those folks looked comfortable, so the tubes must have worked. 

The restaurant industry, despite draconian health and safety regulations, is serving customers — sometimes with jerry-rigged pipes – while our schools are losing students. 

Across the George Washington Bridge in New Jersey, my son’s school, like almost all schools in New Jersey and nearly half the schools in the country, is hybrid. To accommodate new cleaning regimens and small cohorts, students attend school for 8 to 12 hours per week and then watch their teacher and fellow students in little boxes on a Zoom call for another 10 to 14 hours per week. Kids with IEPs, like my son, get a little more time inside the school.

How’s it working out? Thirty students are normally enrolled in my son’s pre-calculus math class. With hybrid instruction, enrollment has been cut in half to 15 students, but today, the number of students in the room is one — my kid. My kid is the only student sitting in math class today. 

Read more here.

Published by Laura

26 thoughts on “The Last Kid in the School: Teenagers are Staging a Quiet Boycott of Hybrid Education”

  1. This sounds like a distasteful future that we aren’t even talking about here because there are literally 148 students being instructed in our schools (in addition to the day cares, where students do remote instruction. I can’t get numbers on those).

    NPR released a poll on schools: https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2021-03/topline_npr_parents_poll_03052021.pdf and a report https://www.npr.org/2021/03/05/973373489/npr-ipsos-poll-nearly-one-third-of-parents-may-stick-with-remote-learning

    in which a remarkable number of parents say they would like remote learning indefinitely:
    “On the other hand, fully 29% of parents told us they were likely to stick with remote learning indefinitely. That included about half of the parents who are currently enrolled in remote learning.”

    It boggles the mind. But, I think there is a significant market for assisted home schooling that’s being picked up on.

    In my kiddo’s first year I had a car conversation about the reason for schools. I think I might have asked him if he’d like to be homeschooled. He was vehemently opposed: he thought school an opportunity for kids to spend time with each other, to learn to interact, and to learn to get along in a community where they are all equals. And he was willing to give up learning content for that experience.

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    1. That 29% aligns well with the 20% of students, 12-18, who reported bullying in a recent nationwide survey.

      https://www.stopbullying.gov/resources/facts

      Socialization is fun if you are at the top of the heap, or have enough friends to shelter you. It is not fun when you are subject to the following:


      Being the subject of rumors or lies (13.4%)
      Being made fun of, called names, or insulted (13.0%)
      Pushed, shoved, tripped, or spit on (5.3%)
      Leaving out/exclusion (5.2%)
      Threatened with harm (3.9%)
      Others tried to make them do things they did not want to do (1.9%)
      Property was destroyed on purpose (1.4%)

      So, that’s not a remarkable number of parents. Teachers can’t be everywhere–and sometimes they assist the bullies. Often the bullies are teacher favorites. So, if you see your kid is happier at home, socializing with people they like, who like them, you may be willing to choose a method of teaching which shields your child from the negative effects of schooling.

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      1. Yes, this is part of the group. Whether those who find the social experience of school distressful (there are also a significant number of articles about students who experience racism in school, racism that influences their ability to learn including bias by teachers) will benefit in the longer run from avoiding the interactions is an open question, since we haven’t done the experiment in any substantial way. Say for example, nearly everyone has been “left out” (can’t imagine why only 5% report that — maybe because being left out isn’t significant to most?). But, we clearly need to learn to cope with being left out.

        I think there’s pretty good data that voluntary homeschoolers are still able to participate in society as adults (though some may be choosing homeschool purposely to avoid aspects of society and continue to avoid it as they become adults –i.e. cloistered religious home schooling).

        I also think that the poll results need to be interpreted with caution (what does “indefinitely” mean? and my kiddo says you can’t just ask parents, that they are bad at telling what their kids want and need). But, I think that we do need to think more about what “assisted home school” means and which children it is appropriate for. We have a home school elementary school in our district. Children are officially homeschooled, but can access some classes/activities at a physical school. There’s also a ed consultant (a former parent at my kids’ school) who helps HS families put together programs for their children (a mix of online, university, community college, and HS classes) curated for individual children (who are asynchronous in their abilities, social development, and potentially quirky, some with identified learning diagnoses).

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      2. bj said, “I also think that the poll results need to be interpreted with caution (what does “indefinitely” mean?”

        My suspicion is that “indefinitely” for most families means “2021-2022 school year.”

        Also, anecdotally, I keep seeing stuff online from people who are moving to escape their local closed schools. That means that there’s going to be less pressure on closed schools from those families, because they won’t be around anymore.

        I also have a misanthropic suspicion that a lot of people (both parents and teachers) who are SO SCARED! about in-person school are actually going to be living fairly normal lives real soon (in terms of outings and get-togethers) in other respects, if they are not doing so already.

        “We have a home school elementary school in our district. Children are officially homeschooled, but can access some classes/activities at a physical school. There’s also a ed consultant (a former parent at my kids’ school) who helps HS families put together programs for their children (a mix of online, university, community college, and HS classes) curated for individual children (who are asynchronous in their abilities, social development, and potentially quirky, some with identified learning diagnoses).”

        That maybe should be more widely available, although I suspect that schools will have a heck of a time keeping track of everybody.

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      3. @AmyP, I know of one family who chose to go virtual from their local school system, then headed off to the family ski condo for the pandemic. Rumor has it that others have made similar choices.

        In the past, a friend cobbled together a variety of online resources for her daughter who was training to get onto a junior Olympic team. It worked well enough for her.

        Of course, one might start to ask whether access to a “good school district” must be tied to living within a town’s borders, if families can access online school while traveling.

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    2. Yes, boggles the mind. I am so out-of-sync with those other parents. It’s just so sad. Kids need to be in schools. Kids learn more in a real school. It’s healthy for them to be around other people. But I don’t know how we can force families to reinvest in their schools. If kids don’t go to their local schools, public education, as we know it, will never bounce back. The biggest loser will be the kids who have learning or social differences and kids who don’t have parents who can supplement w/sports and tutors.

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      1. It would be wonderful to debate that in person. I can see both sides. If a child is happy at a school, making progress in class, if he or she has some friends, and is permitted to socialize with those friends, etc. etc., a school can be a healthy place.

        However, for many children it is not a healthy place. As adults, I think we forget much of what it is like to be a child. Adult society forces children to attend school. We adults would not put up with the current school day, as experienced by our children.

        This is also influenced by our own experiences as students, right? If we enjoyed school, it becomes harder to imagine that it might be torment for another child.

        My experiences as a parent have made me much more open to alternative school models. I think the model of huge high schools is not a good idea. Teach advanced subjects to students who are interested in them without grades. There’s a difference between teaching and ranking. Especially in districts with wealthy, educated families, learning takes a back seat to the college hustle. I’ve seen and heard of crazy, crazy things.

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      2. Cranberry said, “My experiences as a parent have made me much more open to alternative school models. I think the model of huge high schools is not a good idea.”

        I went to a rural high school with maybe 360 kids, and even that felt SO BIG.

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      3. Cranberry said, “My experiences as a parent have made me much more open to alternative school models. I think the model of huge high schools is not a good idea.”

        Not a good idea for my kid, either (we deliberately chose a small to mid-size High School).
        But I have friends with kids at one of the local mega-size HS (3,500 kids) – and they love it. They love the opportunities that a HS that size can provide in terms of options and extra-curricular activities. And they seem to be learning well.
        However, all are fairly self-confident kids, with strong social skills, and mid-range academic abilities.

        One-size doesn’t fit all. Some kids really thrive in the larger schools.

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    3. The WA post had an article on Asian parents keeping kids remote which then appeared on my twitter stream with folks reporting their anecdotal experience. The article mentioned concerns about racism (mostly among east Asian parents) and the number of inter-generational households (apparently 30%). I’d suspect, though, that a focus on content as the main point of school plays a role. The groups doesn’t usually home school, because they want the outside validation of grades/scores for ranking, but if they can get that with just classes?

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      1. Cranberry said: “Teach advanced subjects to students who are interested in them without grades. There’s a difference between teaching and ranking. ”

        I’m conflicted about this. I would have loved it, as a kid. But then I was pretty much an educational self-starter (in the subjects that interested me, or that I had any ability in). I did like the external validation of high grades. But it didn’t inspire me to work harder (perhaps I’m just lazy)

        I look at my kid and his classmates, and they seem to love the ranking system. There is huge competition to get A grades or above 90% in tests. And (in the subjects that interest him), my kid will put in additional work to get over that bar. I’ve actually seen him look at a test result, and work out what he has to do to get into the next grade range…..

        Boys (and I’m aware that this is a huge generalization) seem to be more competitive than girls.

        If he were not comparing his achievement against others, I doubt he would put in nearly so much effort.

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  2. bj said, “I think I might have asked him if he’d like to be homeschooled. He was vehemently opposed.”

    My oldest used to beg to be homeschooled when she was in the lower grades.

    I would tell her, “Homeschooling is for little girls who always do what their mommies tell them to do.”

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    1. My kid never asked for home schooling, but what a disaster that would have been if I were in charge. I think she definitely understood that. A key memory from our lives is parents trying to teach her simple algebra –if x+3 = 6, what is x, and having her literally break down in a temper tantrum screaming,”but, what is x” while melting into a puddle on the ground. She was in kindergarten, but clearly, we did not know how to explain what x was.

      Other kiddo, on the other hand, got it right away, when we told him x+3=6 means x=3 and x+2=6 means x=4 and enjoyed sitting there with a list of problems and finding x. I’d judge their HS math abilities similarly, so it was how they learned, not their ability to learn.

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      1. My kid also has regularly asked for home-schooling – but given that he refuses to learn *anything* from me, and learns much better from anyone else – it would be a “non-optimal solution”

        I have literally watched while his tutor explained a maths problem in almost exactly the same words and steps as I used, and he suddenly got it with her (while I had the blank wall of incomprehension).

        Really, what he means, is that he wants to stay at home and play computer games all day.

        Also, his engagement with online learning is pretty sporadic – he needs to be under a teacher’s eye – to make sure he’s actually producing an acceptable standard of work (in the subjects he doesn’t enjoy). Multiple times this week, I’ve gone to check on him, and found him gaming rather than doing school work.

        Anecdotally, from other parents of kids at his school, about 60% are in the same situation (less engagement with learning remotely). The rest either have more engagement with learning remotely (there are a few), or about the same (kids either do the work or don’t – but it’s the same in person or remotely).

        Also, any of the bullying (apart from the purely physical) will happen online – regardless of whether the kids meet in person or not. Girls are particularly bad at this – but some boys also participate.

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      2. Ann said, “I have literally watched while his tutor explained a maths problem in almost exactly the same words and steps as I used, and he suddenly got it with her (while I had the blank wall of incomprehension).”

        I’d generalize that to say that various messages sink in better to teen brains if voiced by a non-parent, even if it’s exactly the same message. This seems to be especially true at 13 and 14.

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  4. We homeschooled 2 children K-12, and, based on who they have met in college, there are a nontrivial number of well adjusted productive college students who also have some experience with homeschooling. But the type of homeschooling we did also would not have been available during the past year, as it relied heavily on community interaction and engagement with other homeschooled students.

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  5. The Oregon governor just ordered OR schools opened as of March 29 (elementary) and April 19 (6-12). Big news here on the West coast. A lot of OR is in the CDC yellow, so might open fully. Remote option is still promised, so I don’t know how it will pan out (see Laura’s reports on NJ).

    Also, the CDC has a pretty map now of zones: https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#county-view

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  6. Here’s what our kids’ school descided to do about Gov. Abbott’s lifting of COVID restrictions:

    –keep mask requirement, but say that kids (in grades where masks are required) need to wear masks indoors but not outdoors
    –masked and distanced parents are going to be allowed on campus again for events.

    (I’m not sure how they’re going to manage the “distanced” part.)

    They said that they thought that it would be unwise to relax mask rules immediately after spring break. They also said that depending on positivity and other factors, they may eventually drop the mask requirement.

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  7. I was just looking at the city and fancy suburban district COVID dashboards.

    The city has 2 cases total in a district of nearly 15k kids plus staff.

    The fancy suburb (8k kids plus staff) has 2 cases total in the grades up to 8th (PK-8) and 5 at the huge high school. (I’m pretty sure that the fancy suburb has a rapid testing program going on–they announced one in the fall.)

    This is in a county hovering around 20 daily cases per 100k and with 6% positivity.

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    1. Our district now has a COVID dashboard! No kid in school (pretty much), so I don’t know how to interpret it. But, there aren’t many cases.

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    1. Yes, that was a big topic at last night’s school board meeting. I don’t have a huge opinion on this, but I can turn into a blog post for y’all. I’m going out now, so I’ll have to do it later this afternoon.

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      1. Laura said, “I don’t have a huge opinion on this, but I can turn into a blog post for y’all.”

        That’s great!

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