What makes school reopening so challenging to cover?

Four education journalists explain what makes one of the nation’s biggest stories so difficult to cover. 

By Alexander Russo

The safe return of kids and teachers to real-world classrooms is one of the most pressing issues facing the nation, right up there with the COVID-19 pandemic’s widespread health and economic effects.

Eight months after schools shut down, a large number of students in America are still learning remotely. By most accounts, the remote approach still isn’t getting the job done, especially for vulnerable kids

Where are schools reopening, full time or otherwise? Has it been safe for students and adults? What can we learn from the places where reopenings are going better — or worse — than expected?

For education reporters and editors, reopening schools is a huge issue, full of logistical, financial, and political ramifications.

“It’s definitely up there on this beat, the reopening and who’s having surges or outbreaks,” said the Wall Street Journal’s education editor, Chastity Pratt, in a recent phone interview. “That is the story right now. It’s at the top of the list.”

At the same time, this is an especially challenging story to cover, made harder by what appears to be a surge of new infections.

“It’s definitely up there on this beat, the reopening and who’s having surges or outbreaks. That is the story right now. – Chastity Pratt, education editor for the Wall Street Journal

 

This is a story that cries out for data, yet there are no good numbers for two key aspects of the reopening debate: the number of kids who are back in school, part time or otherwise, and the number of kids and school staff with positive test results for COVID-19.

The federal government has not taken the lead in tracking the figures, and nongovernmental tracking efforts are limited in size and approach.

“There is no one-stop shopping national database showing us how many school districts are in virtual and how many are in person,” notes the WSJ’s Pratt, who edited a story on districts reopening that came out earlier this week. Pratt says she made sure that the piece addressed “what we know and what we don’t know” about participation numbers and infection rates.

For in-person learning, the available estimates all lack the comprehensiveness that reporters would like before they write about what’s happening. Ditto for COVID-19 case numbers for students and school staff. There are still no nationwide tracking efforts or agreed-upon metrics.

Many of the same data availability and uniformity challenges also manifest at the state and local levels. “Everybody does it a little differently,” said the Arizona Republic’s Lily Altavena about district reporting practices that her paper has been turning into a database. “Some districts have dashboards, which differ. Some update once a week, some more frequently. Some include more information than others [in terms of whether they identify a student or individual, for example].”

“Everybody [reports the data] a little differently. Some districts have dashboards, which differ. Some update once a week, some more frequently. Some include more information than others.” – Lily Altavena, education reporter for the Arizona Republic

 

In terms of district plan changes, state policy revisions, COVID-19 case reports, and new research findings, the story is enormously complicated and fast-changing.

Many factors may have affected the process: The White House. Congressional inaction. Teachers unions. State governors and legislatures. Public health officials. Parents. Misleading research. Misleading journalism. Is it one story, or several?

It can be hard for journalists to figure out where to start and how to convey what’s happening. The addition of so many variations in learning formats makes things that much harder to grasp.

“There is no single answer to this question [of school reopening],” tweeted Washington Post national education reporter Moriah Balingit in a recent thread, listing factors such as reopening costs and parent preferences. “It is highly dependent on local context — including things like positivity and hospitalization rates and the strength of local testing and contact tracing.”

“The hard part of figuring out how many kids are in remote is that we’re in this point that it’s changing a lot,” said Altavena in a recent phone call. Some schools are reopening this week. In some places, more parents are keeping their kids home, voluntarily or based on a quarantine order. “I would love those kind of concrete numbers. But, realistically, it’s an incredibly hard number to pin down because it’s always changing.”

“The hard part of figuring out how many kids are in remote is that we’re in this point that it’s changing a lot. I would love those kind of concrete numbers. But, realistically, it’s an incredibly hard number to pin down because it’s always changing.” – AZ Republic’s Lily Altavena

 

At the same time, some journalists are also concerned about repeating themselves and losing or misleading readers.

“There’s only so many times you can write the story about schools opening or closing without readers starting to ask, ‘Didn’t I read that story last week?’ ” Pratt says. “You don’t want to bore people, writing the same story about a different school every day, like we saw with college reopenings.”

“Do you do a story every day, reporting that this school had that many cases and the other school had this many?” says Altavena, whose statewide beat includes 200 districts and 500 charter schools. “The answer is probably ‘no.’”

“You don’t want to bore people, writing the same story about a different school every day, like we saw with college reopenings.” – Chastity Pratt (WSJ)

 

In some ways, the school reopening story is sort of stuck, like a high-pressure system that just won’t leave. Lack of student access to the Internet, the need for food distribution additional resources for safety protocols, the special needs of vulnerable students — these are all issues that haven’t really changed much since March, noted US News education reporter Lauren Camera in a recent interview.

“All of those stories that we wrote in the first month or two are the exact same problems that schools are still facing,” says Camera, who took medical leave during the middle of the summer and came back to find herself writing the same stories. “How many times can you write the same story?” asks Camera — a sentiment that I heard several times from education journalists.

“All of those stories that we wrote in the first month or two are the exact same problems that schools are still facing… How many times can you write the same story?” – Lauren Camera, education reporter for the US News and World Report

At even the largest outlets, there are too few people available for the immense size of the story. National education teams are exhausted and understaffed. Some are going through leadership changes or sharing editors with other beats. In some places, reporters are forced to take time off each month to save budget. Journalists are exhausted, worried about their jobs, and overwhelmed by what they’re being asked to do.

“It’s so challenging right now,” says Camera. For months now, education reporters who are also parents of school-age kids have been trying to figure out how to do their full-time work and not turn into a full-time stay-at-home parent while they navigate the different education options that are out there for their own families. “It’s exhausting.”

Related: Journalists describe how they have overcome the challenges of covering the school reopening story.