By PATRICK ADRIAN
[email protected]
CONCORD — New Hampshire officials are asking parents and educators to complete an online survey about remote learning and potential plans to reopen schools.
The School Transition, Reopening and Redesign Taskforce (STRRT), a group of state-appointed educational stakeholders, released the online survey to inform their recommendations to the governor and New Hampshire Department of Education regarding the return to schools once risks posed by the novel coronavirus pandemic subside. The taskforce held their first official meeting on Thursday, May 14, and are expected to submit their report on Thursday, June 30.
The survey — which includes multiple choice questions and written responses and will take approximately 20 minutes to complete — will remain open until Friday, May 29, at 8 p.m.
“[This survey] will play an important part in shaping the list of recommendations provided to the governor and New Hampshire Department of Education,” stated the taskforce in the survey overview. “Your perspective is highly valued.”
In a press release issued on Monday, April 27, the New Hampshire Department of Education said the plan will consider a full-range of instructional models for the fall, including “full [classroom] access,” “limited access” and “no access.”
“Full-access” would be in-person traditional classroom instruction, only simulcasted or recorded for students to have the option to remain at home. “Limited access” would be a hybrid of in-school and remote instruction. Under limited-access, students would likely have smaller cohorts and part-time schedules in the building. “No access” would be a full continuation of the current remote model.
The survey questions are specific to the participant’s “stakeholder group,” meaning that the survey for parents will differ from the survey for teachers or support staff.
Users may encounter limitations in the survey format that narrow the survey-taker from sharing a full scope of perspective. For example, the survey does not allow a person to take the survey twice, so a teacher who is also a parent must choose which survey to complete. Additionally, the parent survey asks the taker to only share the experiences of one child, despite the possibility that one child’s experiences with remote learning may vary dramatically from another. This also means that a parent cannot, for instance, share feedback about remote learning implementation at both the elementary and secondary levels.
The parent survey questions fall into two categories of inquiry: how families feel about returning to school buildings in September and their experience with remote learning, also referred to by STRRT as “remote instruction.”
Questions range from the child’s experiences and learning preferences, health and safety concerns, experiences with remote learning and what supports are needed to make remote learning more effective. The survey also asks what conditions, such as mandatory mask-wearing, staggering school schedules or social distancing policies, would make schools safer in the fall.
New Hampshire Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut said on Monday, May 11, that one of the taskforce’s goals is to explore opportunities to incorporate remote learning into New Hampshire’s education model, as some students have professed to prefer the flexibility and self-pacing of remote learning to traditional instruction.
“As we all search for our equilibrium and new-normal resulting from this pandemic, it is important that we craft a way forward that captures the strengths of an education system that has served us for decades, but also captures the opportunities presented,” Edelblut wrote in an op-ed.
To take the survey, go to the New Hampshire Department of Education to find the link, or go directly to www.education.nh.gov/survey2020.
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