Rethinking the Purposes of Schooling in a Global Pandemic: From Learning Loss to a Renewed Appreciation for Mourning and Human Excellence

Abstract

A main goal of this paper is to complicate “learning loss” as the only, or even the main, thing schools should be concerned about as they respond to the Covid-19 pandemic. While schools have a responsibility to make sure students who are enrolled in school are learning, this cannot come at the cost of ignoring the other substantial losses students are also contending with. Following the work of Jonathan Lear, I make the case that schools should engage students in a process of learning how to mourn for their individual and our collective losses, while also considering ways that school can move beyond narrow conceptions of the purposes of school and to a deeper appreciation for the ways that an education can promote human excellence. As this pandemic wears on, it becomes harder and harder to do anything but endure. One goal of this paper is to serve as a reminder that schools can do more than endure: they can envision new possibilities for schooling that promote conceptions of wellbeing that go beyond fear of learning loss.

An Ethos of Wander Time: Staying with the Trouble to Make Sense During Crises

“…As with the time in the desert, the period was also marked by mourning and loss. Where early in the pandemic there was frequent encouragement to treat the time at home as rich in capacity for regenerative meaning (see Mediators Beyond Borders for a series of widely circulated poems expressing this sentiment), in relation to schools this discourse was quickly and largely drowned out by louder noise about learning loss (Frank 2022 ).…”

“…Amidst a steady neoliberal clamor about “learning loss” in which the Covid-19 pandemic is treated as a lost and empty stretch of time (Frank 2022 ), a few teachers and parents have cautioned we must give children space to grieve, explore, and make sense of a new and radically changed reality. Though fixation on and concern about learning loss has been exacerbated by Covid-19, utilitarian obsessions with efficiency and productivity in schools has been a constant refrain for many years (Løvlie 2002 ; Shuffelton 2017 ).…”

Philosophical Reflections on Teachers’ Ethical Dilemmas in a Global Pandemic

“…There are significant ethical dimensions to these issues which echo pre-pandemic dilemmas in teaching but also offer to broaden philosophical analyses of the complex normative terrain of teachers' work. Emerging philosophical conversations offer ethical and conceptual insights into the pandemic and emotions (d'Agnese 2023; Schweiger 2023) and shifting educational purposes (Frank 2023). This paper links to these by considering teachers and the ethical dimensions of their work during the pandemic.…”

The Effect of Post-Pandemic Transformational Leadership towards Learning Loss

“…Learning loss described as any specific or general loss of knowledge and skills or to reversals in academic progress, most commonly due to extended gaps or discontinuities in a student's education (Ali et al, 2023;Huong, 2020). Learning loss is one of a concept that defined as less optimum learning process caused by a missed or disrupted education especially the absence of teachinglearning activity at school (Blaskó et al, 2022;Frank, 2023). In online learning, learning loss also caused by the absence of direct interaction between educators and students, limited communication with colleagues, limited study time for students, difficulties in discussing, and limited assessment processes (Andriani et al, 2021).…”