U.S. Department of Education to Hold First of Several Sessions on Strategies and Programs to Boost Academic Recovery from Impact of Pandemic

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U.S. Department of Education to Hold First of Several Sessions on Strategies and Programs to Boost Academic Recovery from Impact of Pandemic

On Wednesday, Oct. 26, the U.S. Department of Education (Department) will host Raising the Bar: Literacy & Math Series to Address Academic Recovery—the first of five sessions focused on evidence-based strategies and programs to boost student literacy and math outcomes. These sessions, which will occur monthly through February 2023, are part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s ongoing efforts to support and accelerate the academic recovery of students from the impact of the pandemic. They will focus on sustained, cohesive efforts to improve educational practice.  

President Biden knew that a once-in-a generation pandemic would have a once-in-a-generation impact on our nation’s students. That’s why the Department has focused since Day One on safely reopening schools, helping students recover academically, and supporting their mental health. National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results released earlier this week are a rallying cry to local, state, and national leaders to redouble their efforts to support learning recovery. These results also show how critical the Administration’s work was and continues to be to get and keep students back in classrooms, as well as the urgent need to get American Rescue Plan (ARP) dollars into communities to accelerate academic recovery and provide mental health supports to students.  

ARP funds are enabling states and schools to tackle academic recovery head-on: schools across the country are implementing programs to accelerate learning through integrated and targeted supports, high-quality instruction, providing evidence-based tutoring, and expanding high-quality out-of-school time. The Literacy and Math series will bring practitioners, policymakers, researchers, and parents and families together to identify strategies that are especially promising and discuss how ARP and other resources can support their replication in a variety of State and local contexts. 

The kickoff event this Wednesday will focus broadly on academic recovery and will set the foundation for four subsequent sessions that will include: 

  • Learning research-based practices from content experts
  • Highlighting promising practices from SEAs and districts
  • Leveraging ARP funding to implement literacy and math achievement best practices at scale
  • Offering dedicated time and expertise to support action planning (i.e., guided working sessions and support from technical assistance providers).
Who :

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona
U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education Cindy Marten 
Walter H. Gale Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education Tom Kane (Virtually)

What :

Panel 1: State and District Efforts to Accelerate Learning
Utah State Superintendent of Public Instruction Sydnee Dickson  
Illinois Superintendent of Education Carmen Ayala   
Hillsborough County Public Schools Superintendent Addison Davis   
Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho  

Panel 2: Leveraging Research to Boost Learning Recovery
Associate Director of FutureEd Phyllis Jordan   
Commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics Peggy Carr 
Chief Performance Officer of the Connecticut Department of Education and Coordinator of Connecticut COVID-19 Education Research Collaborative Ajit Gopalakrishnan  
Panel 3: A Focus on Interventions
Paul Laurence Dunbar High School Principal Nadine Smith 
Paul Laurence Dunbar High School Teacher Anthony Allard
Student
Parent 

When :

2 – 4 p.m. ET (Time is subject to change) 

Where :

U.S. Department of Education
Lyndon Baines Johnson Auditorium
400 Maryland Ave., S.W.
Washington, D.C.

*A live stream of the event can be found here.*