After nearly a year of adjusting class schedules and learning models because of the covid-19 pandemic, school districts are grappling with how to quantify and assess learning loss.

“It’s not entirely accurate to say that online learning is a complete failure,” said Kiski Area High School Principal Chad Roland. “It’s not entirely accurate to say that there aren’t flaws in online learning, that we don’t need a wholesome offering of good, old-fashioned school.”

At a meeting Wednesday, Roland provided Kiski Area School Board members with data on high school attendance, common assessments and course failures, AP test results and some stories about students’ experiences.

Student engagement is the most pressing issue, Roland said.

He said an assessment testing English proficiency showed a slight drop in the rate of proficiency this year, but there was a significant increase in the rate of students not submitting the assignment at all. About 17% of students fell into this category this school year, up from 2% last school year.

“They’re at home, they’re completely disengaged, and they’re not even turning in the assignment,” Roland said. “That is a big problem for us.”

Roland said when students are engaging, remote instruction has been “highly successful.” When teachers can’t connect with students because they are not logging on or participating in virtual discussions, their performance in common assessments suffers.

Roland blamed this lack of engagement on more students failing classes than ever before. At the semester break a year ago, only 82 students were failing 290 classes. This year, Roland said, 381 students are failing 1,062 classes.

“It is not pretty,” Roland said. “It’s alarming.”

Roland said counselors have relayed conversations they’ve had with students who are struggling with online learning. Many of those students say they’ve decided to put more focus on the classes they’re interested in while neglecting classes they don’t see as important. Roland said the trend is reflective of students “trying to keep their head above water.”

Roland noted the decline is not nearly as evident in Advanced Placement courses. Last school year’s AP exams took place after just a couple of months of online learning, but those months are arguably the most critical for learning material pertinent in the exams, he said. Still, Roland said the average AP score increased over the previous year.

Disengagement is not evident in all students. Roland said some students appear to be excelling with remote learning because they are removed from distractions in school buildings.

“There are students in our district that struggled immensely in a traditional model,” he said. “Now, having an online model, a 100% online model, they have found their niche.”

Roland said the data will be used as a “springboard” to see what can be changed immediately to help students and get them more engaged, and what can be adjusted as the board and administrators plan for next school year.

Board members said the data was not a huge surprise, knowing each student is different and will adapt to the new models differently. They will hear from administrators in other district buildings at Monday’s regular meeting.

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