There is evidence learning has suffered among Hamilton students since the onset of the pandemic. But to what degree?
First, his grades plummeted. Then he contracted COVID-19.
I was behind by a lot," said Sebastian Hernandez, 14. I had to come back from that."
Typically a strong student, his grades all fell to 50s from 80s last year while studying remotely.
I wasn't really understanding the work and the lessons online," said Sebastian, then in Grade 8 at St. Patrick Catholic Elementary School in central Hamilton.
Hernandez isn't alone.
Since March 2020, schools in Hamilton and across the province have closed and reopened several times as the pandemic surged and receded, disrupting students' lives and learning in the process.
Despite returning to classrooms in September, the effects of those disruptions linger. At the same time, the proliferation of the Omicron variant, along with climbing case counts, threatens to shutter schools once again.
There is evidence that learning has suffered. One U.S. study estimated kids from kindergarten to Grade 12 were, on average, five months behind in math and four months behind in reading.
But, in Ontario, in the absence of standardized testing and other measures, to what degree remains largely unknown.
There are many things we don't know that we're going to discover for the coming many years," said Annie Kidder, executive director of the Ontario advocacy group People for Education.
I honestly thought I was going to die'
The Hernandez family arrived in Canada from San Salvador, El Salvador, on New Year's Eve six years ago.
I feel really safe," said Gabriela Melara de Hernandez, who The Spectator interviewed in Spanish - her native language.
But that sense of security was compromised in an unexpected way in March 2020 when the pandemic took hold in Canada. The family hunkered down in their two-bedroom apartment on Wentworth Street South, and stayed there for nearly a year without stepping outside.
Sebastian and his sister, Sofia, 10, attended their elementary-school classes online. Melara de Hernandez studied English, also online. Only her husband, Armando, left the apartment for his job at a Stoney Creek manufacturing company and groceries.
The first time we went outside to get a breather, we were stuck in the car," Sebastian said. We were so scared that we didn't even pull down the windows ... we just rolled around."
After his grades hit rock bottom, Sebastian vowed to catch up - in fact, he was told he must in order to switch to in-person learning after the winter break. His grades began to climb.
Then, despite all of the family's precautions, Sebastian got sick before he could return to school.
I honestly thought I was going to die," he said. I remember sometimes not even being able to eat. It hurt a lot." His mother and sister also tested positive, but experienced less severe symptoms.
Once they recovered, Sebastian and Sofia transferred to in-person learning, and returned to their home schools - but only for a few weeks. In March 2021, schools across the province once again closed, this time for the rest of the year.
In total, schools were closed in Ontario longer than any other province in Canada.
Ontario educators observe troubling trends'
In a May 2021 report, the Ontario Public School Boards' Association (OPSBA) said educators have observed troubling trends" in periods of remote learning.
Not all families have reliable internet access or enough devices for everyone in the family. Many students required extra help from adults, such as parents and other relatives, and struggled to stay engaged in virtual classes. Many more reported feelings of isolation, loneliness and boredom.
Educators have observed that underachievement in school, and its consequential relationship to learning outcomes and future opportunities, has now become a function of access to reliable internet connectivity and digital learning devices in the home," the report reads.
With multiple people learning online, technology was a constant strain on the Hernandez household.
Their internet was so poor it only reached parts of the small apartment, and, when they tried to switch providers, they were told modems were sold out.
The family tried several configurations to make sure both kids were online and could hear their teachers and classmates. They didn't always succeed.
In addition to reliable internet, access to technology is another barrier.
A Statistics Canada survey found nearly 60 per cent of households do not have enough internet-enabled devices for everyone in the home - meaning many kids likely did not have access to the tools they needed to learn remotely.
In Hamilton, school boards distributed thousands of devices to students learning from home. It is unclear whether all students who needed devices received them.
Even if they had a device, the extent to which they used it is unknown.
I liken it to if we had been in person and parents had pulled their kids to go on some sort of extended vacation, and they weren't present," said Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board teacher Shideh Houshmandi, who teaches at Parkdale Elementary School in east Hamilton.
Teachers, she said, had to show up online every day. But many kids, evidence suggests, were frequently absent or, though logged into Microsoft Teams, not necessarily engaged in the curriculum. Many teachers with whom The Spectator spoke said they were often the only ones with their cameras on, which made it a challenge to tell who was there - physically and mentally - and who was not.
A new study, which looked at enrolment data for more than 630,500 students in Greater Toronto Area school boards showed extreme absenteeism - when a student misses more than half of their classes - increased during the pandemic, the Toronto Star reported.
Extreme absenteeism was most common among elementary students learning online, the report found.
What we saw was a jump in absenteeism in both face-to-face and remote schooling," Kelly Gallagher-Mackay, a professor at Wilfrid Laurier University in Brantford and the study's co-ordinator, told The Spectator. Absenteeism is sort of a red flag in the system. It tends to go with kids who are already having problems and less likely to graduate and less likely to go on to post-secondary."
The OPSBA report also indicates there is hope. Educators have also reported positive outcomes from the use of remote learning models."
Some students - and many educators - have adapted to virtual learning, teachers have collaborated on remote strategies, and parents and caregivers, many of whom have observed their child for the first time in their classroom," have become more engaged with the curriculum.
In Hamilton, about three per cent of all students are registered in remote learning, which continues to be offered in Ontario for the 2021-22 school year. That means heading into the holiday break the vast majority of students were back in classrooms.
But Houshmandi said classrooms are far from business as usual. She points to glaring" behaviour issues that are a huge barrier and impediment" to kids' ability to learn.
Self-regulation, motivation, initiative, and the ability to work in groups and collaborate with peers have all declined since the onset of the pandemic. Some students, she said, will get up from desks and leave the classroom without permission or explanation.
They are not able to function as students normally would," she said - especially in the lower grades, because they have less experience in a regular, normal classroom environment."
Fewer Grade 9s on track to graduate
The pandemic also appears to have made the transition to high school more difficult for some students.
A March 2021 Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB) report shows fewer Grade 9s accumulated the credits required - four in the first semester - to put them on track to graduate.
This is the group I'm worried about," said education director Manny Figueiredo. Transitions are hard to begin with, let alone when you're transitioning to a new reality, a new learning environment, no extracurriculars, alternate days, partially remote and then full remote."
In the 2020-21 school year, 77 per cent of Grade 9 students obtained eight credits - which is considered on track toward graduation - down from 84 per cent the previous year and 83 per cent in 2018-19.
Credit accumulation for students in grades 10 and 12 also dropped last year, but only by three per cent each. Students in Grade 11 performed similarly to previous years.
Laurier's Gallagher-Mackay, whose research focuses on equality in educational settings, said a seven per cent drop is very significant."
These are large numbers, these tend to be pretty stable," she said. That suggests a major change."
In response, board staff worked to reengage" students throughout the summer months. At the secondary level, for example, it used provincial learning recovery funding - Ontario's education ministry announced an $85.5-million commitment in May - to make guidance counsellors available to help students with timetables and planning.
In a recent People for Education survey of Ontario principals, respondents said the need for supports - both mental health and educational - increased dramatically, but without any corresponding increase in human resources."
Principals reported a shortage of social workers, psychologists, counsellors, special education workers, occasional teachers, educational assistants and speech language pathologists.
They pointed to the lack of resources for all of the support staff that were needed to ensure that kids and educators were getting supports they need," Kidder said.
At the Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board (HWCDSB), about 83.5 per cent of Grade 9 students obtained eight credits in 2020-21, down from just over 85 per cent in 2019-2020.
Insufficient' learning
Most are familiar with letter grades from A to F, but another, less frequently used letter - I" - emerged this year amid the disruption.
According to the Ontario Ministry of Education's policy document Growing Success: Assessment, Evaluation and Reporting in Ontario Schools, the code I" is used for students in grades 1 to 10 to indicate that insufficient evidence is available to determine a letter grade or percentage mark."
Students in grades 9 and 10 will not receive a credit for the course, but may be considered for credit recovery."
In a typical year, it would often be used when a student is very new to a school or because there were issues or extenuating circumstances beyond the student's control," such as an illness, the document reads.
But the last two school years were different.
We know that many, many teachers had no option but to hand out many I's across their classes," said Jeff Sorensen, president of the Hamilton-Wentworth Elementary Teachers' Local (HWETL) union. That is the result of remote learning. How do you assess phys-ed remotely? How do you assess music remotely?"
Houshmandi, who taught an in-person French immersion class, said she and her colleagues struggled to engage students, particularly those in fully remote programs.
They had in some cases 30 per cent, even more, who never showed up, never participated, never, never handed anything in," she said. They weren't able to follow up with parents to push them to participate."
At HWCDSB, the use of insufficient" on student report cards soared during the two pandemic school years.
During the 2019-20 school year, teachers at the local Catholic board assigned 82,403 I"s to elementary students, who could have more than 20 subjects on a single report card - a drastic increase from 1,992 the previous year.
Some students received I"s because they disengaged, and school staff may have lost track of them," said HWCDSB superintendent Dean DiFrancesco. Many more, however, received I"s even though they were keeping up with school work.
There might be strands that the teacher didn't even get to ... so they had no marks to give in that area," he said.
Among Catholic high school students, who have just four subjects per semester, 1,899 I"s were given out - up significantly from 167 the previous year.
In 2020-21, fewer I"s were assigned - 11,454 in elementary and 697 in secondary - but remained well above pre-pandemic averages.
Kidder said the increased use of I"s during the pandemic sheds light on the void of information around pandemic learning. Now, she said, it's time to do assessments.
To me, that still points to the need for how important it is that this year ... there's time and space and resources to support deep assessment of where kids are," Kidder said, adding that holistic, one-on-one assessments would be more useful than test scores.
Pandemic's impacts on learning greater for some students
Anecdotally, we know some students weathered the storm more successfully than others. Students who had support from parents, a quiet place to work, reliable internet access and a dedicated device had an advantage over students who did not.
Houshmandi said remote learning highlighted pre-existing equity issues that have forged a gap - one that school boards have struggled to close. While some parents worked from home during periods of online learning, many parents worked front-line jobs outside the home.
There was no one there really to support the learning at home," she said.
Deban Brunette, director of education programs at the non-profit Neighbour to Neighbour Centre on the Hamilton Mountain, said prior to the pandemic many of the kids in his organization's in-school tutoring program were reading well below grade level - which means, for example, a Grade 3 student might be reading at a Grade 1 level.
When we went out of program, those kids were two years behind," she said. I would suggest to you now they're like four years behind."
Like so many others, the program, which typically serves about 250 students in 15 schools, was shuttered when COVID hit. Brunette said a virtual tutoring pilot was launched, but only about eight schools participated. Funding dried up, and the program was never expanded.
Brunette wonders where those students are at now, without the individualized support. She says tutoring programs are currently not allowed at Hamilton's public and Catholic school boards.
COVID exacerbated some of the inequities that exist between students, especially in terms of the academic outcome, the engagement with teachers," said Carl James, a York University professor whose research focuses on education.
James said for all students the teacher-student relationship is essential to learning.
We can't build a relationship in the same way when we're doing it online," he said. It's not simply, I teach and you learn.'"
James said for many students - and in particular those who struggle in school - the learning is made more easy because the teachers care about them."
It's not just teachers feeding them information," he said.
Emerging research points to the importance of in-person learning to equity and inclusion, according to the OPSBA report.
Schools traditionally play a key role in providing equitable access to learning resources," the report reads. Educational opportunities for students requiring special education supports and services during school closures has been particularly challenging."
Alison Brindle, executive director for the Learning Disabilities Association of Halton-Hamilton (LDAHH), said students with learning disabilities - such as dyslexia (reading), dysgraphia (writing) and dyscalculia (math) - as well as ADHD faced greater learning hurdles over the last 18 months.
Our students have suffered dramatically over the last year, both academically and mentally," she said.
Likewise, these students will have a harder time recouping lost learning.
They don't generally get the focus that they should be entitled to," she said. If a teacher has to bring up the whole class, take care of the kids at home and look after kids with learning disabilities ... we know that our children will fall further behind."
Hamilton parent Elizabeth Jackson, whose two school-age children have struggled during the pandemic, said both her kids have ADHD and other learning challenges.
They really do a lot better with a personal relationship with their teacher and clear instruction and reminders to focus and so on and you can't do that online," she said.
But, Jackson said, remote learning isn't entirely to blame.
I think also just ... being in constant stress and uncertainty for a year-and-a-half meant that their brains weren't really able to retain much," she said.
Kids are back in school. Is it enough?
Fast-forward to today, and kids are back in classrooms.
But Gallagher-Mackay, the Laurier professor, is concerned about what she says is very little policy response" to the impacts on learning.
We are spending resources on trying to make schools safer, and that's good," she said. But it's not enough."
She said kids are resilient," and there is hope for recovery. But without support - such as one-on-one tutoring and randomized assessment, among others - catching up will be difficult.
Eighteen months is a big deal in the life of a seven-year-old, but it's still relatively short-term educational disruption," she said. We have to make sure that we're not letting educational harm, including on the academic achievement side, get worse and become a long-term problem for these kids."
Neither Sebastian Hernandez, now in Grade 9 at Cathedral High School, nor his sister Sofia, in Grade 5 at St. Patrick, feel they are behind. Perhaps this is a credit to teachers' efforts to focus on overall well-being before curriculum. But both agree that being back in person is having a positive impact on their education.
It's easier to learn," Sofia said. If you say, I don't get it,' the teacher would explain it in many ways on the board. He'd draw it out, he'd explain, and it's way easier when you can actually see the person."
Kate McCullough is an education reporter at The Spectator. kmccullough@thespec.com