Of all the topics covered in this course, the one that made me critically reflect the most was topic three, Equity and Access in K-12 Distributed (Online) & Open Learning Environments.

Growing up in a household of two teachers as parents I wasn’t living the most privileged life, however, I never had the feeling of being left on my own, or inadequately able to complete my work. I had access to wifi, technology, and my parental support, all things that a large percentage of students do not. After reading topic three’s readings on what occurred when the pandemic hit and students, teachers, and parents were forced to move to an online school setting I couldn’t help but notice that the readings were missing a very clear perspective, one of the teachers and their feelings towards their student’s differing at-home situations. To find this missing angle, I decided what better way than to talk/interview my very own parents in their experience during the COVID-19 pandemic and hear about their own student’s challenges to access the online learning reality.

This opportunity allowed me to examine and reflect the various means of equitable access students had (and still have) when entering online and open learning contexts. It also shows how these inequalities don’t just negatively affect the student’s but emotionally affect their teachers as well.

Grade two teacher 

Situation 1: Single mom supporting a family of three

“Of the kids who went online, I had 13-14 regulars who came on but I had this one little boy who’s family, single mother, did the best she could, she managed to buy each of the three boys a tablet that they could use as an online resource, but the tablet was probably an $80-$100 tablet, which is great but when the boys went online, they couldn’t use Zoom because the audio feature wasn’t compatible to the tablet, they couldn’t actually get on the online chat because the word processor on the tablet wasn’t quality, up-to-date program. The boys didn’t have great internet, so there would be constant glitching where at times you wouldn’t be able to even see the boys or the Zoom video would consistently log him out so I would be receiving messages throughout the meeting from his mom saying “we can’t get on.” What would happen is when we were sharing stories as a class and I knew he had a really good story that he wanted to share we wouldn’t want to ask him to share because we knew he was just going to glitch out, and it was just so sad. This is a family, one who actually tried really hard to participate, and it just wasn’t fair.”

Situation 2: Full family support and access to unlimited online learning tools and technology

“Another student I had, to show the other side of the inequality scale, was a student whose mom and dad were very tech-savvy. So this little boy ended up creating a youtube channel and videos that he would post, make his own script-writing, did his own editing, add music to the videos, and would send thee videos to me that I would post on our class website. He personalized his online learning and was technically was above any of us. It just shows you that it’s not fair. Not only did he have the equipment, the video camera, and the whole set up he could use, he had the parental support. His mom was home 24/7 and when his dad did come home from camps he would help the boy with all of the editing and stuff.”

Grade two/three teacher:       

Situation 1: Divorced parents, a mother with mental health and addiction problems and a father who is functionally illiterate

“A boy in my class was living with his dad who is unfortunately almost illiterate and didn’t have any access to wifi or a computer/tablet since he spent most of his time working in camps, so I tried to get him access to one of the school’s resources. On the news, you hear about all these school districts giving away their iPads and resources to students in need thinking just how great the program is when really it is each specific school administrator’s choice whether to or not. So I managed to get in touch with our administrators who gave this boy a ten-year-old iPad that only had access to the school district wifi, so basically, if he wanted to use this iPad he had to be within twenty feet of any school. So that didn’t work. The only time he could get on to my website or our Zoom meetings was when he was with his grandparents, who as well had an computer that didn’t work. During the month of online learning, he got on once. I invited him to email, talked to his dad and his grandparents asking them to help him compose emails to me but he never did.”

Situation 2: Family that didn’t care for online learning

“I had a little girl who didn’t go online once, not because she didn’t have the opportunity or technology to but because the parent said she wasn’t going to participate in online learning. So is just shows that some parents who have the potential to allow their kids this opportunity and to let them virtually learn, just simply don’t want their children to be online.”