Year 11 – Week 37: The 2021-2022 School Year

Here’s what we know for sure about the 2021-2022 school year.


Next fall, at its worst, mitigation practices will look like they do right now.

As vaccination rates rise and more and more children receive vaccinations, we will transition even more into a new normal next school year. Children twelve-years-old and up can be vaccinated, but it is unclear when younger students can be vaccinated. Even though most adults are vaccinated, it is difficult to imagine a situation when young students under the age of twelve can resume school without mitigation factors without being vaccinated. Likely there will be two different school phases next year, one where students wear masks and one where they do not.

We know what works, we know what is gratuitous, and we know what we need to do to modify our teaching to help our students.

School populations will change.

In early May, Evanston public schools, District 65, reported that their student enrollment had declined by more than 300 students and that this number will likely grow. This decline in enrollment will be accompanied by staff and faculty layoffs. In my school, we have three new upper-level administrators coming to our school this spring and many new faculty who we hired this spring.

The vast majority of schools next fall will have significant changes in their population due to faculty and staff changes and/or student changes. For some school communities, this will have its benefits, for other schools, this will be devastating, and for every school, these changes will be challenging.

I predict that these changes will continue in the 2022-2023 school year, as people who do not have the financial ability to move for this school year will do so the following year.


Curriculum will have to adapt.

For music programs like mine, which had little band and choir at 7th and 8th-grade level and no beginning 6th-grade band and choir, we will have to modify our curriculum from previous years next year. Even schools with mostly in-person school cannot expect students to transition into the curriculum comfortably; they would typically learn at the grade level they are entering next fall.

Discussions of “catching students up” and learning loss will continue in the next couple of months, and schools will have to wrestle with how to serve students academically. After two years of schooling, in the very best of circumstances, students could not achieve the learning growth that would have happened without the pandemic.

Changes in the curriculum to meet the needs of the students are not a concern just for the next school year but will continue for many years.


The crises continues.

When many educators talked about the challenges of the 2020-2021 school year, many of them spoke about three crises: the pandemic, the political tensions, and the upcoming election, and racism in America.

All three of the crises will be present in the 2021-2022 school year. Even if most Americans get vaccinated, the pandemic will continue to have a profound effect on the human race. Few countries are vaccinating at the rate of America, and the incomprehensible suffering and trauma due to COVID-19 will continue around the world as America return to “normal.”

It is a disservice to our students and our humanity if we ignore how the pandemic continues while we remove masks and reengage with each other.

The losers did not go silently into the night. trump’s insecurities, whims, and desire for power continue to influence the Republican party.  Lies continue to be embraced by many Americans and racism as a tool to consolidate power. Democracy didn’t win when President Biden was elected, it survived an assault, and the battles continue.

“In recent weeks, Republican legislatures in roughly half a dozen states have either adopted or advanced bills purporting to take aim for the teaching of critical race theory, an academic approach that examines how race and racism function in law and society.”

- Adrian Florido, this NPR article

This is where we are with the essential integrating of lessons about racism into American public schools.

Black and brown people continue to be mistreated by police officers, and racial injustice permeates every facet of our society.  America has failed to address the systemic racism in public education made painfully clear by the pandemic in a meaningful way.

Instead of leaning into these issues, Republicans are trying to pretend they don’t exist. This crisis continues.

While we have many reasons to be optimistic about the 2021-2022 school year, we need to be realistic about the challenges that we are facing. As the masks come off, we have to use this comfort and lessened anxiety to focus on creating an educational experience that truly meets the present challenges while meeting students where they are at.  This means focusing on mental health, inequity, and community.

We can see this as a burden, and we can see this as a wonderful opportunity to engaging in meaningful, invigorating, and society-changing work. Every day, regardless of the past, we can make choices to do better for our students.  We have to remember these past two years, but we can't dwell on them.

Don’t look back in anger.  Look forward to next fall with hope. I’ll be there with you.