Quality education isn’t as readily available nationwide. The most recent long-term trend assessments from the National Assessment of Educational Progress make that clear. Nationwide, 13-year-olds are drastically underperforming their peers from pre-pandemic levels in reading and math scores. In addition to a lack of recovery post-pandemic, the report shows that the lowest achieving students suffer more significant performance drops than their peers.
Increasing access to high-quality educational programs can mitigate these shortcomings and provide students with a clear path to success. All students deserve the opportunity to access a K-12 curriculum focused on preparing them to be lifelong learners and leaders.
Educational opportunities are readily available but mean little if students can’t access them.
What can educational leaders and decision-makers do to ensure every student can engage in meaningful educational experiences that prepare them for college, careers and leadership roles?
Leaders at every level of education can mitigate barriers to quality education, regardless of geography and socio-economic background, by taking decisive action and remaining open to collaboration.
There are three paths to optimize access to high-quality education for every student:
—Focus on developing public schools.
—Increase resource allocation to rural schools.
—Support classroom digitization.
Leaders can effectively reduce educational disparities across states and districts through these paths.
Public school resources:
By developing and investing resources in public schools, education leaders can effectively increase access to opportunities for every student, including those most historically marginalized.
Throughout their tenure in the Atlanta Public Schools district, Superintendent Bryan Johnson and district International Baccalaureate coordinator Ovura Murphy — with staff and faculty help — connected students in 30-plus schools with quality PK-12 educational programs, regardless of the students’ neighborhood or socio-economics. As a result, the district continues to support every student’s right to educational programs that promote lifelong learning and has proactively reduced academic and achievement gaps.
Through school and district-level advocacy, more students in the United States have access to quality education than ever before.
Public funding and leadership’s prioritization of public schools must go hand-in-hand to ensure every school and every student has the opportunity to flourish.
Rural school communities:
A second path to increase access to high-quality educational programs is purposeful investment in rural communities to ensure every student is equipped for a rapidly evolving future.
According to the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, a “burden falls on rural areas, where a lack of access to modern energy services negatively affects productivity, educational attainment, and even health and ultimately exacerbates the poverty trap.” Leaders effectively increase access to lifelong opportunities through infrastructural and educational investment in rural communities.
As society becomes more globalized, students deserve access to diverse and well-rounded curricula for capacity building, including leadership, problem-solving and multi-lingual language skills. By providing students with the tools and resources they need, we prepare students to thrive.
Classroom digitization:
Digital expansion in teaching, learning and assessment is the final path to increasing access to high-quality student programs.
Of course, comprehensive digitization requires infrastructure building. Through active collaboration and resource allocation at all levels, it is possible to reduce or eliminate disparities such as access to the internet or technological devices.
Schools can and should be equipped with the necessary tools to engage in digital learning and assessment platforms. New technologies open students’ and educators’ minds to innovative problem-solving.
No matter which digital learning tools and practices educational leaders choose to embrace, the goal remains the same: increasing access to education to promote life-long learning.
By investing in public school systems, reallocating resources to rural school communities and supporting classroom digitization, leaders and educators can effectively carve new paths to ensure every student has access to a quality education. Through action and collaboration, we can reduce performance gaps for marginalized communities and support underperforming students to achieve post-pandemic recovery.
