New Jersey's School COVID-19 Operating Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many Students
Earlier this year, I posted about the racial inequities in New Jersey's school reopening plans, which were all affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Following that blog post, I used some updated data, refined my analysis a bit, and wrote about it over at the NJPP website. In both of these analyses I relied on data published at NJ Spotlight (an invaluable source for news about education policy in the Garden State).
Turns out NJ Spotlight just updated their list of NJ school districts and their COVID-19 operating plans. Let's first give props to Spotlight's Colleen O'Dea for keeping on top of these data updates.
With a few tweaks of my statistical program's code, it's not too hard to see how things have changed over the last few months. But let's review what I found back in September:
- About half of the state's students were in districts that only offered fully remote classes, while one-third were in districts that offered a hybrid of remote and in-person learning.
- White students were more likely to have the option to receive in-person instruction than Black or Hispanic students.
- The districts that offered only remote instruction were more likely to be underfunded -- according to the state's own law -- than districts offering hybrid instruction.
Before I get to the update, let me be clear about what I'm presenting. The analysis here is not what students are actually doing; it's what their districts offer. Governor Murphy has required all districts to offer fully remote instruction during the pandemic. But some CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: New Jersey's School COVID-19 Operating Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many Students
