Superintendents reflect on e-learning

The lights are mainly off in St. Joseph-Ogden High School.

And they will remain that way at least until August due to Governor JB Pritzker ending in person learning for millions of students in Illinois since March

“It is a very odd feeling in the building each day,” said Superintendent Brian Brooks.

Typically, there are just four people in the building during the day, Brooks said.

Which is a change even during the summer months where there are summer custodians and technology workers.

Brooks said from a district perspective e-learning went as well as could be expected.

“I think everyone is growing professionally from all of this, but at the same time I think the majority,
if not all, of our teachers and students would rather be back in the classroom,” Brooks said.

Brooks said he was impressed with how quickly the students and teachers adapted to a very difficult situation.

“I feel that our teachers adapted fairly well and very quickly,” he said. “They have some frustrations with it, without question, but they have made the best of a
tough situation.  I think it is an opportunity to learn new ways in which education could be delivered, even once back in the classroom  next year.”

Brooks said his work as superintendent has went more virtual as well. He has been attending virtual meetings as opposed to traveling to meetings in Champaign-Urbana and elsewhere.

“That part has actually been a nice change, but I’d still rather be doing those virtual meetings in my office while our students are here physically in classrooms,” he said.

Prairieview-Ogden Superintendent Vic White said his teachers also adapted well to E-Learning but it was still a sad situation.

“It makes us all sad,” he said. “We love our PVO students. I feel that the PVO teachers are doing a great job trying to communicate with students/parents during this Remote Learning experience.”

White said some teachers got creative in ways to reach their students.

“I have a kindergarten teacher that developed her PVO North Kindergarten Facebook page and she has posted videos of herself reading to her class.  We have teachers using Dojo, Zoom, Google and more to stay connected with their class.  I am very proud of them especially since this was all new.”

White said the district did a combination of packets and remove learning.

“We have students that don’t have internet service at all and some with poor internet connections since parents are working at home now,” White said.