School board President Gabriela López did not specifically address the problem of learning loss, but she said that parents are doing an amazing job helping their students and that learning has not stopped during the pandemic — rather, it is just different.
“They are learning more about their families and their cultures, spending more time with each other,” López said. “They’re just having different learning experiences than the ones we currently measure, and the loss is a comparison to a time when we were in a different space.”
Yet, San Francisco’s statistics offer confirmation that learning difficulties exist among students, especially those who struggled before the pandemic, district administrators said.
The district has yet to reach an agreement with labor unions on the conditions required to reopen, but it has moved forward with the application to bring the youngest and most vulnerable students back first, with city health department inspections of school sites and classrooms beginning.