It is that mindset as a student advocate that Morgan is bringing to her work a decade and a half later. “A real part of advocacy is connecting the dots between students, parents, and educators with legislators,” Morgan argues. What JerseyCAN brings to the table through Morgan’s leaders is that “we are solely focused on students and families.”

Over the past several weeks Morgan was appointed to both the New Jersey Senate’s Education Recovery Task Force and the Department of Education’s Steering Committee on Reopening Schools. Her focus will be to directly convey the needs of students as key decisions are made and to bring new ideas to the table on how to meet those urgent needs. 

“Because we have this national connection through 50CAN, we are really a gateway for bringing a number of incredible national thought partners to the conversation in New Jersey,” Morgan shared. These student-centered policies are at the core of her newly revised campaign goals. “It’s really about connecting all the information to make sure you’re solving the problems as quickly as possible.”

Watch the full video interview here.

• The task this week is to seek out opportunities to bring student needs directly to the rooms in which decisions are being made and bring fresh thinking on how to solve those problems. 
   

Get creative now in order to be ready when students return in the fall

“This is something we’ve never experienced before,” Joris Ray, superintendent of Shelby County Schools told the Memphis Flyer. “The reality is we don't know what hold this virus will have on the community, and we must be prepared for a variety of scenarios.” Memphis, like many other districts across the country, is exploring a hybrid model for the fall with students learning partially in-person and partially virtually. 

In addition to hybrid models, there is a clear need to think creatively about how to catch students up. Arne Duncan, former secretary of education, recently suggested the need for new tutoring programs while Chiefs for Change advocates for a small group approach to instruction, more nimble staffing models and a more flexible school calendar in their new report “The Return.”

“If there was ever a time to go all-in on personalized learning this strikes me as the time,” GeorgiaCAN executive director Michael O’Sullivan shared in his reflections on these new proposals. “When kids return to school in the fall, there will be no child perfectly on grade level. We’re going to need to individualize to catch them up.” 

Of course, making these changes will take time and money. That means making sure that the federal money that is flowing to states gets distributed to all schools. Victor Evans, executive director of TennesseeCAN, tells us, “This pandemic has laid bare the inequities that exist for students and in how schools are funded. We need to explore avenues to ensure there’s equitable funding for all schools--public, charter, private--so that they can meet the needs of their kids.”

• The task this week is to ensure that the best ideas for adapting our education systems for these new student needs are customized for local communities and marshal the time and resources to ensure they are in place in time for the return in the fall. 

In New Jersey, computer science and robotics teachers at Warren Hills and Mount Olive high schools helped their students to produce over 26,000 face shields for emergency responders. For the students it was a lesson not only in technology but also in civic leadership.