Task Force: Design a COVID-19 Classroom

Congratulations!

You have been selected to participate in a national competition to design the best classroom under COVID-19. Your goal is to try and create a plan for schools throughout the nation to implement during the pandemic for Fall 2020. 

 Why Are We Doing This?:

Schools around the country are being impacted in significant ways during the COVID-19 pandemic. UNESCO is taking certain steps to help various countries and communities impacted by the rising pandemic. Here, we want you to design a classroom that you think best considers the various obstacles that the pandemic has brought to learning environments.

 Steps:

1. After doing brief research on what kinds of decisions schools are making to account for the effects of COVID-19, try to design a classroom that ensures the safety and well-being of all students. 
   1. Will your school be in-person? 
      1. How will you enforce social distancing requirements?
   2. Will your school adopt a hybrid program? What will that look like?
   3. Will your school adopt an entirely online program? 
      1. How will students without access to technology be accommodated for?
   4. Will your school bring something entirely different to the table?
   5. Will students be tested each day if the school is in-person?
   6. Explain your design and the reasoning behind its features.
2. Think through the possible objections about your design that someone could have and how you would answer them. 
   1. Does your design account for the needs of various students (i.e. students with special needs, students without access to computers/laptops, etc)?
3. Share with the group and see if you can convince them that your design is the ideal solution for classrooms and schools during the pandemic.

Things to Keep in Mind:

• You do not have to come up with an exhaustive list of features for your school/classroom. Think of a few features that your group is prepared to defend.
• You don’t have to worry about answering all possible objections, but you should have some defense of why you think your reasons are important.
• The features of your design should be things that schools could realistically implement.