PA DOE chief Noe Ortega visits Erie schools, addresses mask mandate, teacher diversity
Pennsylvania Department of Education Secretary Noe Ortega visited McKinley Elementary School Friday morning to remind children to practice healthy habits during an unprecedented new school year.
During his visit, Ortega popped into several classrooms and ended his tour of the school in a first-grade classroom, where he read the story “A Germ’s Journey.”
His appearance highlighted the efforts of Pennsylvania schools regarding the health and safety of students and what the Department of Education is doing to supplement those efforts.
One of the challenges Ortega sees is the increase in COVID-19 cases, which has affected the education and mitigation efforts schools are tending to on a regular basis.
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Similar to the Ohio Department of Health’s COVID-19 Dashboard, which details the number of COVID cases by school district, the Pennsylvania Department of Education is working on a way to streamline communication with schools in a comparable fashion.
“I think this process will allow (communication) to become a little more systematic and manageable by the schools,” Ortega said. “We’ve been talking to a number of stakeholders, whether it’s school leaders, superintendents, and everyone is asking us to find ways to create more relief so they can tend to all the things they need to attend to, which includes learning.”
Remote learning and test scores
A concern for all schools has been the decline in test scores because of remote instruction last year. With the disruptions to in-person learning, Ortega expects to see changes in scores, and wants to see what has worked and what hasn’t worked within schools, with regard to how students have adapted to learning.
“(Of) all the federal funds we’ve received, I would say around 90% of them are supposed to go to address learning gaps to accelerate learning,” he said. “We do know there’s going to be a lot of work in that area and we do know things aren’t feeling as normal as we want them to, which has created some challenges, but we’re confident that everything the schools are doing is going to help accelerate that.”
The Department of Education is also developing resources to give to schools to supplement what they’re already doing.
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Statewide mask mandate
Another challenge the Department of Education has faced throughout the pandemic is the face mask mandate, which has been politically contested by many, Ortega said.
Ortega has heard from the public, most of which has been positive toward the mandate.
“We get a lot of calls from parents, schools and families telling us how things are going well,” he said. “How (the face mask mandate) keeps kids in school for longer, which has been the goal all along and how it’s helping provide in-person learning.
“We’re hoping that our parents and communities can model the behavior that we need for our young kids to understand the importance of what the face mask is going to mean for us, which is protecting the most vulnerable population.”
To Ortega, the “most vulnerable population” is the children under the age of 12 who have not yet been vaccinated. In order to protect those children, requiring the face mask mandate is critical, he said.
By and large, all Erie School District students are following health and safety protocols, said Superintendent Brian Polito. Kids are cooperating with the mask mandate, and having Ortega visit further shows how important wearing masks is, Polito said.
“The students see that people do care about them, that we have adults here and down in Harrisburg that are really working hard for them,” he said.
Teacher diversity
Along with COVID-19 mitigation efforts, increasing teacher diversity has become another big priority for Ortega.
Addressing the changing demographics in classrooms is “extremely important” in addressing the needs students have in those classrooms, which is why the Department of Education is “pushing tremendously hard” on recruiting teachers with more diverse backgrounds, plus training for all.
“Not just on recruiting more teachers, but more teachers of color, then equipping them with the competencies of how to work with different populations,” Ortega said. “It’s not important to expect only the teachers of color take on the diversity efforts, this is something we all have to take on, which is a vital part of our mission.”
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Later on Friday, Ortega toured McDowell High School’s McDowell Manufacturing Lab and met with students participating in a manufacturing enterprise.
Baylee DeMuth can be reached at 814-450-3425 or [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @BayleeDeMuth.
