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The Keep Michigan Learning website is brought to you by the Michigan Virtual Learning Continuity Workgroup, a team of 25 classroom teachers, building administrators, and district-level leaders who joined forces at the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis to provide Michigan educators with the tools and support they need to ensure ALL of their students have access to high-quality learning opportunities during the pandemic and beyond.
To develop a deeper understanding of the needs and challenges facing educators in Michigan during the COVID-19 pandemic, Michigan Virtual convened a group of educational leaders who possess a deep understanding of instructional design, online learning, and the leadership challenges associated with this level of systemic change.
Members of the workgroup consist of 25 classroom teachers, building administrators, and district-level leaders. The purpose of this group was to serve as a sounding board on issues from the field, propose solutions, and explore new scalable delivery models that enable effective anytime, anyplace, and any pace teaching and learning.
The Michigan Virtual Learning Continuity Workgroup began meeting in early April 2020 with a focus on developing a rich understanding of the current challenges facing educators in the transition to emergency remote learning. During these conversations, three areas emerged that required in-depth research and development. As such, three sub-committees were developed and given the following charges:
In parallel to these sub-committees and in coordination with the workgroup, Michigan Virtual engaged the Southfield-based and nationally recognized design thinking firm of Sundberg-Ferar to conduct an assessment of activity happening related to the emergency remote learning implementations. During this process, the team at Sundberg-Ferar conducted interviews and small group sessions with students, parents, teachers, and administrators from learning communities across Michigan.
The Michigan Virtual and Sundberg-Ferar teams are currently in the midst of analyzing this information and developing hypotheses, summarizing knowledge gaps, generating recommendations and ideating solutions for consideration as districts continue to move forward with flexible models for student learning. The project will coordinate efforts to create tangible outputs, with clear project roadmaps and objectives for larger projects to be developed and executed in the near future.
Finally, in addition to the support of the workgroup, Michigan Virtual has developed and released a plethora of learning continuity resources to support educational leaders in their learning continuity planning and transition to emergency remote learning.