Learning at home during COVID-19: effects on vulnerable young Australians: independent rapid response report

The outbreak of coronavirus disease [2019] (COVID-19) has been declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) and the virus has now spread to each State and Territory in Australia. To help contain the spread of COVID-19 a significant number of public, Catholic and independent schools have implemented home-based, online and offline learning. It is already clear that nationally, children and young people are experiencing learning losses. This means that there will not be the expected cognitive gains for these students over the period of learning at home. These losses will cause a delay in cognitive gain and achievement in some students and result in others being lost to the education system. The reason for these losses is that many families lack the physical spaces, technology and other resources to support learning at home. Additionally, many parents and caregivers lack the time needed to support their children's learning. This is occurring irrespective of socio-economic status, with full-time waged and sole parent-waged families reporting difficulties. The scope of this enquiry was based on one central question: What are the impacts of learning at home during COVID-19 for vulnerable young Australians?

Key findings: (1) There are a large number of Australian children and young people who are vulnerable to adverse effects on their educational outcomes, nutrition, physical movement, social, and emotional wellbeing by being physically disconnected from school. This number is estimated to be 46 per cent of the student population; (2) There is an urgent need to reconnect students, especially early-years and vulnerable students, to the physical context of school-based learning to support learning and wellbeing outcomes; (3) Children and young people are experiencing learning loss over the period of learning at home. This delay in cognitive gain and achievement is more difficult to recover for some cohorts of students, and for others may result in them being lost to the education system; (4) Concurrently there is a need to invest rapidly in developing significant capability in schools to deliver education both online and on-site; and (5) Readjustment on return to school will be challenging for many students, especially those who are impacted by trauma, or who have been newly exposed to trauma or impacts of poverty as a result of COVID-19.

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