Without denying the educational hardships that have resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic, Hanover School Board Trustee Carisa Klassen believes there has been a positive shift in the local school system lately.

It is well known that the long periods of remote learning necessitated by the government have caused holes in student learning. For many kids, attending school from home depleted their excitement, motivation, and engagement in their studies. Still, Klassen maintains that the worst is now over.

“There’s no doubt that COVID took an emotional toll on people,” she offers. “But, as a division, we feel that we have settled in. We are moving out of crisis and moving into recovery and what that looks like for each student.”

To Klassen, a key part of moving forward is assuming a fresh perspective. Like many divisions across the province, Hanover has been using the phrase “recovery of learning” to refer to the process of helping students reclaim knowledge and skills a person at their grade level should have. Moving away from that expression now, Klassen submits “meeting the students at their level” as a slogan to fit the changing atmosphere.

“I think the term ‘recovery’ was associated with how we felt in fall and sometimes just changing terminology switches our perspective,” she says. “Maybe it’s just a silly way of psychologically putting ourselves in a different position but a lot of these things are mind over matter.”

As Chair of the board's education subcommittee, Klassen has her finger on the pulse of what is happening in Hanover classrooms. From her perspective, the overwhelming challenges that rocked the division in November and December have begun giving way to progress. In many ways, she says the learning environment is more stable now than it has been for several months.

Previously, teachers were dividing their attention between students learning remotely and students learning in-person. Now, however, extra online supports mean homeroom teachers can pour all of their efforts into their physical classroom while the remote needs are taken care of by others.

Now that the general function and operation of the schooling model has become more predictable, Klassen says teachers have plunged into “accelerated learning” where they determine their students’ strengths and weaknesses and put an increased emphasis on those areas that need development.

“It is hard for me to say where kids are at because they are all over the place,” she remarks. “But I believe they are bouncing back quicker than we thought they would.”