[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 241 Introduced in House (IH)]
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117th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 241
Expressing the sense of Congress that reopening schools for in-person
instruction should be a critical priority for local, State, and Federal
policymakers, and that funding for K-12 schools under the American
Rescue Plan and State vaccination guidelines should be used to help get
children back in the classroom.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
March 16, 2021
Ms. Sherrill (for herself, Mrs. Watson Coleman, and Mr. Payne)
submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee
on Education and Labor
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Expressing the sense of Congress that reopening schools for in-person
instruction should be a critical priority for local, State, and Federal
policymakers, and that funding for K-12 schools under the American
Rescue Plan and State vaccination guidelines should be used to help get
children back in the classroom.
Whereas many K-12 students have spent almost a full year outside of the
classroom due to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent school closures,
with their learning entirely remote;
Whereas there is a growing body of evidence that remote learning can have
significantly negative impacts on student learning and educational
achievement, potentially harming long-term educational and career
success;
Whereas recent studies have shown that students' learning in math over the past
year was at least 30 percent lower than expected and their learning in
reading was at least 10 percent lower than expected;
Whereas other research has found that school closures in the spring and summer
of 2020 may have reduced student learning gains by up to one-third in
reading and up to one-half in math relative to a typical school year;
Whereas new studies have found that school closures have caused a decline in
children's skill attainment, with those impacts being particularly
severe for students whose parents have low educational attainment;
Whereas the shift to remote learning has also significantly amplified
educational disparities along socioeconomic lines throughout the
country;
Whereas research has found that majority non-White school districts saw much
larger learning losses than the average school district, with students'
learning in those districts falling almost 10 percent more in both math
and reading relative to expectations than in the average school
district;
Whereas access to in-person instruction itself has been highly unequal during
the COVID-19 pandemic, again stratified along socioeconomic lines;
Whereas recent reports have found that almost 70 percent of Black, Hispanic, and
Asian students were in remote-only school districts in the fall,
compared to slightly over 50 percent of White students;
Whereas school closures have also left behind students with disabilities, who
have had to get by with limited access to the special education programs
that are supposed to be guaranteed to them;
Whereas recent surveys of families with children in special education programs
have found that only 1 in 5 families said they were receiving all of
their children's support services and that 4 in 10 families said they
were receiving none of those support services;
Whereas the Government Accountability Office found that school closures have
created significant educational challenges for English learners and
students with disabilities, who already had large achievement gaps
compared to other students prepandemic;
Whereas school closures have also been linked to declines in students' mental
health, as children are deprived of social interaction at school as well
as critical mental health services that schools provide;
Whereas this mental health crisis has been highlighted by large increases in
mental health emergencies among children at hospitals during the
pandemic, and an increase in worrying mental health behavior as reported
by school districts;
Whereas new studies have found that the proportion of emergency department
visits that were mental health-related has increased by over 20 percent
for children aged 5-11 and over 30 percent for children aged 12-17 from
2019 to 2020;
Whereas the employment crisis facing our country has also been exacerbated by
school closures, as parents (predominantly women) have had to leave
their jobs to stay home and take care of their children;
Whereas new research suggests that over 1,000,000 mothers have left the
workforce since the pandemic started because of school closures;
Whereas among the 140,000 job losses reported by the December 2020 employment
report, the entirety of the jobs lost were held by women;
Whereas President Biden recently said that he hopes ``a significant percentage''
of schools will reopen 5 days a week within his first 100 days;
Whereas President Biden also recently urged that teachers be vaccinated to
support this school reopening process, saying that ``we should move
[teachers] up in the hierarchy'';
Whereas the recently passed American Rescue Plan provides an unprecedented
$130,000,000,000 in funding specifically to help K-12 schools reopen
safely, with funds to reduce class sizes to comply with social
distancing, modernize HVAC systems, and hire more school custodians and
nurses;
Whereas the most recent CDC research finds that it is safe to reopen schools as
long as safety precautions such as universal masking, social distancing,
and sanitation and cleaning rules are in place; and
Whereas other CDC research has found little evidence that schools have been a
major contributor to increased community spread of COVID-19: Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of Congress that--
(1) schools reopening for in-person instruction as quickly
as is safely possible should be a key priority for all levels
of our government;
(2) school districts across the country should use funding
for K-12 schools under the American Rescue Plan to safely get
children back into the classroom; and
(3) States should consider how best to reopen schools when
developing their vaccination rules.
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