Minnesota parents rush to create 'learning pods' for distance learning | Coronavirus - Minneapolis Star Tribune

Families are banding together for education during the pandemic, as Mara Klecker, Star Tribune reports.

Carlos and Katy Armendariz think pod learning for Juliano and Gabriela, with baby Mya, will help during the pandemic.
 Photo: Brian Peterson – Star Tribune

Once she found out that Minneapolis Public Schools would be starting the year with online learning, Katy Armendariz started texting two oth­er fami­lies about how they could get through it together.  

They decided to form a “learning pod” for their children and hire a part-time teacher to help.  

The pod of six to seven students, the parents hope, will allow for some social- and group-learning experiences while providing the supervision and child care necessary to allow them to continue their own work...

A­man­da Sul­li­van, a pro­fes­sor of educational psychology and school-psy­chol­o­gy program co­or­di­na­tor at the University of Minnesota, said learn­ing pods are “inherently exclusionary” and will “fur­ther harm stu­dents who have been and will con­tin­ue to be mar­gin­al­ized” in the ed­u­ca­tion sys­tem.  
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Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune