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School closures and continuity of learning measures
School closures were common throughout the region in 2020 and 2021, including during the pandemics, epidemics and natural disasters referenced in the questionnaire. School leaders were asked to indicate how long their school was closed due to, respectively, a pandemic, epidemic, natural disaster, or other reasons in these years. Durations for school closures were collected separately for each of these categories.
School closures
On average, 21% of students attended schools in Small Island States that were closed for more than eight weeks due to a pandemic in the years 2020 and 2021, while 16% of the students attended schools that were not closed at all.
Continuity of learning measures
Along with the school closure information, school leaders were asked to indicate what measures were in place to provide continuity of learning during school closures. The measures that were asked about focused on the provision and availability of learning materials and communication with students and parents. Table SLT3.4 shows the percentage of students in Small Island States in PILNA 2021 who attended schools with specific continuity of learning measures being implemented, available but not implemented, and not available.
About half the students in Small Island States attended schools where learning materials were delivered to student’s homes (54%) or made available for pick-up from school (49%) during school closures.
The most widely implemented measure for learning continuity was, however, emailing learning materials to students or their parents; 61% of students attended schools where this measure was implemented and a further 31% attended schools that had this measure but did not implement it. Similarly, 58% of students attended schools that communicated with students or parents by email during closures and a further 30% attended schools that had this measure but did not implement it.
Interestingly, radio, often considered the most readily available mass media tool, was not fully utilised as a means of learning continuity during school closures in Small Island States. On average, only 11% of students attended schools in Small Island States where learning materials were broadcast on radio.
What does this mean?
School closures affected large numbers of students across the region during 2020 and 2021. Pandemic-related school closures were the most common in Small Island States and only 16% of students attended schools that were not closed for a pandemic. Countries experienced different levels of school closures for pandemics, epidemics, natural disasters, and other reasons.
To provide continuity of learning during these closures, many measures were made available for students in Small Island States. Commonly, these involved physical learning materials, although the measure implemented across the greatest proportion of students was emailing learning materials to students or parents. There were also significant efforts by some schools to provide communication with students and parents through social media and email during closures.
