Last week community leaders wrote an op-ed article describing an initiative from the African American Community Response Team to help safely close the achievement gap during COVID-19 by funding “pods” – small in-person student groups to reinforce distance learning.
Tutors running the pods might also help find the estimated 40% of maltreated children who are currently going unreported largely because teachers aren’t seeing them.
Identifying maltreatment in pods might raise concerns that more minority families would get referred to child protection, exacerbating racial disparities in that system. But no one we know supports ignoring legitimate cases of abuse and neglect.
Instead, this inequity could be better addressed first by counties training tutors on what is and is not child maltreatment, and second by implementing pods in all schools. This would enhance learning, socialization, and child safety, while simultaneously decreasing disparities.
Do you think this idea could work? Why or Why not?