- State audit shows student test scores and grades fell across Georgia during the 2020-21 school year.
- Enrollment fell by tens of thousands of students in Fall 2020 after schools closed and classes moved online.
- The federal government is sending $4.2 billion to Georgia state and local school officials to address learning loss.
The dust has started settling on the damage done to Georgia’s 1.7 million public school students from COVID-19 – and the initial picture looks rough.
Across the Peach State, teachers report their students have fallen months behind in their studies since the pandemic broke out. Thousands fewer students passed math and language-arts courses last school year, particularly younger kids. Roughly 1 in 40 students dropped out of public schools or opted to homeschool in Fall 2020. Many haven’t returned.
Those findings come from a recent state audit that sheds light on the pandemic fallout for Georgia’s more-than 2,000 public k-12 schools. While state officials pushed back on some findings, local education advocates say the auditors’ insights largely square with what they hear from teachers, students and parents still grinding through COVID-19 outbreaks.
“It’s just been a really uneven period of time where it’s been hard to have a level of consistency you need to have kids in classrooms,” said Craig Harper, executive director of the Professional Association of Georgia Educators (PAGE). “It’s hard to make that up.”
Around 60,000 more Georgia students failed math and English classes in the 2020-21 school year compared to before the pandemic, according to the audit’s findings. The largest fail rates occurred in 3rd through 8th grades – critical ages for building foundational skills in preparation for college and beyond. Thousands of students lost ground in language arts, math and reading at grade level, state data shows.
Georgia middle schoolers have struggled to keep up with reading, writing and arithmetic classes during the pandemic. (Credit: Beau Evans for State Affairs)
The state’s data likely doesn’t show the full picture of how far Georgia students are lagging in their courses, the audit warned. Hundreds of thousands fewer students took the Georgia Milestones year-end exams that help educators track academic progress. State officials gutted the annual exams to give stressed-out teachers and students a break.
Learn more about the money challenges Georgia faces when it comes to improving struggling schools in our story, "Money, Poverty and the Pitfalls of Georgia's Public Schools."
Meanwhile, total enrollment fell by nearly 40,000 students between the 2019 and 2020 Fall semesters, especially among kindergartens. Local districts that kept students in online classes long into last school year also saw big enrollment drops, the audit found. Many students switched to private schools and homeschool, the audit says. Others likely just dropped out.
“It’s easier for kids who have participated in the face-to-face option,” Carrie Booher, assistant superintendent at Henry County Schools, said in PAGE’s June newsletter. “Those who have participated in the virtual option have bigger gaps and we know we will have to apply more intervention.”
Virtual learning threw a big wrench in the equation. Just 16% of teachers surveyed in the audit considered online classes an effective format. Many kids simply tuned out during chatroom lectures, while more than a quarter of Georgia’s students – mostly in rural areas – were hard pressed to even get reliable internet without mobile hotspots on loan from the state, according to the audit.
Read about how most Georgia colleges and universities have historically charged more tuition for online classes than in-person classes in our story, “Why Most Georgia Colleges Charged More – Much More – for Online Classes.”
Barely half of Georgia’s roughly 2,000 schools even gave students the option of remote learning to start the 2022 Spring semester – indicating online classes have gotten the cold shoulder from many parents and administrators, despite COVID-19’s highly contagious Omicron variant that’s still flaring across the state.
State public-health data shows COVID-19 positive case rates have spiked in recent weeks amid a surge from the Omicron variant. (Credit: Georgia Department of Public Health)
State education officials haven’t shied away recognizing times are tough for Georgia students.
“Without question, Georgia students experienced lost learning opportunities as a result of the pandemic – including statewide school closures in 2020 and rolling quarantines and shifting instructional models continuing into 2021,” officials said in response to the state audit.
Still, it’s not all doom-and-gloom in Georgia schools. State officials credited letting local districts decide whether to open schools for in-person classes as key to boosting college-acceptance test scores and keeping graduation rates steady last year.
Georgia students’ declining grades were “in line with national trends,” officials said, “although Georgia likely fared better than other states which closed schools for the majority of the 2020-21 school year – as evidenced by Georgia’s graduating classes of 2020 and 2021 exceeding the national average on the SAT and ACT.”
Few Georgia schools are requiring virtual learning for students to start the 2022 Spring semester. (Credit: Beau Evans for State Affairs)
Officials also took issue with the audit’s bleak assessment of academic declines, noting auditors based much of their findings on surveys from 725 teachers – less than 1% of the state’s nearly 120,000 teachers.
Now, state and local school officials are eying around $4.2 billion in federal pandemic aid to address so-called learning loss over the next few years. How they use that money could make a big difference in how swiftly Georgia gets its students back on track.
Read about how state officials plan to handle Georgia’s upcoming rounds of federal pandemic relief in our story, “Georgia’s Governor has Nearly $5 Billion in Pandemic Relief to Spend. How Will He Use It?”
Many districts have already started pumping funds into summer school and more virtual options, on top of more regular class hours for students to catch up. Some schools added counselors and special tutors to work with struggling kids. Others plan on hiring more teachers and one-on-one staff to focus on the propping up younger kids who stumbled the most.
State School Superintendent Richard Woods heads Georgia's state agency overseeing public k-12 and charter schools. (Credit: Georgia Department of Education)
To pay for those things, Georgia’s public schools are set for $3.8 billion in the federal American Rescue Plan to help reverse learning losses from the pandemic. The state education agency will get an additional $425 million. Officials to spend $85 million on summer and after-school programs; $77 million to create a new office focused on boosting school performance in rural Georgia; and $68 million on teacher recruitment and retention, including a one-time pay bonus, the audit says.
The funds should bring a shot in the arm to Georgia schools – but state auditors have questions. They’re concerned state and local officials haven’t nailed down enough specifics on how they’ll spend those dollars. Some local schools already have “lacked defined plans for evaluating impact” of the federal aid, the recent audit found.
“Given the learning loss that has occurred, it is critical that local school systems make the best possible use of this one-time funding,” the state audit says. State officials told auditors it is largely up to local officials to decide how they spend the $3.8 billion, so long as they devote 20% of the funds “to address the impact of lost instructional time,” according to the audit.
State officials said they plan on largely leaving it to Georgia’s 181 school districts to spend federal funds as they see fit. They’re also planning to spend $52 million on a data system for collecting formative assessment results, which track students’ progress during the year.
“We cannot allow students to fall through the cracks," State School Superintendent Richard Woods said in a recent news release. “We know that school closures, quarantines, and varying instructional models have caused some students and families to disengage with their education.”
What else do you want to know about Georgia public schools and student impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic? Share your thoughts/tips by emailing [email protected].
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From funeral homes to helicopters and the courtroom: The other side of Georgia legislators
Ever wonder what a politician does when they’re not … well … politicking? So did we.
Georgia’s 236-member General Assembly is a part-time citizen Legislature whose members are paid a salary of $22,342, plus a daily allowance of $247, to work during a 40-day legislative session that runs from January to March. (The salary is in the bottom quartile of legislator compensation in the U.S.)
We wondered what kind of jobs or financial situations Georgia legislators have that enable them to take three months off each year and fit in all of the other meetings, calls and work that the position demands throughout the year.
State Affairs looked at the mostly self-reported information of the 180 House and 56 Senate members.
Topping the list of occupations? Lawyers.
Doctors, medical practitioners and those who are retired (or semi-retired) from a wide range of professions and careers also top the list.
Some surprising findings: This year’s assembly includes a helicopter pilot, an auctioneer, a jewelry store owner and a pontoon boat maker.
— Jill Jordan Sieder
Have thoughts, tips or questions about the compensation or workload of state legislators? Contact Jill Jordan Sieder on Twitter @JOURNALISTAJILL or at [email protected].
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Header image: Lawmakers ready to head home on Sine Die at the Georgia House of Representatives in Atlanta. (Credit: Georgia House of Representatives)
Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that Rep. Karen Lupton is now retired.
Judicial circuits get $15 million more to pare down big case backlogs
Georgia courts are getting a $15 million injection to help combat case backlogs accumulated during the COVID-19 pandemic. The money will be used to update courtrooms with new audio-visual equipment, cameras, recording devices and other technology.
Nearly half of Georgia’s 50 judicial circuits are getting the new round of money, the second and final round of federal American Rescue Act (ARPA) grants slated to be distributed this year. Two of the 24 circuits awarded grants – Flint and Pataula – are first-time recipients. The rest of the money is going to circuits that applied and were approved for more money.
What’s happening
“The bulk of this round of distributions is to modernize courtrooms and things like that,” Bruce Shaw, a spokesman for the Judicial Council of Georgia/Administrative Office of the Courts, told State Affairs.
For example, according to their backlog response plans, 21 circuits plan to use the money to add newer audio-visual equipment. Approved as a new eligible expenditure by the committee starting this award cycle, over $12 million was requested and awarded to update audio-visual equipment.
Requests also included money for temporary personnel such as senior judges, judges to serve by designation, court clerks, prosecutors, security, investigators, victim support staff and court reporters. There were also requests for supplies, personnel education and training as well as money to rent temporary space to hold court.
“We look forward to the support and efficiencies the audio-visual equipment modernization will provide to move cases faster and without technical delays,” said Supreme Court of Georgia Chief Justice Michael Boggs, chairman of the Judicial Committee.
Why It Matters
Between March 2020 and June 2021, Georgia’s judiciary system operated under a statewide Judicial Emergency Order that placed limits on court operations to protect the health and safety of people working or coming into court during the pandemic. That led to a backlog of criminal and civil cases, especially those requiring jury trials to resolve.
In October 2021, Gov. Brian Kemp allocated $110 million in ARPA money to the state’s judicial branch to deal with the backlog, especially serious violent felonies.
The Judicial Council is administering $96 million of that money to eligible courts, prosecutors and related agencies. The remaining $14 million in ARPA money went to the Georgia Public Defender Council for grants to public defenders.
With this latest round of awards, 45 of Georgia’s 50 judicial circuits will have received grants since the program began on Jan. 1 , 2022.
Challenges still persist. In addition to the backlog of cases, Boggs said there’s a shortage of attorneys during his inaugural State of the Judiciary address in March. And some courts are in need of court reporters.
In addition to dealing with serious felony cases, COVID and court backlogs tied up many civil cases. For example, Atlantans Antonio Fleetwood’s and Lakiela Edwards’ wedding plans were on hold for nearly two years. The couple finally tied the knot in a special Valentine’s Day ceremony at the Fulton County Probate Court.
How successful has the ARPA program been in helping reduce the backlog in Georgia’s 50 judicial circuits? That’s hard to say. There is no statewide clearinghouse, Shaw said, that would give a clear picture of the progress. Or lack of it.
“It’s going to be different in each circuit,” he said. “So a statewide average would be difficult to come by right now.”
State Affairs checked in with Georgia’s 10th Judicial District, which handles civil and domestic cases for 21 counties in northeast Georgia. It has seven circuits and is the third-largest district in the state.
In the first few months of this year, the Augusta Judicial Circuit, the 10th District’s largest circuit, has seen its pending serious violent felonies drop by 37%, District Administrator Tracy J. BeMent told State Affairs.
Alcovy, another circuit in his district, “has done extremely well in prioritizing serious, violent felony trials this past year and has worked down their [cases] quite a bit,” BeMent said.
As of last August, the latest data available, “Alcovy had cleared out 54 serious felonies and was on track to complete almost 49 trial weeks for 2022 amongst their five judges,” Bement added.
In the Toombs circuit, clearance rates are low but they’re prioritizing backlog cases, BeMent said. The Western circuit in Athens continues to have a backlog “as they have a number of cases that have yet to be indicted,” he said.
What’s Next?
More work remains to be done.
“The challenge continues to be making sure we have appropriate staff and that we’re fully staffed and that that staff is trained and ready to go,” BeMent said.
The ARPA money has helped add more personnel but it takes time for them to get up to speed, he noted.
So far, the district has received about $8 million in ARPA money, BeMent said, with another $3 million coming from this latest round of ARPA distributions.
Meanwhile, former President Jimmy Carter recognized The Judicial Council/AOC’s 50th anniversary this year in a Jan. 25 letter. The council was formed while Carter was Georgia governor. The ailing 39th president entered hospice on Feb. 17.
“Now the challenge is considering what is needed from all of you for the next 50 years,” Carter, 98, said in the letter. “What do future generations of judges, lawyers and citizenry need from their judicial branch? What does improving justice look like in the next decade? These are no small questions, but ones I know you will meet with the same spirit that has guided you through the past half-century.”
Have questions, comments or tips? Contact Tammy Joyner on Twitter @lvjoyner or at [email protected].
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Top image: Inside the Nathan Deal Judicial Center in Atlanta (Credit: Judge Stephen Dillard)
$69.4 billion farm-to-table pipeline: ‘If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu’
Tammy Joyner and photographer Brandon Franklin hit the road with the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus (GLBC) for the Black farms tour. There were so many great pictures, we decided to share the tour with you. Enjoy!
And check out our Q&A with Chairman Carl Gilliard and an agriculture perspective on Gov. Brian Kemp’s budget vetoes.
“Make the farm work and serve the community.” — Addis Bugg, Sr., Addis Farm
Joyner and Franklin traveled with the GLBC to several Black-owned farms, including Roberts Vineyard, Addis Bugg Farms, Paul Copeland Farms and Living Waters Farms. They concluded the tour with the “At the Table Roundtable” discussion event with Georgia farmers at Fort Valley State University.
Can you spot the bull?
Have questions, comments or tips? Contact Tammy Joyner on Twitter @lvjoyner or at [email protected].
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Header image: John Deere combine at the state-of-the-art agricultural research facilities at Fort Valley State University. (Credit: Brandon Franklin)
All images and video by Brandon Franklin.
Read more on the ag industry by Tammy Joyner.
Q&A: Even the Energizer Bunny is no match for Carl Gilliard
State Rep. Carl Gilliard has been running at a fast clip for nearly four decades, juggling a ministry, making music and movies, writing books, feeding the hungry, hosting talk shows and performing community activism.
As a teenager, Gilliard founded a local rap group in Savannah to fight gun violence. By the time he was a student at Morris Brown College, the late civil rights activist the Rev. Hosea Williams was his mentor. His activism also put him in the sphere of other influential civil rights icons: the Revs. Joseph Lowery and Ralph Abernathy, and Coretta Scott King.
Gilliard later went on to become a minister himself as well as an author, radio show host and head of a multimedia group that produces documentaries on history. Gov. Brian Kemp appointed the state representative from Garden City to the Georgia Film Commission in 2019.
Gilliard sits on eight legislative committees, including appropriations, creative arts and entertainment, and transportation.
In January, Gilliard ascended to a critical leadership post in the Georgia General Assembly: chairman of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus (GLBC), the largest caucus of Black lawmakers in the nation.
In that role, Gilliard is determined to get Black farmers solidly entrenched in Georgia’s $69.4 billion farm-to-table pipeline. “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu,” the 59-year-old is fond of saying.
Caucus member Sen. Gail Davenport, D-District 44, marveled at Gilliard’s energy. “I don’t know how he gets it all done. He’s busy,” she said. “He has led the caucus very well. He knows South Georgia very well and certainly here in the General Assembly, he has been an effective leader. He works to make sure the Senate understands the position of the House and the House understands the position of the Senate as far as the Democrats are concerned.”
As caucus chairman, Gilliard has made Black farmers and other Black businesses, access to credit, affordable housing and medicine top priorities.
But Black farmers are close to his heart. He recalled years ago when Georgia lawmakers gave millions of dollars to pecan farmers after tornado-ravaged storms damaged their pecan trees.
“We did a bill to give them money. Then we called a special session just to appropriate more money,” said Gilliard, who served on the Appropriations Committee at the time. “Unfortunately, Black farmers were not a part of [getting] that [money].”
State Affairs spoke to Gilliard about his role as chairman, what he intends to do to help Black farmers, and his other top priorities.
How do you see your role as chairman?
As chairman, I’m blessed to be able to walk in the leadership of 74 great senators and representatives from across the state. We represent the melting pot of Georgia.
What has been the biggest takeaway in your first five months as chairman?
Being able to hear from the members and their diverse communities. When we look at the big picture, we have more in common than not in common. That is the reason we did the GLBC rollout in reference to legislation because those are some of the things you hear in communities across the state.
You head the nation’s largest caucus of Black legislators. What are the economic and social issues impacting Black Georgians and how is the caucus poised to address those issues?
The needs of Black Georgians are just like what we went through when the recession hit. Everybody on Wall Street got bailed out while the people on Main Street got left out.
We are constantly playing catch-up. We’ve got to do more: continue education, start more businesses, be able to get a fair share of [state] contracts and be able to deliver services so that we can have generational wealth for future generations.
Black Georgians also have to be included in the top levels of [Georgia’s] $4.4 billion film industry. So the focus is to look at legislation that gives inclusion to levels of opportunity in film.
We must also try to get more Blacks into the business side of film, in reference to the creative opportunities of making and producing films and soundtracks.
Some people feel now that we’re in a post-racial era, there’s no need for a separate caucus for Black legislators. Thoughts?
There will always be a need for a Black caucus in Georgia. There’s always been a need since 1868 with “The Original 33” senators and state representatives who were [initially] not allowed to take office. Fourteen of them were lynched and killed. They had to go through unscrupulous challenges. We still face those challenges when we are in the minority, and we’re trying to get legislation passed for the people who are still facing obstacles. Across the nation, there will always be a need for Black caucuses because of the consensus of the people we represent. We represent over 3 million [Black] people in Georgia.
Who are Georgia’s Black farmers?
When people think about farmers, 99% of the time they just think about those who grow. But you have farmers who have land. You have farmers who have cattle. We even have farmers today [whose business ranges from] cattle to produce to hemp. They just don’t get an opportunity to [publicly] share all that they produce.
Having the resources to upgrade and getting the materials and equipment they need — that’s the biggest need.
They don’t have the workers to help with these farms. And they don’t have the money to hire. They’re just trying to survive. So there has to be a connection to workforce development to help them. The state has workforce development programs that may be able to help some of these farmers. Here again, it’s about us being innovative enough to use what we have to help them.
Have you talked to Agriculture Commissioner Tyler Harper about your concerns?
Well, we’re going to be talking with the new agriculture commissioner. We’ll give him a chance to get in the door [of his new job] first. We’re giving him the benefit of the doubt to say, ‘Let’s meet.’ This will better Georgia because agriculture is the No. 1 entity in Georgia.
What’s the caucus’ next step as it relates to Black farmers?
We’ll push for a bill that would create the Georgia Racial Equity in Agriculture Act. It would establish an Office of Equity in Agriculture, provide training for farmers of color and other historically-underserved farmers and ensure equal distribution of federal aid from the Inflation Reduction Act and Promoting Precision Agriculture Act. And we are gathering information to establish a Georgia Black farmers directory to list all of the farmers who are currently in the state to get them support from consumers as well.
Aside from Black farmers, what are the caucus’ other priorities?
Health care for all Georgians. Looking at the criminal justice system and people who are unfairly on probation for long periods of time when they have a misdemeanor. Some people are still on probation after 20 years. We’ve got to look at different elements of the criminal justice system to see what is fair and what needs to be updated.
We need to make sure we have a fair shake in the minority participation of state contracts. If we’re 30% of the population, then those contracts need to look like the representation of the 30% of minorities in Georgia.
What are some of the events the caucus has planned?
On June 7, we have the Young Leaders Conference at the Capitol for high school and college students. The caucus’ annual conference will be in Savannah July 21 to 23 and we have several for-the-people rallies coming up in Athens, Augusta, Macon and Valdosta. Lastly, we have a Black university tour the first week of September at several Black universities in Georgia.
The Carl Wayne Gilliard File
- Title: Chairman of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus; Democratic state representative, District 162 (Savannah)
- Age: 59
- Hometown: Savannah
- Residence: Garden City
- Occupation: Pastor of Family Life Center in Garden City which operates the Empowerment Center, a program that “gets people on their feet and helps them with everything from housing to credit.” He also has a nonprofit, Feed the Hungry, that has distributed about 1.5 million servings of food in 10 cities in Georgia and four in South Carolina.
- Education: Graduate of Morris Brown College; Doctrine of Divinity from the New Generation School of Seminary.
- Career: While in college, worked as the national youth coordinator for then-presidential candidate the Rev. Jesse Jackson. Became a minister in 1995. Sworn in to the Georgia House of Representatives on May 5, 2016.
- Accomplishments: In the mid-1980s, he founded the Savannah-based rap group Candy Love to combat gun violence. Creator of four national gospel plays. Host of a radio talk show in Savannah as well as gospel TV shows. Founder of Feed the Hungry Inc. in 2009. In 2012, he launched a multimedia communication company called Urban Media and the Gilliard Foundation, which produce documentaries and television specials on history. Author of an upcoming book “Power of the Pen.”
- Family: Married father of four daughters
- What do you do to relax: Watch sports. I am a writer and a filmmaker who does documentaries.
- What’s your ultimate dream? Having a farm.
Have questions, comments or tips? Contact Tammy Joyner on Twitter @lvjoyner or at [email protected].
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Header image: State Rep. Carl Gilliard touring Bugg Farm in Pine Mountain, GA. (Credit: Brandon Franklin)