The real question we should be asking is....

What would an education system designed to work within the context of Covid look like?

It's similar to the struggle to get employees to return to crowded urban offices. Covid acted as a catalyst to disrupt and change the way many people work. Many workers having experienced the benefits of remote work are refusing to go back.

For some employers, empty offices are seen as something to be filled, not an indication of a paradigm shift in the way the workforce operates. Leases must be paid, therefore we must fill them is flawed logic.

For education, decentralized learning supported by remote connectivity, smaller distributed pods of students in neighborhood facilities where socialization, mentoring and focused assistance can occur is a better model for the future. Project based learning, internships and work-study harken back to the days when school age children worked on the family farm before and after walking to school. If we pretend our school buildings aren't there we can reimagine and recreate a more progressive model that requires less redundant space.

The world has changed. Time to change with it.