Ready or (Definitely) Not: Learning to Teach in a Pandemic Classroom

By Cooper Sved

In the summer of 2021, I sat on the floor of my alma mater’s basketball arena next to my mother and my partner, eager to graduate with my teaching degree. We were isolated and told to sit with our “pod” for the duration of the ceremony. As the convocation’s student speaker, I was one of the fortunate few who were able to leave their seat and remove their mask.

That fall, I was to assume a position in an unfamiliar school some 200 miles away. Despite graduating with honors, I had not once set foot in an elementary school classroom. That August, I oversaw my very own in-person class populated by panic-stricken, masked five-year-olds. Unsurprisingly, I crashed and burned.

Cooper Sved

Cooper Sved teaches a first-grade special education inclusion class in northern Virginia. He is finishing his master’s in education policy studies at George Washington University. Cooper has interned for the Educational Testing Service and the U.S. House of Representatives. He currently resides in Washington, DC.