Cross-National Variation in School Reopening Measures during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Kate Steed Hoffman, Stanford University; Mariana Barragan Torres, University of California-Los Angeles; Christine Min Wotipka, Stanford University

Version:  View help for Version V1

Version Title:  View help for Version Title Dated May 26, 2021

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  Qualitative-Documents 05/23/2021 10:57:PM
COVID-19 - Data Sources.csv text/csv 14.7 KB 03/25/2021 09:22:AM
COVID-19 Complete Country and Measures List.csv text/csv 23.3 KB 03/25/2021 09:26:AM
COVID-19 Measure Codes and Themes.csv text/csv 9 KB 03/25/2021 09:22:AM
COVID-19-country_final_AERAOpen.dta application/x-stata 16.7 KB 11/19/2020 09:37:AM
COVID-19-reopeningAERA.do text/x-stata-syntax 14.9 KB 03/24/2021 05:51:PM
Readme.text.rtf application/rtf 2.1 KB 05/25/2021 07:41:AM

Project Citation: 

Hoffman, Kate Steed, Barragan Torres, Mariana, and Wotipka, Christine Min. Cross-National Variation in School Reopening Measures during the COVID-19 Pandemic . Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2021-05-26. https://doi.org/10.3886/E135922V1

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary To contain the initial spread of the SARS-CoV2 virus and the COVID-19 disease, many countries opted to close schools. However, the importance of schooling to mitigate inequalities motivated many economies to reopen schools after having formulated various COVID-19 mitigation and containment strategies. Using an exploratory sequential mixed method design, we explore the measures undertaken by countries when reopening schools and how these measures varied cross-nationally. We find that countries formulated a wide range of school reopening measures (total: 243) to mitigate the spread of the virus in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. From a policy diffusion theoretical perspective, findings from our statistical analysis suggest that cross-national diversity in policies are related to both internal and external country factors such as peer emulation mechanisms, income, and past pandemic experiences. We urge international agencies for more explicit guidelines for effective school reopening measures.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms COVID; SCHOOLS; EDUCATION; REOPENING
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage International
Time Period(s):  View help for Time Period(s) 3/2020 – 7/2020 (Second quarter of 2020)
Collection Date(s):  View help for Collection Date(s) 5/2020 – 7/2020
Data Type(s):  View help for Data Type(s) aggregate data; other; text

Methodology

Sampling:  View help for Sampling This dataset includes countries with documented school closures due to COVID-19 that also reopened or released reopening plans by July 2020. To determine which countries met these initial criteria, we cross-referenced two databases from UNESCO (2020) and the Center for Global Development (2020), frequently checking for updated information on a country-by-country basis over a multi-week-long period. We chose to only include countries in which schools had formally closed to ensure that they had been significantly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.3 In the end, we determined that 49 countries fit our selection criteria.
Data Source:  View help for Data Source

Qualitative Data:

Research Reports. 

We first collected reports and publications from research institutions, which each described one or more country(ies)’s reopening strategies and were found through the following processes: turning to core international organizations in the field of education such as UNESCO, the World Bank, and UNICEF; looking at renowned research institutions such as the Learning Policy Institute and the Center for Global Development; and soliciting information from colleagues working in the education research space who were knowledgeable about school reopening plans. With many reports aggregating policies and practices across multiple countries, this collection arrived at 10 documents detailing measures of  28 countries.

Primary Documents. 

To collect official policy documents, we predominantly used two different search methods. First, based on the Center for Global Development’s list of countries that had reopened and other already collected research reports such as that of the Learning Policy Institute, we searched for policy documents for each country. In these instances, we searched the official websites of the ministries of education (or the equivalent) for relevant documents. Second, we again requested these documents from our colleagues around the world. These efforts gleaned 35 documents.

Popular Media Sources. 

Finally, to ensure a comprehensive number of countries, we searched popular media sources and news outlets, which gave us an additional 60 documents. These were found by conducting online searches using terms such as: “COVID-19 school reopening;” “COVID-19 school policy;” “COVID-19 health and safety school guidelines;” “coronavirus school reopening;” “coronavirus school policy;” and “coronavirus health and safety school guidelines.”
Collection Mode(s):  View help for Collection Mode(s) other
Unit(s) of Observation:  View help for Unit(s) of Observation School Reopening Measure
Geographic Unit:  View help for Geographic Unit Country

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Published Versions

V1 [2021-05-26]

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