Kick-off meeting PRESENT project – Impact of School Closures

Last Tuesday, the sounding board and participants of the PRESENT consortium gathered in Utrecht for the kick-off meeting of the PRESENT project. In this project, the PDPC, together with Erasmus MC, the Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences (ESSB), UMC Utrecht, SEO Economic Research, and Nivel, is investigating the short- and medium-term effects of school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The sounding board consists of representatives from the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport

(VWS), the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (OCW), the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), the Municipal Public Health Services (GGD), the Secondary education council (VO-raad), the Secondary Vocational Education Council (MBO- Raad), the Teachers’ Union (CNV). Two representatives were invited on personal merit, due to their experience as a LAKS (National Action Committee for Students) board member , and research on school closures at a GGD.

The meeting began with an introduction on the PRESENT project by research leader Dr. Anja Schreijer, Medical Director of the PDPC. During this introduction, the goals of the meeting were explained, which were twofold. The first goal was to bridge the gap between researchers and stakeholders, and the second was to exchange ideas among students, teachers, school boards, doctors, researchers, and policymakers on the impact of school closures on health, education, educational performance, and policy.

Following this, the four different Work Packages were introduced. The first Work Package (WP) on the effect of virus transmission consists of WP1a, a systematic literature review, and WP1b, which focuses on quantifying the effect of school closures on the spread of COVID-19. Work Package 2 focuses on the impact of school closures on work, education, and mental well-being. Work Package 3 specifically addresses the economic effects, and the final Work Package, WP4, facilitates a knowledge synthesis between the PRESENT consortium and stakeholders, providing results and recommendations for implementation. The questions and comments from the sounding board helped the work packages to critically reflect on their research plans.

Visioning Exercise

After introducing the Work Packages, a visioning exercise was conducted, where lively discussions took place between the researchers and the wide range of stakeholders that attended the day. The purpose of this exercise was to align the COVID-19 research conducted in this project with our overarching goal: preparing for the next pandemic. The exercise centered around a fictitious scenario of a new Avian Influenza outbreak and the potential measure of closing secondary schools. Participants were asked to consider the following question: “What would you like policy actors to know to better accommodate the needs of young people in case of a new pandemic?” This exercise aimed to identify knowledge gaps in our research, to address them in this project or in potential future research.

Several important points emerged, such as the need for an integrated decision-making framework to address various aspects including virus transmission, social and mental effects, the involvement and support of parents and teachers, measuring the long-term impact on education, identifying exceptions to school closures for vulnerable students, exploring alternative measures instead of full school closures, and understanding the needs of young people. Currently, the results of this exercise are being analyzed and will be incorporated into Work Package 4. Overall, the picture that emerged from the visioning exercise gave us the most important policy questions that need to be addressed through knowledge translation at the end of the project.

Researcher Meeting

After the combined session with the sounding board and the PRESENT consortium, we proceeded with a researchers’ meeting. During this final part of the day, we first reflected on the valuable input provided in the earlier sessions and how to integrate this in our research. Following this, we continued with more in-depth presentations on the research per Work Package, addressing questions and challenges, and importantly, identifying the links between the Work Packages. Building on the input from the sounding board session, we explored ways to integrate key takeaways into the project.

We look back on a successful and inspiring kick-off meeting, which provided us with valuable insights to work with for the rest of the project.