This fall, millions of American students won't get to hear that bell.

It's funny just hearing that sound takes me back.

You're hanging out in the hallway or talking to your locker, making plans for the weekend,

and then that bell.

You're running, sliding into your desk before the teacher notices anyone is late.

For many kids, school isn't going to sound that way.

It's not going to look that way for a while at least.

When my seven-year-old eventually does return to the classroom, I often wonder what will

have changed.

The truth is, probably, a lot.

Disruptions caused by COVID-19 are far-reaching, and when it comes to our education system,

far worse than we could have imagined just months ago.

So all this week, we're trying to understand those ramifications just a little bit better.

We'll find out what it means to take the traditional public school experience and move

it away from group work and recess and field trips to a system that relies on tablets,

apps, and lots of video calls.

It's a series we're calling Coronavirus in the classroom, and if there's one thing we've

learned this week, and talking to dozens of parents and teachers and experts,

it's that the education crisis, born out of this pandemic, is fraught.

So what we want to do is we want to get our schools open.

We want to get them open quickly, beautifully in the fall.

The science should not stand in the way of this.

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