Virginia Postrel, Columnist

The Big Question: Can U.S. Schools Recover From the Pandemic?

A Q&A with outgoing Los Angeles schools superintendent Austin Beutner on how technology, data, federal funding — and Hollywood — are helping to revitalize the country’s second-largest public school district.

July 4, 2021 at 12:00 PM UTC

By Virginia Postrel

Virginia Postrel is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. She is a visiting fellow at the Smith Institute for Political Economy and Philosophy at Chapman University and author, most recently, of “The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World.”

Making up for lost time.
*Photographer: Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images North America*

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

This article is for subscribers only.

This is one of a series of interviews by Bloomberg Opinion columnists on how to solve the world’s most pressing policy challenges. It has been edited for length and clarity.

Virginia Postrel: After a career in investment banking, diplomacy and newspaper publishing, you’ve just finished a three-year tenure as superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), the second largest district in the country. The pandemic has been a huge shock to the whole educational system and it would be easy to focus on the negatives. Do you see any positive changes for the future that might come out of the pandemic experience?