The pandemic’s future timeline is unclear

Though states are beginning to reopen their economies and are considering allowing government workers back into offices, the changes brought by the pandemic are far from over, CIO said.

“We’re having conversations about our emergency operations center, about prolonged operations,” one IT leader said. “We’ve had our EOC active for a long time before for hurricanes or floods, but it’s never been like this.”

Officials are now questioning what “the new normal” will look like.

“When we look at our end-user services, how do we safely reopen?” one official said. “It’s not immediately clear what that looks like.”

One educational technology leader noted that just because the initial move to a remote workforce and distance learning has been successful doesn’t mean preparation is done.

“Future favors the well-prepared,” the leader said. “We were already moving to blended learning, but this sped all of that up, and will continue to define the future.”