A Year of COVID-19: What It Looked Like for Schools A Timeline 13 min read A Timeline 13 min read It started with the closure of a single high school in Washington state on Feb. 27, 2020. A school employee’s relative had gotten sick and tested positive for the coronavirus. The school underwent a deep cleaning and reopened two days later. One month later, nearly every school building in the United States was shut down, an unfathomable moment. Schools scrambled to stand up a remote learning program—some virtual, some by passing out packets of learning materials. Most of us thought this disruption would last a few weeks, maybe a month.