The COVID-19 pandemic and emergency transition to remote learning prompted communication scholars and educators to explore the challenges and opportunities in online teaching with new fervor. Morreale and colleagues (2021) offered questions about instructional communication competence, learning efficacy, student engagement, and learner-centered course development in online environments to guide these important conversations and research. Considerations of these and related questions require that we examine teaching modalities and instructor--student interactions against the backdrop of heightened sociopolitical tensions and two ongoing pandemics--COVID-19 and racism. However Courtney N. Wright found it surprising that the essay (Morreale et al., 2021) and "Communication Education's" associated call for submissions to this forum did not acknowledge the centrality of inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility (IDEA) issues in this way. As the pandemics accentuate structural and attitudinal inequities within teaching and learning (Ashby-King, 2021; Simon, 2021; UNICEF, 2020), scholars should avoid framing the challenges and opportunities in post-2020 teaching. If not, then history may repeat itself, and the biases that have limited the impact of instructional communication research may continue well into the post-2020 era of education.