2020 will go down in history as the year that witnessed disruptions in living owing to the biggest Pandemic Corona. Originating from Wuhan, CORONA rapidly spread like wildfire bringing the world to a standstill. For generations, our lives had all been about socializing and within a few weeks, Social Distancing became the new way of living.
This new Ab(Normal) has had an impact on all sectors from education Industry to Healthcare System. Schools and Educational Institutes were shut down immediately, as the younger generation is at a higher risk. As per United Nation Agency data, education of 1.5 Billion children across the globe has been affected by CORONA Pandemic. Further highlighting school closures can have an adverse effect on the learning achievements of the children as parents struggle to balance their work commitments and child care. India alone accounts to nearly 300 million children in 1.4 million schools and 51,000 colleges.
Can you feel the impact that CORONA has on children in India?
In one word the impact is Humungous
College, institutes, universities launched large scale distance learning programs to keep the learning growing. Schools and colleges are taking few classes over video apps, but it’s not available to all. Only a handful of schools could make the switch to virtual classrooms. In India, low capacity of educational institutes to adapt to the change is the major factor of disruption in education. Corona pandemic also highlighted the lack of resources available to make such a change. After being shut down for over 60 days, some schools further announced summer vacations.
But for how long can vacations continue?
WHO official Dr Michael Ryan recently quoted “This virus may never go away. Without a vaccine, it could take years for the global population to build up sufficient levels of immunity”. This clearly implies the education sector need to revolutionize ways of learning.
Virtual Classrooms along with comprehensive tools required are to not just conduct virtual classrooms but manage the entire schools virtually. The system needs to be evolved from just delivering lessons to managing student-teacher data and school administration as a whole. Online schools are a necessity to reduce the disruption in the learning process. Sharing homework over WhatsApp groups, taking classes via ZOOM, TEAMS etc are working out at the moment. The education system requires more robust solutions to be resistant to catastrophes in the future.
The Way-Forward
Information Technology needs to be leveraged to not only address the ongoing crisis but built up long-term e-school models. The future of learning looks more technology-driven, where e-learning will take over traditional classroom learning, with teacher-student-parents interactions over live sessions and software & apps to manage the entire school administration from admissions, recruitments to results &everything else in between. And when schools go back to their normal routine, it’s high time that they adopt new technologies in learning so as to be ready for any unprecedented times in future.
Share your thoughts and opinion on how the education system should be reshaped?
Image Reference :
1.Photo by Pragyan Bezbaruah from Pexels
2.Photo by Julia M Cameron from Pexels