Education Systems and COVID19 The Way Forward

hello everyone

i’m assuming that those of you listening

or watching have been through

some kind of formal schooling looking

back at your experience

you’ve probably had to work in groups

because as you may know

it is well established that students

learn a lot when interacting with their

peers

you might have also gone on a field trip

to help you better understand the

lessons you’ve been taught

like going to the forest when learning

about different ecosystems but then

covet 19 came along and threw away

everything we knew as best practice in

education

this is however not the first time an

interruption to education has happened

it has happened before

in different individual countries due to

natural disasters

protests war and other reasons

but this is the first time an

interruption to education happens

globally and without being able to

predict

when the interruption will be over

ministers of education

educators researchers students parents

and the public

worldwide looked at each other and said

well but now what but there it was

the magical solution distance learning

it might have been the only way for

education systems

to demonstrate resilience many were

skeptical about it at first

russians for example were not sure about

its effectiveness

it is suggested however that we must not

use the

we must not use the term distance

learning

to explain what education systems did

during the pandemic

but instead use emergency remote

education

because systems adopted this approach in

order to survive

with minimal losses possible you see

this is an important realization

education systems

were not aiming for ideal education

delivery

but rather they switched to survival

mode

now that educators know that emergency

remote education

is the way to move forward without

interrupting education delivery

for god knows how long education systems

worldwide help to figure out

how they’ll implement emergency remote

education

the easiest way might have been online

websites and apps

with content available for self learning

and where virtual sessions take place

but we’re not talking about a group of

students or a school

or even a group of schools or

universities

where you can track the needs of

students and respond accordingly

we’re talking about nations moving from

face to face to online learning

almost overnight with all the

diversities present among its citizens

economically socially culturally etc

according to unicef out of the 127

countries with data

five methods were used for emergency

remote education

absent websites for live sessions or

self-learning

tv programs radio stations and

paper-based responses

with take-home packages in most cases

countries adopted more than one approach

to cater for the needs of

all students from different

socio-economic backgrounds

south korea for instance provided three

options for schools to choose two

or more from synchronous interactive

classes where students go online at a

specific time

to attend a class as synchronous

content-based classes

where the content is made available to

students to go through

at their own convenience or independent

assignments

where students are provided with tasks

to complete

independently some issues however were

raised

because of emergency remote education

and countries responded

quite differently to these issues i’ll

talk about

four of these issues one the digital

divide

the problem is not new but the pandemic

broadened the gap and highlighted the

inequalities that were present

long before the era of covet 19.

not every student in the world has

access to the internet

tv radio or even electricity governments

responded differently to this issue

turkey china and india were among the

countries that subsidized the internet

to students who need it

on the other hand in addition to

subsidizing the internet connection

the government in south korea provided

rental devices

to students in need another approach was

providing students with radios

as in burkina faso or using telephone

connections to deliver tasks to students

as was done in russia two trauma

psychological pressure

and anxiety the pandemic and the

lockdown were pressuring to all of us

of all age groups through though to

different degrees

the education systems should have taken

this into consideration

some systems did for instance in china

the government established counselling

services to students

as well as a hotline that residents can

call for psychological support

and provided services to help fresh

graduates

find jobs on the other hand emergency

remote education applied in saudi arabia

relied heavily on students motivation

their self-learning skills

and their parents involvement by

providing

mainly asynchronous content this

added to the heavy psychological social

and emotional impact

of the pandemic on the parents and the

students

this brings us to the third issue the

emerging educational roles of parents

parents suddenly found themselves

responsible for their children’s

education

in some countries such as saudi arabia

the parental role was essential

which not only was a heavy burden on

students and their parents

but also increased the inequalities

between students

depending on the availability of their

parents and whether or not

they have a full-time jobs of their own

as well as

their level of education and readiness

to tutor

this was also the reason that sets

unique challenges

for households with multiple children in

egypt

the last issue is that unique basic soft

and technical skills were necessary to

survive in a time of crisis

i remember spending the first 15 minutes

of a session

waiting for the professor to call the it

department

because she couldn’t log in believe me

nobody knows the need

for these skills during the pandemic

better than the i.t people at

every institution teachers and students

were suddenly in need to gain

skills related to the use of technology

to continue teaching and learning

during the pandemic japan for instance a

country widely known for its technology

and advancement

lagged introducing technology into

schools and universities

and thus its teachers and students

lacked the essential skills to survive

during the pandemic

which led the government to postpone the

beginning of the new academic year

which usually starts in april instead of

implementing

emergency remote education it is worth

noting here that

remote learning should not be

face-to-face learning

done online although a lot of countries

reported facing this challenge

i’ll give the example of india and

russia where teachers kept on teaching

the same way as they did

prior to the pandemic but instead of

standing in the classroom in front of

the students

they were now sitting in front of a

computer

this is what happened during the

pandemic what happens afterwards

what will the postcovid education system

look like

what are the lessons learned that will

help systems become

more resilient first of all we can’t

really tell the effects of the

approaches

that the education systems adopted

during the pandemic

on students education just yet this is

an analysis

that has to wait a bit longer as for

whether education systems will

change after the pandemic is over here’s

what we hope

happens one not back to business as

usual

the pandemic forced education systems to

take steps into the virtual world

which would have otherwise taken so much

time

we don’t expect schools and universities

to turn 100

virtual as is the case currently but it

is expected

that blended learning approaches to

education will be adopted

and more online learning approaches

would be implemented

two a very important lesson to take from

the pandemic

is that we must fix the systems in favor

of those who have been facing

injustice within the education system

prior to go with 19 pandemic systems

should invest to reach marginalized and

vulnerable children

as previously mentioned the issue of

inequality was pre-existing

in the system and it was only

highlighted

during the pandemic in simple words the

system should now

resolve this issue they should invest in

the infrastructure of remote and rural

areas

they must provide equal access and

support

to students three each education system

should look at its own experience to

enhance its curriculum

teacher training structure or other

aspects of education

for instance because the curriculum in

egypt was

highly dependent on road memorization

students

and teachers found it hard to shift to

research and

project-based learning during the

pandemic

how will education systems prepare for

possible upcoming interruptions

in the systems the response to the

pandemic was different in different

countries and societies

but perhaps the most important lesson

here

is for systems to create a plan b

because this is what resilient systems

look like

they have the resources and the

knowledge that help them survive

when facing challenges and maybe after

all this is over we can give parents a

well-needed break

and get students to sleep in schools for

a couple of days

weeks maybe thank you