Introduction
The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the capabilities of education systems and participants to act collaboratively and with innovation during a time of crisis. This was not an easy feat. The psychological and emotional impact on educators, learners, and parents was unprecedented and well documented and discussed (Cullinane, 2020). UNESCO describes in detail some aspects that many of us did not even consider, such as a decrease in nutrition intake as students no longer get free lunches at school and their caregivers cannot provide them with adequate food. Social isolation, increase in abuse, access to resources to support distance learning, are other major impacts that this pandemic has wreaked on humanity. Fortunately, organizations such as UNESCO and national departments of education (Cullinane, 2020), are doing everything in their power to see to these concerns.
On a lighter note, the repercussions that will follow as the world heals and restarts will be phenomenal. One example is the consortium of several Canadian universities to collaboratively share and develop digital resources (University Affairs, 2020). The same article also mentions how work structures have been affected (University Affairs, 2020): students are being employed to assist educators in creating educational material or acting as mentors for younger students.
Educators also underwent considerable growth in their technical abilities, whether they ever wanted to or not. I, myself, have learned tremendous amounts about education technology available but never employed in classrooms until now.
As some areas in the world are slowly returning to some kind of normalcy, other parts are still waiting in dreaded anticipation for the height of the pandemic to strike, and kindness will be the key to support one another during the years to come. UNESCO and other frontrunners have already rolled out their support systems to assist the world’s return to a new reality. Moreover, education will not, cannot, go back to be as it was before the pandemic. New realities were glimpsed and have started taking form: increased distance learning and applied technologies such as VR and AR to explore classroom alternatives.
Personally, I am extremely excited to see the evolution of education in the near future.
References
Cullinane, C. (2020, April 27). COVID-19 and home-schooling: the crisis has exacerbated and highlighted existing education inequalities.
UNESCO. (n.d.). Education: From disruption to recovery. Unesco. https://en.unesco.org/covid19/educationresponse/
University Affairs. (2020, June 5). COVID-19: updates for Canada’s universities. Universityaffairs. Retrieved June 7, 2020, from https://www.universityaffairs.ca/news/news-article/covid-19-updates-for-canadas-universities/
Hi Ruhann,
I am glad to see some positive ideas of what we obtained during the pandemic time. It brought a lot of challenges for educators and learners. However, it also brought some opportunities to us. For example, some e-textbook are free to students in Canada. Some universities are doing collaborative project which is beneficial to teachers and students to development their comprehensive competence. Educators and teachers needs to have a deeper thinking of the integration of technology and classroom(physical and virtual). How to optimize the classroom and how to keep students motivate in lifelong learning are the major issues that educators have to think about them during the pandemic time as the current situation pushes over them to do that. I totally agree that “Education will not, cannot, go back to be as it was before the pandemic.”. It’s time for optimizing the education model.
Hello Ruhan and Eden,
It is true that many of us, being privileged, haver ignored its psychological and emotional impacts, especially on minorities. Thanks for mentioning about UNESCO. I would definitely read this more. However, it’s positive side can not be ignored. It has helped in bringing many institutions together to work collaboratively. Moreover, I agree that it has helped in the personal growth of educators too. I have also learned about so many educational tools, which were just rocket science for me like months ago. I hope this rapid change, would prove a boon for all, and soon there will be ways to mitigate all the issues.
THanks&Regards,
Rajman
Hi Ruhaan!
Hope u doing great.
I really appreciate your post the way u mentioned your viewpoint. Even I think the same way, pandemic changed millions around the globe. New solutions for education brought innovation. Even I have read about 5G technology used by countries like China, Japan, and US. Some countries developed a new cloud-based learning platform for students.
Learning will be harmonizing with these new learning modalities from live broadcasts to educational influencers with the help of virtual reality tools. This pandemic brought an opportunity for student needs in this unsure or unforeseeable world.
Thanx & Regards
Pushpinder Kaur