Is India ready for online classes??
Lock-down across the globe as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic have adversely impacted educational institutions, with over 1.2 billion enrolled students out of classrooms at the moment. The complete shutdown of all schools and universities has affected an unprecedented explosion of online education using virtual classrooms, online resources, and tools of information dissemination, raising pertinent questions about the capabilities of Indian institutions to effectively and urgently adapt to the online mode of learning.
As an immediate measure to stem the spread of Covid-19, most educational institutions have been shut since the end of March. It is still difficult to predict when schools, colleges and universities will reopen.
Teachers and school administrators have been advised to continue communication with students through virtual lectures or portals like Massive Open Online Courses. However, in the absence of physical classrooms and proper digital infrastructure, both teachers and students are facing unprecedented challenges.
The major challenge of remote learning is disparity in access – from electricity and internet connections to devices like computer or smartphones.
Access to electricity is crucial for digital education, both for powering devices as well as for connecting to the internet. While the government’s Saubhagya scheme to provide electricity to households shows that almost 99.9% of homes India have a power connection, the picture is less luminous if we look at the quality of electricity and the number of hours for which it is available every day.
Mission Antyodaya, a nationwide survey of villages conducted by the Ministry of Rural Development in 2017-’18, showed that 16% of India’s households received one to eight hours of electricity daily, 33% received 9-12 hours, and only 47% received more than 12 hours a day.
Even the penetration of digital technologies in India has been haphazard and exclusionary. According to the 2017-’18 National Sample Survey report on education, only 24% of Indian households have an internet facility. While 66% of India’s population lives in villages, only a little over 15% of rural households have access to internet services. For urban households, the proportion is 42%
The gender divide in internet usage is also stark. As per the Internet and Mobile Association of India report, in 2019, while 67% men had access to internet, this figure was only at 33% for women. The disparity is more prominent in rural India, where the figures are 72% and 28% for men and women, respectively
If the governments continue online education without necessary supportive measures, the prevailing disparity in the virtual world could translate into widening educational inequalities among learners.
Apart from access, digital education also requires regular and predictable internet connectivity. To support online work from home during this lockdown period, telecom operators and broadband service providers like Vodafone, Jio and BSNL are offering facilities like additional data and free internet to their subscribers.
Would these offers really ensure a sound transaction of online classes to students across the country?
On a digital platform, how students learn and communicate with others is largely dependent on the readiness of both teachers and students to accept digital learning.
In the case of distance education, the onus of learning is more on students, which requires discipline.
There are challenges for teachers too. Not only are many of them digitally inept, a large number of teachers have never used an online environment to teach. Teaching a course online course ideally requires preparation, such as designing a lesson plan and preparing teaching materials such as audio and video contents. This has posed new challenges for many teachers.
Learning demands a conducive environment for study. However, not all students have a quiet space for learning at home. While 37% of households in India have one dwelling room, it would be a luxury for many to attend lectures in an undisturbed environment
The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed how rooted structural imbalances are between rural and urban, male and female, rich and poor, even in the digital world. With the existing digital divide, expanding online education will push the digital have-nots to the periphery of the education system, thereby increasing inequity in educational outcomes.
Thank you for reading .
#staysafestayhome.
Comments