Covid-19 disruption and ‘new normal’ for Schools

I attended Convent schools for my K-12 education where the major emphasis was on academic missing out on an holistic education. Thankfully, I had some good teachers in College where I improved myself as a learner and relied less on rote memorisation and test strategies and more on understanding and problem solving and becoming curious to learn in general. Now, I am a life long learner taking this course when I am 58 years old. Rather than write on how my own schooling could have been improved, I am focusing on what is important for Schools today as the very idea of schooling has been disrupted by the pandemic.

The covid-19 pandemic is literally an existential threat to humanity. When going to School itself is a great concern for any family and for individual safety of the student, the task of learning is another burden. Additionally, several families have the breadwinners who are out of job and living on government dole or managing without it. Coping with unplanned and unorganised online schooling is a great challenge because quite commonly the physical schooling may be replicated online without concern for pedagogical effectiveness or instructional design. In this week, we focused on School Inspections, which mentioned about the need to consider the socio-economic conditions of the neighbourhood and the students. Similarly, we must consider the cultural aspects of the students and the environmental conditions like the global pandemic and accordingly the inspection report must give suggestions instead of merely being critical of the shortcomings.

I read this article Dealing with the ‘new normal’. Offering sanctuary, community and hope to children and young people in schools and local organizations in infed.org series on Pierre Bourdieu on education. I thought this article was interesting, and the three key takeaways for those working in schools, during and post pandemic, are to:

• Let go of the idea that schools are fundamentally about teaching a curriculum. They are also places of pedagogy — of animation, care and education. There is a real sense in which we need to reinvent the school if it is to properly address the needs of children and young people.
• Value the work of specialist pedagogues, educators and care givers. A common characteristic of occupational groups is to look down on other occupational groups — and to think they know best. This is especially the case where one group (in this case teachers) is dominant in an institution.
• Work to convince funders (and in particular state funders) that resources are needed to employ a much wider range of practitioners.