The need for inclusive online teaching methodologies is now more than ever.
When the whole world is on its way to cope up with the COVID crisis, India is struggling to breathe for want of Oxygen. It has been a year since online education and teaching has taken the front seat in the education realm. In times like these, when people are craving for physical interaction, E-education seemed like the way to go ahead. When the whole world is struggling to survive and overcome these COVID times, the health sector has certainly become a priority. We have witnessed philanthropists and several organizations investing in the health sector. While everything seemed to have come to a halt for a brief time, developments started at a slow pace like the reopening of educational institutions in shifts and everything was up and running with proper safety and precautions. There were academic losses, but educational departments and teachers rose hitherto to unheard and unseen challenges. Our teachers and students left no stone unturned and did their very best to overcome these challenges. Online education seemed like the only way to go ahead and digital literacy transformed into a must-have.
My question however is, when we look for alternatives during challenging times do we also account for inclusivity?
India’s landmark Right to Education (RTE) Act, 2009 completed its decadal anniversary 2 years ago. Further, renewed focus on skilling and higher education, the RTE continues to remain one of the most important catalysts for India to reap its much-anticipated “demographic dividend.” The Right to Education Act (RTE) provides free and compulsory education to children and enforced it as a fundamental right under Article 21-A of the Indian constitution. India became one of 135 countries to make education a fundamental right of every child when the act came into force on 1 April 2010. The title of the RTE Act incorporates the words ‘free and compulsory’. ‘Free education’ means that no child, other than a child who has been admitted by his or her parents to a school which is not supported by the appropriate Government, shall be liable to pay any kind of fee or charges or expenses which may prevent him or her from pursuing and completing elementary education. ‘Compulsory education’ casts an obligation on the appropriate Government and local authorities to provide and ensure admission, attendance, and completion of elementary education by all children in the 6-14 age group. With this, India moved forward to a rights-based framework that casts a legal obligation on the Central and State Governments to implement this fundamental child right as enshrined in the Article 21A of the Constitution. But in the post COVID world, schools and classrooms have reached our smartphones, can this fundamental right be exercised by the ones that need it the most? According to the National Sample Survey on Education 2017-18, only 15 percent of India’s rural population has access to the Internet and the figure is even lower for children from marginalized social groups.
As per the data on COVID-19 and school closures (Remote Learning and Reachability Report), issued by UNICEF in August 2020, the report expressed concerns over children from economically disadvantaged families struggling with access to remote learning because only 24% of Indian households have internet facilities to access e-education. There is a large rural-urban and gender divide that is likely to widen the learning gap across the high, middle, and low-income families, claims the UNICEF report. The fundamental right to education today is being dictated by the availability of resources for online education. It is simply assumed that everyone has access to smartphones and an internet connection. Children of parents who cannot afford smartphones have been suffering education losses for over a year now. Imagine the kind of un-attachments these students might be feeling towards their schools and studies. The classroom was the one place where students from all social backgrounds could come together and learn together and seek education. And with our classrooms shifting online and families with lesser digital resources than others might exhibit resistance in sending their kids to schools again in the future, once they reopen. Retention rates may see a decline after schools open. Many students by then would have already started supporting their families, and then education would no longer be a priority. One witnessed such cases after the Uttarakhand floods; families who lost an earning member then meant the automatic shifting of the financial responsibilities onto the shoulders of the elder child. Many students quit school to help their families financially.
There is a dire need to propel this wall creating hindrances towards universal education in rural India. The enhancement in the digital infrastructure of schools, and not expecting every child to have a personal digital device, is one way to go about it. More inclusivity in our approaches, keeping in mind the child at the last mile, as well. Catering to our students in such a way that everyone feels included and attached.
Even as I write this blog on my laptop, my heart reaches out to millions of children across the globe, who do not own a digital device for whatever reason and with every passing day, I realize the widening gap increases, even further. The gap between children and their education. The distance among social groups from where these kids are coming. The distance between them and their dreams. The distance between hope, vision, and reality. The distance between them and their Right to Education. The distance between them and the world they want to be an equal part of! There is a distance that we need to bridge- because every child matters and matters equally.
Simrat Kaur is Anchor, Strategic Partnerships (Uttarakhand) with Dream a Dream