Education During Pandemic: A right or a Privilege?

India holds a vibrant and arduous history in the area of education. At the advent of the 21st century, education policies were strengthened and implemented with a zeal like Right To Education (RTE) 2012, and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA). RTE was a landmark step as it brought provisions for free and compulsory education for all. It has prevented and protected young children from entering into child labour and has given them access to facilities like nutritious meals (Mid-Day Meal Scheme) and products of basic hygiene in some states. These policies are of profound importance with India being home to the largest child population in the world of 472 million children.

Despite a strong network of policies, education has faced several limitations during the current pandemic. With the shutting down of schools and increased limitations due to lack of accessibility to technology and the internet, maintaining momentum with learning has been a task. It also brought a halt to the implementation of schemes like mid-day meals which were the motivation for the parents to send the children to school.

Education During Pandemic: Reflection through Data and Experiences

The challenges were considerable for the children who lived in bigger families, cramped housing and lacked access to the internet. The access and the conditions are represented in the data below.

Along with other factors, a joint study by ILO and UNICEF raised concerns that, with schools closed, absenteeism would increase, as several children might opt out of schools to take up jobs to support their families. The study noted that whenever families seek more financial support and need income for sustenance, child labour spikes. With falling family incomes, many children might choose to stay out-of-school to take jobs and support their families.

To understand the concerns a survey was conducted by The Wire in the month of May. Under which, responses have been received from 155 students across 13 states — Assam, Bihar, Delhi, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Manipur, Odisha, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal on a random basis. About 47% of the students showed that they were enjoying online classes. The survey shows that students were not present every day or day after. 23% of students said that they couldn’t use the device for the entire day to attend all the classes because of the scarcity of devices at home. The survey also reveals the associated costs of online classes. About 11% of students reported that it was difficult for them to attend all the classes with a limited data pack. The other factor having a substantial cost implication for students was study materials. Due to the sudden closure of schools, 49% of the surveyed students did not receive new textbooks from schools.

We at The PolicyFide conducted a series of informal interviews with students and educators from different backgrounds to understand their experiences with online education.

(i) Perspective shared by the Students

In the process, one respondent who is in tenth class shared her experience with regular school and Teach for India. For her studying online is a task as everything happens through the phone only, the homework, the submissions, the classes and the tests and lack of accessibility for some students. But TFI fellows are bridging the gap by clearing their doubts and they ensure that kids don’t have a lot of burdens.

We also talked to a girl who lives in a shelter home and MAD NGO collaborated with them, to provide them with the facilities like laptops to attend online classes. The 12th class examination season for these kids in shelter homes was quite stressful amidst the pandemic. The girl said that she was confident enough to give the answers during online classes and how the children learnt to use the internet.

Another respondent added her experience after completing twelfth grade during the pandemic and her trajectory with getting an admit into Pearl Academy. She is enjoying learning online and how she’s making friends virtually on zoom calls. She’s hopeful and acknowledged the pros and cons of online education, and wishes that at the end pros will win.

(ii) Perspective Shared by the Educators

Transition to online education has been an equal challenge for educators as well, whether they were in the primary level of teaching or tertiary. The experiences and effectiveness have given insight over the issues in the implementation and the existing gaps. We can see this, in our respondents’ experiences as well.

A private school teacher in New Delhi shared an optimistic account of her experience with us. Her school could provide and afford facilities for the teachers to conduct their classes and connect with her students more deeply.

However, in our discussion with a DU professor, her experience with online education was a bit grim. She faced plenty of issues regarding the inability to develop a proper connection with the students as it is in class. She shared the challenges posed by the administration, unresponsiveness from the side of students, and struggles faced by Students with Disabilities. Besides this, the professor focused on lack of the infrastructure and concerns regarding accessibility and availability of resources and provisions.

Experiences with online learning have been different and distinctive for every respondent. On one hand, everything is running in rhythm and with due support of the institutes and on the other hand, there are hindrances over affordability, availability and accessibility. There is an urgent need to reflect over our systems, and bridge the existing gap. Some state governments have taken certain steps toward it. Addressing diverse needs by states, personality development along with command over language is focused by NCT of Delhi for higher classes, amid lockdown mental well-being of children is also taken care of through happiness classes channelized through SMS/IVR for primary grade children. Similarly, other states are also focusing on the mental well-being of students like Tamil Nadu and Telangana. Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat are actively focusing on inclusive education for students with Special needs. In such a way, the state’s education departments together are determined and committed to curbing the learning crisis remotely.