The hit of the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the scenario of education in India. Well, not only India but many developing countries that are still in the process to be named as the developed countries are trying to cope up with ways that can help them in modifying their education system as per the current demand. The social distancing factor has made the governments shut the offline mode of education and switch to the modernization systems i.e. online education. Well, in a country like ours where the population count stays as high as 135 crores it isn’t easy at all to makes changes overnight. But still, the country and the citizens seem to be experimenting with various ideas that can help in making the online education system formalized so that no brain of the motherland stays unproductive.
The learning from home will shorten distance: be it collaging or coaching, the dawn of the 20th century brought up a revolution where the trend of migrating to a new city in order to pursue education became a fashion for the teenagers. In recent times with the coaching industry becoming so glittery, many students opted to move to the educational hubs leaving the families behind. This migration based on higher education brought a big change in the family life of Indians. Now as the social distancing factor has forced the students to sit in the houses and continue with their studies via online education checks that every student stays near his/her family and the family distancing criteria gets removed from the society.
Maybe because of this new approach of online education students and also the parents might drop the trend of educational migration. The bond between the youngsters and the other family members will surely get to see the benefit of this newly emerged concept of online education.
A golden opportunity to high the technology dive: no wonder that the country has been doing immensely well in the technological sector to uplift the economy and be more self-sufficient. The internet service provider companies are sure to get benefitted from the online education system, as the internet is the prime resource required to assist online education. If the telecom and the internet department take this period as a challenge then India will be able to reach to a higher level. The companies should come up with accurate strategies to provide high-speed internet at a pocket-friendly price but with a suitable plan that focuses on the sustained development policies. If the companies are able to meet the internet demand of almost all the citizens then the country would surely be able to adapt this online education concept in a better way.
Getting back to the radios: we are still in the phase of fixing adaptabilities towards online education, and as said earlier adopting for the online system is easy said than done. Not forgetting the fact that the city lights are still a dream for more than 50% population of the country. Be it the central government or the local bodies of the villages, at every level the heated conversation regarding the education of the rustic crowd becomes tensioning with time. The system of online education cannot be accessed by the villages. There are many suburbs that can’t afford the online education trend, running low on the basic requirements be it electricity or the internet connection. Where there is a will there is a way, the absence of basic amenities cannot hinder the dreams of the village students, as they are the ones who want to build a bridge from the atrocities to an honorable life.
So without the internet and electricity how are the children of our prestigious farmers coping with the newly formed education system? Well to rescue them the radio is on service. Getting back to the times when technology was in its initial stage, the invention of the radio gave mankind a gift not only for entertainment but for several other benefits as well. The villagers have adopted radio as their ‘GURU’, the chapters and explanation are made to reach the suburb crowd via radio. “Our pride our farmers” and their families have proven once again that nothing is impossible, it’s the zest of these students to study that have made them find an alternative to both the online education and the school education.
The biased gaping in technology accessibility: for the city people like us changing phones is such a common phenomenon, but there is a big section of the crowd of India who still lack a smartphone. We live in a society where houses of 6 have 12 smartphones, apart from PCs and laptops. Well for us it is hard to believe that there are families in India where the capacity of members is 6 but there isn’t even a single smartphone in the house. This is a biased technology divide is very problematic in making online education reach all the students. the next problem is in context is with the internet facility, it might be possible that the student gets a smartphone but he/she has accurate internet speed in their area to manage the online lectures and tutorials isn’t a surety. Internet connection problem is not just about the affordability, but the accessibility of the network is another hindrance.
Though we have many big ISP’s but still there are numerous regions in the country that suffer from the issue of low internet speed.
We are moving towards a big change and surely there are countless troubles that obstruct our path. But anyways the participation and cooperation of all the individuals at their level will definitely help the country to adapt to the new online education concept.