Prof Javed Mughal
Keeping in view the fierce onslaught of Covid-19 pandemic and compelled by ruthless circumstances, sudden swing from class-room teaching on to the virtual mode of education has, of course, given rise to the debates and discussions on social platforms on the point whether this newly adopted style of transmitting education should be allowed to continue or stopped forthwith, and to my utter surprise I find two non-compromising mindsets unnecessarily imposing their opinion on each other i.e. those who are the owners of private institutions and others who comprise the lot of parents and the Govt. teachers, each of them trying hard to substantiate their own point of view quite illogically. This dramatic exchange of views on social media has compelled me to drop a few lines on this issue supported by reasons and evidences. And I think, I have to adopt a very simple approach to make the readers understand this conundrum in a very point plank way. The age we are faced with is an age of technology and all those who, despite being blessed with such a wonderful digital world, talk of sticking to the age of Wooden Planks and the dusty Chalks, Ink-Markers and the Chalk Boards are none but immature brains most likely to hamper the on-going progress of our young generation.
Like everything else in the universe, the educational system has also passed through a tangible evolutionary process. We shifted from the cult of clusters of pupils with gurus and rishies under the shade of trees or the river-shores and there-from to the modified academic hubs devoid of all scientific instruments and tools and afterwards switching on to the scientifically well equipped institutions and now the time is ripe when we have to decide to take a paradigm shift to an educational system sans big buildings, hostels and other expenditure-inviting paraphernalia, putting our young blood on the track of learning by earning and preparing our tiny innocent tots to cope up with the challenges of times and circumstances ahead in future. An online course requires just as much work as an on-ground format, and the amount of time you dedicate is all the same as well. However, the online format-just as a virtual workplace-affords you more flexibility. As long as you meet your deadlines and communicate with your instructor and peers, it doesn’t matter where or when you fulfill the requirements. Adjusting to an online learning model could be a challenge at first, but once you adapt to the format, there are numerous benefits to be realized. Attaining an online education can help prepare you for career advancement and demonstrate key skills to potential employers. It serves two fold purposes; first you learn how to use technology to remain in touch with your teachers, mates and the fast-changing world around and secondly you attain education while sitting at home or elsewhere away from the compelling time tables and boring atmosphere of customary dictates of conventional teachers. There is one basic difference between a human being and a buffalo i.e. the human being can not compromise with the stereo-typed activities of daily life whereas a buffalo is quite comfortable with the same grass in the trough every day. Hence digesting the same desolate and angry faces of the teachers in the classrooms daily can nowise be acceptable to our modern generation and they can have an easy escape from such an irritating spectacle during off-line schooling only through online mode of teaching.
Till yesterday we had reports that a major chunk of students in our country are being swallowed by anxiety and depression and rendered unable to do anything on the ground, thereby developing into a mere burden on their parents and this all happened in a conventionally run schools and colleges due to suffocating atmosphere created by the majority of incapable and frustrated teaching lot and the managements who always gazed at their monetary benefits more than the betterment of their students. Due to the routine negligence of the school managements, the parents (who are raw at educational techniques) take a lead to lay pressures on their children and same unplanned pressure pushes these little students into the abyss of personality disorder. This is the hard fact and there is not even an iota of exaggeration in it. Exceptions are there but majority of teachers are quite incapable of handling small children in schools or the grown up students in colleges. Apart from it, not many people have the ability to take time off from work to commit to a full-time educational program, and others often travel for work. For those who still need to juggle working and going back to school, the flexibility of an online program provides individuals with the opportunity to learn while still working and growing professionally too.
Additionally, students don’t always feel comfortable asking professors to repeat a point they make in their lectures or dive into deeper detail on a specific topic. When learning online, you can revisit past material or stop the lecture to perform additional research or organize your notes. You can work through the lesson plan at your own pace to ensure that you’re really mastering the material before moving on to the next section. This added flexibility allows online learners to move through the course work at their own speed and get the most out of the learning program. So far as small children are concerned, they feel comparatively more comfortable with online educational programmes while sitting with their parents in an independent environment away from the terrifying browbeats bullying frowns of their teachers who always make hollow claims to have created wonders in their fields with no tangible performance on the ground at all. Otherwise too, parents of the private school-students have to work in double tide since the ultimate job of a private school teacher stands confined to giving heavy home assignments only with the intention not to allow these poor tiny tots to have a leisure time even at home. Free and frank atmosphere is obligatory for these little scholars to learn comfortably and this kind of atmosphere can be possible only with the online system of education that too with the face of certain teachers switched-off. The prevailing circumstances and the growing population explosion, we know that the space for erecting tall buildings for educational institutions and hostels etc is going to be an uphill task in the time to come and under such circumstances the system we have adopted now due to COVID is the best one where one small office with a very scanty staff and a computer system with internet facility is more than enough to engage and accommodate ten times greater number of students than otherwise. The teachers can run the classes online while sitting at home and their salaries and fee collection system for schools shall go as usual.
The poor students, who can’t afford to spend thousands on daily rounds of schools, will spend a meager amount of money to buy cell phones with a comfortable internet datum to sit at home and learn online. Side by side our grown up students can work to earn their livelihood as well and they can cease to become burden on the weak shoulders of their poor parents. Now-a-days the freedom from the conventional and old-fashioned teachers is, no doubt, the greatest freedom ever and badly desiderated by our students in the present times. Freedom from the fruitless home work and frightening postures of their teachers is, no doubt, the greatest freedom and may be called a precious gift of COVID-19 to our upcoming generation. We must support this newly adopted approach of the Govt. to adopt this online mechanism of education with all thanks to the COVID in a way otherwise we had not even a distant idea of changing this hackneyed and rotten system of teaching learning process. Twenty miles journey always start with a single step and similarly the online teaching fashion is a beginning and can of course snowball into a big and the most prolific experiment if we continue our support to it. The private and public institutions will work as usual with no loss to their incomes and students will heave a sigh of relief and achieve their goals without pulls and pressures.
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