Rise of E-Learning during the COVID-19

Rise of E-Learning during the COVID-19 will impact the continuity of learning for over 285 million young students in India in the short term, but also have far-reaching economic and social implications.

National governments around the country began temporarily shutting down schools and universities as a measure to prevent the novel corona virus from spreading, in the first week of March’2020. When they reopen, there is no certainty. This is a crucial time for the education sector. Over the next days, with no immediate solution to end the Covid-19 outbreak, school and university closures will not only impact the continuity of learning for over 285 million young students in India in the short term, but also have far-reaching economic and social implications.

These closures were the first to affect the structure of education and learning, including the methodologies for teaching and evaluation. Online teaching methods could only be adopted by a handful of private schools. On the other hand they have completely shut down their low-income private and government schools because they lack access to “E-Learning” solutions. The students are under pressure from both social and economic stress, in addition to the missed learning opportunities.

Decline in international higher education demand:

The higher education sector was also significantly affected by the pandemic, a critical factor that determines the economic future of a country. A large number of Indian students – Chinese only, second only – enroll in universities outside the United States, Canada, Australia and China, especially in countries worst affected by the pandemic. Many of these graduates have already been stopped from joining school. In the long term, a decline in international higher education demand is expected if the situation persists. However, it is the disease’s impact on the job rate that is of great interest to all.

Recent Indian graduates fear that companies will withdraw jobs due to the current situation. Estimates from the Center for the Surveillance of the Indian Economy on unemployment rose from 8.4% in the middle of March to 23% in early April, and urban unemployment to 30.9%. The pandemic of course transformed the hundred-year – old model of tactical talk into a technologically-driven one. This disruption in training leads policy makers to understand how engagement is to be promoted on a large scale, while ensuring inclusive “E-learning” solutions and addressing the digital gap. To manage the crisis and build a resilient Indian education system in the long term, a multipronged strategy is necessary.

Immediate action is essential to ensure that government schools and universities continue to learn. Open-source tools for multimedia learning and learning management applications can be used to ensure teachers can teach digitally. This can change the education system, enable students and teachers to choose from various options and increase the efficiency of education and training. Many aspirating districts have initiated innovative mobile learning models that can be adopted by others for the effective delivery of education.

Strategies to prepare for the growing demand trends worldwide for higher education , particularly in relation to student movement and faculty mobility worldwide and improving the quality and demand of higher education in India are required. In order to mitigate the effects of the pandemic on job offers, internships, research projects, immediate action is also needed. In order to create a cohesive learning network, it is also necessary to reconsider existing approaches for teaching in school and college, merging classroom education seamlessly with the e-learning modes.

Problem with EDTech reforms to implement the technology :

The biggest problem with EDTech reforms at national level is to implement the technology smoothly in Indian education, with over 15 lakh schools and 50, 000 colleges, the most diversified and highest education network in the world at present. In addition , it is important for HEIs in India, as well as “E-Learning” platforms (with a rapid growth) to establish quality assurance mechanisms and benchmarks in online study. Many e-Learning players are offering several courses with different certification levels, methodology and evaluation parameters on the same subjects. Therefore, classes can vary from one “E-Learning” platform to another.

Traditional Indian knowledge is well known worldwide for its scientific innovation, values and advantages in developing sustainable technologies and medicines. Indian traditional knowledge system courses should be integrated into today’s mainstream university education, to serve the larger cause of humanity in the areas of yoga, Indian Medicine, Architecture, Hydraulics, Ethnobotany, Metallurgy and Agravity.

With the task of closing up schools and colleges, the Indian union, government departments, and private players have published regularly details on various initiatives conducted by ministries such as the MHRD, the Technical Education Department, the NCERT and others to support young people and students. A few actions include SWAYAM’s on-line teachers’ course, CEC-UGC YouTube Center, Vidwan, a database of information experts and prospectives, and a PPP-based initiative, based on Aicte, which offers information to peers and prospectives collaborateurs, including e-PG Pathshala and e-inhalte modules on social sciences, arts, fine arts, natural and mathematical sciences, and AICTE.

Regardless of the technologies available, the online lessons are only as strong as the instructors and students’ ability to understand the latest teaching process. One of the teachers thought that the students in online classrooms were generally more open and active compared to traditional classrooms. It may be because the theory is fresh and the teachers are looking forward to discussing it. Often, their peers are not troubled, even in a normal classroom. Teachers see the lack of a blackboard as a drawback and network connectivity as a constant problem. In the absence of the transparency of a blackboard, they are quite associated with the virtual whiteboard on Zoom application.

Most schools arrange the timetable according to the topic weighting, distributed over the entire week. They also ensure that everything from attendance to student assignments is done in the same way as their regular classroom, so that students don’t have to struggle to cope. Students who miss classes are contacted instantly through WhatsApp and proper reasons are taken. Schools are continuously sending out circulars and text messages, holding parent registration and testing processes where senior teachers are updating classrooms and collecting input to strengthen them in the future.

Yet there is no doubt that this is e-learning journey for all of us. The consistency of online learning requires future studies. At present, there was little room to get into the specifics of quality control of the electronic teaching system, because the key priority was to save the education process and to continue it in whatever way possible. When changing physical education into online education, the country requiress to estimate how successful was the process for the whole country or the world.