This present COVID-19 pandemic not only challenges disease control and crisis management but also

brought long-term, far-reaching and dramatic impacts on the global community; on people’s lives,
health, livelihoods, economies, and education. With this crisis going on right now, the term “new
normal” arose. There is a lot of “new normal” that happened in our everyday lives specifically in
education. According to Education Secretary Leonor Briones last July that there’s no face-to-face
classes will happen this year and implemented an unprecedented distance learning plan that has been
met with skepticism by several groups and lawmakers. In the educational context, to sustain and come
up quality education despite this lockdown, the new normal should be taken into consideration in the
planning and implementation of the “new normal educational policy”.

Frankly, before this “new normal” happened, teachers and learners are already using the internet,
computer, and other technologies in education. However, the difference is now the students are using
technology throughout the day or more specifically, having online classes. Schools and universities
scrambled to empower digital and technical learning to support whatever form of virtual learning that
learners will most likely adopt. Online learning is implemented as a solution for learning continuity
amidst school closure at this time of the pandemic. Some schools have done it successfully, while some
face issues from students, parents, and even their teachers.

As we can all see, one of the issues was this new normal is about online learning and having the digital
platforms or tools to support and enable learning. Based on an article written by Bernardo (2020),
Daisy — a single mother of 7 kids from Marikina — found out her daughter had left with an older man,
who promised to give her child a cellphone that she could use for distance learning in the coming
school year. Few families or students have turned to participate in unlawful activities so they could
earn money to provide technology that would be utilized for online learning.

Personally, even though you have some privileged to enroll and study, I don’t think that it will be
effective especially with what’s happening to our community. Based on experience, it is very
demotivating thinking about your requirements while knowing that people are suffering and even don’t
know how can they survive. Additionally is that not everyone can easily learn and not everything can
be learned online. According to an article also by Bernardo (2020), Flores, a father of 3 school children
said, “sa mga bata naman, mahirap kasi silang kumbaga, makahabol sa turo ng teacher kung sa
cellphone… kagaya noong sa isa ko, mahirap pa po siyang magbasa, hindi pa po siya ganoong kahusay
magbasa.” Despite that, he still enrolled his child with the reason of “para hindi masayang ang panahon
ng mga bata”. Come to think of it, medical field students, need actual laboratory experiments to
completely understand this and that. Without the proper way of learning those, it could affect their
future performances especially for graduating students. As I’ve said earlier, not everyone can pick up
topics that fast, and with my observation, it’s difficult not having friends who can help you with
academics parallel to they can help you since they can justify and taught more about it.

Before having my online classes, I heard many complaints from my other friends from different
universities and schools. One even told me that there are two students in their batch who drop the
school year because of distress. By that, I was really nervous and scared about what’s going to happen.
Without doubts, my first week was hell. I clearly don’t know if it’s exhausting because of my personal
issues but I’m sure that part of it was because of this new normal learning. So far, I kind of used to it
and it’s not that burdensome compared to the first week. Thankfully, I have my friends who made this
distance learning bearable and teachers who are indeed considerable.

This new normal is indeed a big challenge for all of us and there are more things we need to adjust and
to embrace. These modalities in learning presented can really continually deliver quality education to
our learners yet the question is, is it really helpful for us or it just serves as a weight for each of us?
Moreover, I know this is just a challenge for all of us and we will get through this.

Bernardo, J. (2020). The new normal for school year 2020-2021: Education in the time of coronavirus.
Retrieved 25 November 2020, from https://news.abs-
cbn.com/spotlight/multimedia/slideshow/07/04/20/distance-learning-philippines-new-normal-2020.

Bernardo, J. (2020). Students struggling to get gadgets for online classes fall victim to abuse, sexual
exploitation. Retrieved from 25 November 2020, from https://news.abs-
cbn.com/news/08/08/20/students-struggling-to-get-gadgets-for-online-classes-fall-victim-to-abuse-
sexual-exploitation