As the world delves deeper into the unmasking of the onslaught of COVID-19, there has

been a myriad of measures taken by people across the globe to protect themselves and
everyone around them.

The world has been brought to a standstill as the coronavirus continues to travel the
world, compelling governments to issue nation-wide lockdown order in an attempt to
encourage social-distancing norms. Not only have these steps affected economic
activity but have impacted the education procedures too.

Children and youth are groups that have encountered a massive hit from this crisis. As
institutions have been ordered to close, for the time being, students are forced to turn to
the virtual world to continue their learning. However, this has led to a major reveal of
global inequality as many pupils worldwide don’t have access to devices or even an
available network.

Education is a basic human right and a key to poverty alleviation and inequality
reduction; thus, we must bring notice to how this contributes to a social divide.

Currently, more than 1.2 billion children in 186 countries are out of school. The sudden
shift from the classroom has not only affected their stress and anxiety levels of school
but has taken the essence of their normal lives away from friends and school
environment.

This change has had a bigger impact on the low-income families and less-developed
countries. While 95% of students in Norway, Austria and Switzerland have reliable
internet access, a bit less than 34% of students in Indonesia do, as stated by OECD data.

Almost 90% of youth in Sub-Saharan Africa don’t have access to electronic devices and
around 82% are unable to find a secure network connection and come online. Not only
that, but both teachers and students are also struggling to adapt to the rapid transition
to virtual learning.

It is certain that the digital divide continues to expand. Forced into quarantine, many
students are in the position of studying in small spaces shared with large families. The
older children have to balance out their schoolwork while dealing with the trauma of
living in a pandemic without many of the protections that more affluent families have –
such as the ability of the parents to work from home or call in sick leave.
For them, every penny ill-spent is an invitation to starvation. Bargaining with social
distancing comes at a cost that can no longer be quantified – the cost of inequality.

We mustn’t take advantage of the opportunities and privileges that we so freely

overlook. I believe inequitable access to education for every child is a fundamental right.
This current situation is a call to action for us and an epiphany to focus on the prevailing
inequalities. We must continue to close the digital divide for the future of our world.

A silent and unequal education crisis.

And the seeds for its solution.
A girl in 6th grade is sitting in a comfortable chair in front of her laptop
engaging in a class through Zoom.  Her 15 classmates are all connected.
Since the pandemic-induced lockdown, their parents, like hers, are mostly
teleworking, and are able to supervise how they are engaging. She just got
new headphones and a tablet where she can have her digital workbook
open. She is shy and feels comfortable asking questions via chat. This way
of interacting fits with her personality, so she is enjoying the class.  Too
many hours on Zoom is a drag, though, and sometimes she just mentally
disconnects. 
A boy, just a few miles away is taking turns with his siblings to watch one
hour of TV programing for 6th grade in the recently launched public TV
educational channels. His teacher sends him homework through
WhatsApp, but he can only see it at night on his mother’s smartphone.
She is out most of the day working and must take the phone with her.  His
teacher came to his house some weeks ago to give him a brand-new
textbook and a workbook.  That was great, as there is no other reading
material at home.  He has not seen most of his classmates for many
months.  Actually, his teacher has not been able to contact several of his
classmates for a long time either.  
These dramatically different experiences – and many shades of gray in
between – are happening in countries as diverse as Indonesia, Kenya, and
Colombia. Some were able to easily cope with the changes after schools
closed, but not the majority. 2020 marks a different childhood experience
that these young people will remember for the rest of their lives. And a
different education service, during many months, that might impact their
skills and economic prospects for the rest of their lives.    
This pandemic has generated suffering of an unthinkable scale across the
globe.  It is the worst economic, health, and social crisis of the last 100
years.  A once in a century event. But this suffering has been
tremendously unequal, something that should not be a surprise given the
increasing level of inequality we were already witnessing. An unequal
suffering that invades many aspects of human life.  The likelihood of not
being properly treated if infected – and, hence, dying – is higher for the
poor.  Unemployment and less possibility of teleworking is higher for
unskilled workers.  Hours worked have fallen disproportionately more on
women.  
Education opportunities have been lower and, also, dramatically unequal.
Most countries have made heroic efforts to put remote learning strategies
in place.  But the quality and effectiveness are varied, and low.  A recent
survey of government responses to COVID-19 by UNICEF, UNESCO, and
the World Bank shows that in only half of the cases there is close
monitoring of the usage of remote learning.  And in those cases, remote
learning is being used by less than half of the student population.
This generation, who is – or should have been – in school during 2020 is
bound to lose at least US$ 10 trillion in foregone future earnings. Unless
we do something, this generation might do worse than the previous and
the future one.  This potential economic loss is linked to the loss in
learning (and hence future productivity):  at the World Bank we had
assessed that before the pandemic, Learning Poverty (the share of 10-
year-olds that cannot read and understand a simple text) was already at
an extremely high 53% in low- and middle-income countries. With the
pandemic forcing massive school closures, we now project that Learning
Poverty could increase to 63%. That is, 72 million more primary age kids
will be learning poor. Reading is not all but it is a precondition to advance
many of the aspects of education we care about. And the ability of a
system to assure that their kids read with and understand a simple text is
a good proxy of its overall quality.  
In addition to lower learning in basic education, other mechanisms are at
play. We expect large increases in dropout rates both in secondary and
higher education, and most likely the total number of schooling years of
this generation will be lower. Younger children, those who were 5 to 7
years old in 2020 and were supposed to receive early childhood education
services, lost that option completely, as no form of remote learning has
been possible for them. Remember all the arguments in favor of the early
years’ investments proving they had the highest private and social
returns?  Well, all those returns disappeared. Those children will never get
those valuable years back and will be at a disadvantage compared to
previous and later generations.   
We were already witnessing an education crisis.  A silent, slow moving
crisis that was denying a future to many students.  The pandemic is
making this crisis even more serious.    
In addition, data that suggest how unequal these learning losses are is
slowly appearing. We have some evidence from rich countries. Despite
their extensive technological reach, for a few European countries for
which there is learning data post closures, there is evidence of learning
losses and higher inequality as a result of the pandemic. In
the Netherlands, researchers found a decrease in student performance
on a national exam equivalent to a fifth of a school year (roughly the
actual time out of school due to the pandemic) and a growing inequality,
likely due to children from better-off families receiving more parental
support and having better remote learning environments. In the US,
regardless of the type of college, Fall of 2020 college enrollment rates for
low-income high school students plunged by 29%, nearly double that of
students from higher-income high schools.
Among middle-income and poor countries, we only have some data of
usage of different forms of remote learning, and they reveal different
experiences for different children.  In Sub-Saharan Africa, 45% of children
had no exposure at all to any type of remote learning.  Of those who did, it
was mostly radio, TV, or paper material.  In a typical African country, at
most 10% of kids received some material through the internet. In Latin
America, the situation is better, 90% of children received some remote
learning; but less than half of that was through the internet – the rest was
radio and TV. 
In many middle-income countries a small minority, mostly in elite schools
had several hours a day of synchronous instruction.  On the other side of
the income spectrum, many students had to settle for a few hours for
their grade by TV or radio.  In Chile, a country better prepared than most
Latin American countries, it is estimated that the poorest quintile might
lose 88% of expected learning for this year, while the richest quintile “only”
64%. Note that in the southern hemisphere, the school closures that
started a few weeks after the pandemic, coincided with the start of the
school year (April or May).  There was no northern summer vacation from
May to August to try to figure out what to do.  The school closures
smacked down at the precise moment to affect the school year almost in
its entirety.  The average Latin American country has lost 160 days. And
for many children, in-classroom instruction vanished completely. 
This horrendous year, however, carries the seeds for a promising change.
It has shown that innovation and technology adoption is possible. Mental
blocks can be lifted, and quickly. Starting in April, millions of children
started communicating with their teachers and having their homework
reviewed through WhatsApp or other social media. Not the panacea – and
not everyone had access to a smartphone – but it allowed many children
to maintain contact with the education system. In many systems, millions
of teachers have started learning the use of social media and ed-tech tools
at an unheard of pace, forced by the circumstances.
And many other mindsets are changing. Education, as if there was any
doubt, is mainly a social endeavor. Parents now have a whole new
understanding about how much they can do to support their children’s
learning, and at the same time, the immense influence that a teacher can
have in the lives of children and about the complexity of a teacher’s job.
In the short run, this raises the stakes of smart and creative school
management policies that could help increase face time between teachers
and students in the coming months, trying, at least, hybrid experiences.
Authorities, teachers, and parents have to cooperate and reach a balance
to minimize both the negative health impacts and the negative education
impacts.  
In the medium-term, this better understanding of the role of teachers
raises the stakes of making teaching a socially valued career.  A good
teacher is the most important factor to guarantee quality education and
makes a huge difference in a student’s life. This pandemic has shown that
many great teachers have found creative ways of engaging with their
students, with technology or without it.  Yet, in many countries, we still see
teachers selected from low-quality applicant pools, and political
considerations defining selection, promotion, and deployment of
teachers.  Countries that do not change that will simply fail. But that is
changing.  In the state of Edo in Nigeria, in the states of Ceara and Sao
Paulo in Brazil, in Peru, in Turkey, shifts towards a meritocratic career are
being consolidated,  and countries are investing in coaching, schools-
based practical training, providing feedback to teachers to excel in their
classroom engagement, and giving them tools to perform better in class.
Going forward, as schools reopen even with modified schedules and
curriculums, educational systems will need to be more flexible and adapt
to the student’s needs.  That flexibility requires giving teachers the tools
and support to provide a more personalized and flexible learning
experience that ensures that all children within the classroom learn.  That
is a critical element to making systems more equitable. Technology can
have an incredibly powerful role to provide these tools and complement
the work of the teacher. That is another critical lesson that some countries
are starting to build on: the pandemic has shown that the digital divide
has to be closed at a much faster rate. Technology will be critical also to
make systems more resilient, allowing for a continued educational
experience at home and at school. 
All this will require resources. Closing the digital divide will not be cheap,
having the right number of teachers and investing more in a
professionalized well-respected career, will also require resources. The
complex management of the school system – which is being pushed to its
limits – requires resources.  It is a challenge for both Ministries of
Education and Ministries of Finance defining the investment path that is
needed in the coming years to provide a minimally decent service for all
its children and youth. This investment path requires a financing path that
maps into higher domestic resources mobilization, mainly taxes. There is
no magic wand. A renewed social contract, and a political commitment to
invest what is needed to provide the right opportunities to all is
unavoidable.  
In this compilation of 30 blogs, written by both World Bank staff and guest
bloggers between July and December 2020, we dig into all these issues in
detail. I welcome you to explore.

The silent and unequal education crisis

by REMINA ALEKSIEVA /JUNE 12, 2021

Disclaimer: This blog post solely reflects the opinion of the authors and should not be
taken to represent the general views of IPPR’s management/ editorial team or those of
fellow authors.

The COVID-19 pandemic has upended education systems around the world. Schools
closed and students and teachers needed to adapt to the challenges of distance learning.
This disruption accentuated the long-term structural failings of education systems that
have long impeded children from achieving their full potential. It has also raised
questions about the equity and equality in education that highlight the need for
policymakers and governments to rethink and way education systems around the world
operate. 

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned of a “catastrophic education
emergency’’, as at least 168 million children have missed almost an entire year of
education. Social distancing measures and regional travel restrictions prompted a
prolonged closure of schools around the world. Many of them remained closed despite
openings of restaurants, bars and other social venues, causing a political stir in countries
such as the US, that have remained rather silent about providing equal access to
education (The Economist, 2020). 

Many governments still find it challenging to provide the necessary infrastructure and
human capital to get schools going again, and some of them have remained largely closed
since March 2020. In middle and low income countries, access to digital technology is
scarce, internet connection is poor and children often lack a quiet place to study (OECD,
2020). Earlier this year, the UN Institute for Statistics estimated that during the world-
wide school closure, 40% of students did not have access to the internet and could not
learn adequately online (Saavedra, 2021). The economic and educational fallouts from
this are dire – around 150 million more people could be forced to live in poverty,
pressuring more children to leave school. The current ‘’lost generation’’ of students is
estimated to lose approximately $10 trillion in earnings due to missed education
opportunities. 

The pandemic has also raised important questions about the quality and outcomes of
current education systems. There were already growing concerns about ‘’learning
poverty’’ – the inability to read and understand simple text by the age of 10, particularly
in lower and middle income countries. According to the World Bank, learning poverty
rates are set to rise to 63% in low and middle income countries, leaving millions of
children illiterate and ill-prepared for the job market (2020). However, even in countries
where face-to-face or online teaching is in place, this doesn’t necessarily mean that
children are learning. International and non-governmental organisations have long argued
that education systems globally need to change in order to ensure children are equipped
with at least the most basic skills. Worldwide, millions of children – now young adults –
lack basic skills such as calculating correct transaction changes when shopping,
understanding prescriptions or public transport schedules. If systematic changes are not
implemented fast, younger children that are the most severely affected by the schools’
closure are projected to lack these skills to an ever greater degree.

The current circumstances of online education have reiterated a very old problem with
education – the inconsistencies of what textbook learning methods are thought to teach
and what they actually omit – the development of behavioural, emotional and social skills
that are fundamental for students to build a successful and satisfactory career (Jones &
Doolittle, 2017). The CEO of the Azim Premji Foundation, a philanthropic education
organisation – Anurag Behar – comments that the problem with online learning lies not
only in the poor internet connectivity or the lack of technological devices for children,
but that it hardly captures the core competencies that students build – the social,
emotional and cognitive capacities that help them thrive in our complex world. Virtual
lessons, he argues, are currently not effective to provide these skills for children. We
know that the issue is not merely about whether teaching is done online or in person – the
content and teaching methods require improvement to account for the skills that adults
need in the 21st century – something that global education systems have been battling
with for decades now. Despite this, the pandemic has also paved the way to thinking
about how to integrate technology into the classroom contributing to a more interactive
and creative learning experience. 

School closures have also interrupted high-stake exams. Governments were forced to
make difficult decisions as to whether to conduct important exams, which revived the
question of their fairness and value in education systems around the world. High-stake
examinations can be challenging to prepare for and can disadvantage students that are
particularly dealing badly with pressure, no matter how clever they are. These narrowly
formatted exams often times limit the way knowledge, critical thinking and creativity are
assessed, leaving useful but more difficult skills to measure out (Wall, 2005). The
negative impacts of high-stake exams are concerning. They can potentially lead to a
range of mental health problems that can in turn influence the students’ performance at
school, as well as their quality of life. Yet abandoning exams can cause a cascade of
issues, such as implicitly encouraging students to learn just for the grade or the
perspective of unfair assessment if their progress is assessed throughout the year.
Objective and adequate assessments also need to change, because without them,
disadvantaged students would be unable to learn appropriately. 

But how can countries solve the current challenges in education? These are unlikely to be
solved by a quick initiative, even if implemented globally. Instead, we need a long-term,
holistic and connected approach to education, where all students are supported effectively
depending on their needs. Evidence shows that education systems that adapt to the local
needs of students and that can adjust teaching and learning amidst changing
circumstances are better at ensuring education is equitable (OECD, 2020). Inequalities
must be addressed early in childhood to ensure children are ready to learn when they are
set to enter school. The difficulty of this task, however, comes from the fact that
education inequality is often tied with economic and social inequalities that require
holistic preventative policies (García & Weiss, 2017). 

However, there is hope. Governments and institutions now have the prerequisite to
comprehend what equity in education looks like and why it is an important feature of
high-quality schooling (Sahlberg, 2021). We now know that school is not only a place of
acquiring knowledge – it is a fundamental part of the social fabric that helps develop the
emotional and social capacities of students. Schools also prepare children to approach
and respond to challenges healthily and effectively and form healthy relationships with
other people, not simply reproduce knowledge memorised from textbooks. Making
education systems globally more equitable requires a better understanding of the
complexity of skills that students engage with and develop at school.

References: 
1. Free education has been the only upward mobility opportunity for non-
privilege children in Sri Lanka. Covid pandemic and government’s
inability provide affordable alternative ways and means to continue
education has been dealt a devastating blow to these children.
2. School education in Sri Lanka is facing an unprecedented crisis due to
Covid 19 pandemic and threatening to leave 60 percent of student
population behind, claims teacher trade unions and concerned civil
society actors. In a public appeal Joseph Stalin, General Secretary,
Ceylon Teachers Union has called for urgent attention and action to
remedy this situation. *
3. For Sri Lanka the pandemic is not only an economic and health crisis
but also an educational crisis, which can have long term repercussions.
But the Government has not understood the gravity of this crisis yet,
states former secretary to the Ministry of Education Tara de Mel. *
4. On 18th Friday 2021, eleven teachers’ trade unions called on the
government to stop forcing teachers to teach online as so far
government has failed to provide facilities and Internet data required for
online education.
5. On 12 March 2020 Schools and universities throughout the country were
closed as a covid preventive measure. Although schools were open for
short periods of time, now and then, until now no school and university
education has been properly started. (Issues faced by the University
students deu to the pandemic  are not covered in this update.)
6. There are 10,012 government schools with a student population of 4.2
million and 736 Pirivenas (monastic schools for the education of
monks.) (There are hundreds of madrasas run by Islamic clergy.)
235,924 teachers are employed the government sector. There are 104
fee levying private schools with 127,968 students where English
medium education is offered.
7. Out of 10,012 government schools 2644 do not have toilet facilities and
1627 do not have drinking water.
8. During the 15 months of school closure only opportunity provided by the
government for the students to continue their education has been online
based distance learning.
9. One of the main teachers’ unions in Sri Lanka, Ceylon Teachers’ Union
estimates that almost 60% of the school student population has been
affected negatively in the online based distance education programme
of the Government. Primary education in rural areas is almost non-
existent.
10. The main reason for this deplorable situation is non-availability of
proper internet connections, computers, tailer made education
syllabuses and almost non-existent suitable teacher training
programmes, according to the unions.
11. Although unions and other concerned groups have repeatedly
requested, no other distance education channels, such as television and
radio, to which students in rural areas have relatively more access, have
been used.
12. Sri Lanka computer literacy (2020) is limited mainly to middle and
higher segments of the population. National average of computer
literacy is 32%. (Urban 43.5%; Rural 30.7%; Estate 12.1% – Persons 5-69
years old is considered as a computer literate person if he/she could
use computer on his/her own, even playing a game) Digital literacy:
National 49.5. (Urban 65%; Rural 47.6; Estate 23.1 – Persons 5-69 old is
considered as a digital literate person if he/she could use computer,
laptop, tablet or smartphone on his/her own.)
13. Vast majority of the students, who can afford to own an
economically priced smart phone use them for online education.
Nonetheless, online education accessed through smartphones limits
access to reading materials, writing assignments, and solving quizzes
etc. in Some areas students had to climb trees and hills, walk distances
to access internet date of 3G/4G data connections. Further medical
personal has warned that prolonged usage of smartphones could harm
students’ physical and mental health. *
14. Because of non-availability of a comprehensive national/ provincial
work plan for teachers, some students must be on smart phones from
6.00 am to 6.00 pm claims Ceylon Teachers Union. Female teachers are
forced to wear sarees while doing online teaching. Students are forced
to wear school uniforms just to sit in front of a smart phone. Instead of
addressing the issue with due seriousness, government focus on
 trivialities like uniforms. As majority of teachers do not have skills and
access to online platforms, they use PDFs and WhatsApp massages in
online teaching. *
15. Teachers have not been considered as frontline workers in the
vaccination programme by the government. They have not been paid
any expenses for providing online education.
16. According to teachers’ unions only 5-10% of the syllabuses have
been covered by online education. As Sri Lanka’ school education is
exam centric this will affect majority students. *
17. The report published (Sep 2020) by the Presidential Task Force on
Education Affaires has not even touched upon any of these issues.
18. Sri Lanka first Covid 19 case was reported 27 January 2020. Only 19
deaths were reported during the first wave of the pandemic.
19. Second and third waves have affected the country badly. By 17 June
2021 320,692 Positive cases and 2,374 deaths have been reported.
Tests per Million stood at 174,126. State Minister for Health has
stated that undetected daily COVID-19 cases possibly three times what
PCR testing suggests.
20. Sri Lanka has approved four vaccines to be used: 4 approved
Pfizer/BioNTech- BNT162b2, Gamaleya- Sputnik V, Serum Institute of
India – Covishield, Sinopharm -BBIBP-CorV
21. By mid-June only 2.81% (613,200) of the population has been fully
vaccinated’ Doses administered stood at 3,027,917. Vaccination
programme has been politicised and ad hoc.
22. Projections of flattening the curve in Sri Lanka differs. The best-case
scenario predicts that the pandemic situation will remain until October
2021.
23. These figures show that pandemic will last few more months at
least in the country and as result free education in the country will
continue to suffer.
*Inputs provided at the webinar held by the National Movement for Social
Justice on 13 June 2021.
For more information on the global situation and some remedial measures: A
silent and unequal education crisis. And the seeds for its solution.