The Future of Education

School, something that we all must go through, and for most, they must go beyond just high school to get the job that they desire. But with this novel coronavirus going around there’s also some confusion about what will happen with the upcoming school year of ’20-’21.

For the past six weeks, school has been no longer in the classroom but moved onto online meeting platforms such as Teams or Zoom. Teachers have been giving and receiving school work from StudentVUE and Teams, whilst students complete work on computers and phones. And the people who work at the main office are throwing ideas back and forth on what to do and improve. And, for some, this seems like what will be the upcoming school year.

This, and many other fears relating to the change in life resulting In COVID-19, is due to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, who is the top guy for President Trump’s coronavirus task force, stating that, “Back in January of this year when we started the phase 1 trial, I said it would likely be between a year and 18 months before we would have a vaccine. I think that schedule is still intact,” to NPR on Friday the 22nd, during their Morning Edition podcast. With this information, main offices from pre-primary to post-secondary schools are taking this into account, some even are making the whole ’20-’21 school year online.

For students in pre-primary to secondary schools, this means that they will not have the ability to see some friends like they would if they were at school, alongside the problem that those who may not have an easily available network, they will have to find a way to have a somewhat easy accessible network. Post-Secondary students also have to deal with the latter, be that for some they may live in an area that doesn’t get a connection. Which, for both types of students, could lead to them falling behind in school work, possibly failing the class(es), and potentially not graduate. And, for most people, graduating, being one of the best, and getting a three-figure paying job is key, which means that they can’t risk not being able to see work or lessons and learn about what they, or their parents, are paying for.

With all of this in mind, the question must be brought up: What will education look like in the future when all of this is said and done? Will it be smaller classes? Or will it be all online with almost no in-person classes? Who can tell, the only thing we can do is hope that when this is all said and done, we’ll still have the ability to have the luxury of education.