The academy we need

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 The academy we need

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• Tectonic shifts in education: The sudden shock of COVID-19 has hit higher education very hard. Regular ways of working are dead, as social distancing norms bring a 'new normal'. Classrooms' nature and content will change.
• Unclear communication: Authorities have been clueless about what to do, throwing millions of students in utter confusion. If we really believe that 'crises are opportunities', then public Universities must take the opportunity to bring long-awaited changes in admission processes, evaluation methods, governance methods and merit determination.
• Beyond hardware: Officials are focused on the hardware aspects of this crisis, talking about syllabi completion in time and learning outcomes, while maintaining distance. But there is no talk of transformation that's possible.
• Regular dead, Distance in: Distance education was always the low-ranked sibling of regular education, but the tech-enabled version of it is now mainstream. UGC wants 25% of teaching to move online. That can immediately worsen the inequalities that exist in campuses. Marginalised people benefited from the RTE and reservation policies, and that should not be hurt.
• The vulnerable: Students who lack in access to technology, learning resources, internet connectivity, physical space will be hit hard. Women and special needs students will be hit harder. Families with more care needs will burden students even more.
• A sudden switch: For the teachers of India's 1000 Universities and 40,000 colleges, it was a sudden shift that has meant teaching the far less satisfying manner with even more efforts! Most universities lacked the online infrastructure, and it is a halfway solution today.
• Online versus offline: The magic of actual classroom teaching is all replaced by the temporary challenges of the online. Teachers are trying to do their best, secure in the hope that offline will not vanish but will return one day. They long for the magic of the sports field, the hostel environments, real world lessons in living, and so on.
• The opportunity: Universities have always been stifled by a centralised bureaucratic structure, and the time to bring new pedagogy structures is here and now. 

1. Skills being taught to students are for a future that we do not know the nature of. 
2. The best skills to be taught will be the ability to learn and re-learn.
3. Teachers and learners can now become partners in knowledge production.
4. Teachers can redo their entire teaching styles now - give more space for dialogue and rumination
5. Young learners can try building the mental and emotional skill needed

• A caution: "Sapiens" author Harari has warned us about the power of technology to decide human choices (without humans knowing it). Time to seek KNOWledge rather than mere NOWledge (www) and build new eyes and mental vision.

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