The challenges are here to stay

The suddenness, unpredictability and freakish length of covid-19 pandemic has affected all spheres of life and all sectors of human activity. A lot has changed in academia alone and a lot of stuff has been written on academics and covid-19. This pandemic and women academic has been a hot topic worldwide considering the homely involvement of women teachers and their role in online teaching from home. A lot has gotten worse during this pandemic, more importantly uncertain and constantly changing work environment of teaching has been one of the biggest challenges before a teacher and a student during the closure of educational institutions. Education is struggling so is a parent. Home environment is exacerbated by the pandemic, learning environment is playing a sea-saw, work balance has deteriorated and campus occupational health is stressful in times of covid-19 fear and beyond when educational institutions are planning back to normalcy (although virus is still in same mode and mood to infect).

Online teaching has been labeled as “teaching to walls” as we never know what is happening behind the screen for a major lot of students. Even longer screen time is annoying when watching or listening to virtual classes, however, the same is not the problem when watching social media screens, to me it is a kind of personal ethical contravention. My son (who is in grade 4) in one of the prestigious valley schools will often complain about “Zoom Fatigue” and I understand his concern more being a teacher than a parent, as it has trapped us all and it is time to come out of it. His school is running six classes daily on Zoom platform. I had tried to interfere but school administration is hell bound to zoom it further, as they are running a pure business not education, they hardly bother whether it is really of any benefit to students or just virtual completion of defined curriculum. Six classes on screen a day for a pre-primary standard child is a mere joke, and not a way of imparting quality teaching. We need to re-tool this approach of virtual education.

   

The offline and in-campus teaching is much sought after by all the stakeholders of education to prevent a learning crisis from happening more day by day. But opening of some educational institutions at lower and higher level for certain classes is full of drama, chaos, confusion and conflict after the appearance of positive covid cases from therein. This has put us in some sort of an institutional crisis waiting for best principles and practices of governance to thwart the situation in academia. Reality must be in our minds when thinking of bringing educational institutions back to in-house teaching-learning processes, when we know that prevalence of covid-19 positive cases is still there. Virus has not become week, but our approaches have weakened.

I am always in a dilemma when I am face to face with colleagues and students in campus. Is wearing a face mask and using hand sanitizers my full protection, no it is not. The support, assurance and re-assurance from administration is all that will boost the spirit of teaching community to overcome the challenges of this covid-19 enforced change. A joint planning by all the stakeholders for long term measures to open the educational institutions is need of the hour. We must be concerned about the mental health and the resulting covid-19 trauma cum stress in campus. The covid-19 enforced psychological stress has already surrounded us for last more than a year. More needs to be done and practiced so that both students and faculty remain safe on campus and go safe to their homes. In fact it is weird being back in campus/classroom/lab with heterogeneous group of students differing in following covid SOP’s when anything is not yet right but quite unpredictable with this virus and the peoples behaviour. Health and safety must be every one’s priority; can we put so much precautions to protect students and ourselves in our educational institutions despite failing to obey and follow covid safety guidelines, face coverings, typical physical distancing, canteen restrictions, procedural travel, avoiding in-person gatherings, etc. It is more horrifying when noncompliance of the daily check and surveillance of covid-19 is now a new normal at the cost of false normalcy.

I am not very late in re-thinking covid-19 as the challenges of a change, I have then and now reflected it in my perspectives and opinion articles on covid-19. I am wondering if it is really an issue with us and the administration to look at the covid-19 challenges with an open daylight analysis. Lock-downs happened and normalcy resumed but covid was there and is still prevalent. Vaccination is now available but covid-19 has changed its strain. Some are anticipating it, some not. Even RT-PCR (the only reliable technique) fails to detect the current circulating strain of this virus. Chaos, confusion and crisis is very much obvious. Virus is still powerful, in fact more virulent in its new avatar as it is changing strains. No doubt humans are developing immunity, but are consistently getting the infection, even same persons have turned positive again and again. The fear of after math effects in affected people is a big challenge to manage.

Wearing face masks, practicing hand hygiene, maintaining physical distance and avoiding crowds is a remote norm now, in practice it has failed. 99 times we may obey and follow the covid SOPs but on a single significant occasion we may fail to do it, when it matters the most. Being a teacher I know how frequently we make contacts with students in examination halls, classrooms, laboratories, besides contacts with fellow colleagues and other staff due to close association. For that matter following covid SOPs in markets and passenger vehicles is a gone case now. Talking and formulating SOPs may happen to satisfy the policy initiatives but when it matters at implementation level, it fails miserably and we all owe responsibility to it. Is anyone to be blamed for it, yes every person in the society. We have been lenient in our approach, we think covid virus has forgotten to infect people or has become week, it hasn’t. In fact covid challenge is changing our attitude towards false belief that covid is a conspiracy. Let’s believe it is a reality and is following the principles of natural selection to infect human populations, where human intervention has no role other than to allow it to happen.

Educational institutions are the spots of gathering and crowd, practically SOPs remain on shelves, students are sitting shoulder to shoulder in classrooms, visiting canteen and hotels is a norm now, almost everything is back to old pattern. Buses and other public transport is plying to full capacity. A person is asked to follow SOP at his/her workplace, but we forget that person has come through overcrowded passenger vehicles, markets are back to business with people thronging in flocks. It seems now a purpose less affair to talk of covid SOPs, the change is still there but due to our callous attitude the challenges we are facing are increasing day by day.

It was my Sunday and I knew its importance to be at home with parents after spending a full working week at workplace. This time the fear of covid-19 was at its peak as some of the colleagues had turned covid positive. I had to keep myself in isolation this Sunday fearing being covid positive as some covid or covid like symptoms had started appearing. This isolation day was painful and took an emotional toll on me but at the same time it stimulated me to write this challenging perspective to reflect some of the challenges of changes brought by covid. I don’t know I may its victim, and I may be its carrier; by the time this article will be available to readers, I may have tested positive. We should religiously follow the guidelines and covid SOPs at home and outside. Optimism must prevail and rethinking in every aspect to overcome the covid challenges must happen. And to meet the emerging demands of our new normal is the duty of all stakeholders. Stay safe, healthy and well to mitigate the challenges of this change.

Dr. Khurshid Ahmad Tariq is Assistant Professor, Department of Zoology, Islamia College of Science and Commerce

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