Education systems are in crisis all over the world. Here's how they will recover
April 13, 2020, 4:54 p.m. CEST
Authors:
Patrick Charland
Full Professor, Department of Education, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
Olivier Arvisais, Professor, Department of Educational Science, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
Tegwen Gadais, professor in the Department of Physical Activity Sciences, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
The current COVID-19 crisis, which is affecting the entire world, is certainly unprecedented. No other crisis has affected so many countries in recent decades. According to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, it may even be the worst crisis since World War II.
The consequences are far-reaching: an almost complete shutdown of the economy, transportation, and education systems. Schools, which are ideal settings for viral transmission, are closed. Education systems are in crisis around the world, affecting more than 1.5 billion students in 188 countries.
According to UNESCO, the consequences of this crisis are significant: disruption of learning, food security challenges, a reduction in the safety net for children, parents’ lack of preparation for homeschooling, the exacerbation of inequalities, economic costs associated with parents being forced to stop working, and the risk of rising dropout rates.
Beyond its roles in educating, socializing, and training students, schools play many other roles in society.
As researchers at the UNESCO Chair in Curriculum Development, we have observed that educational crises unfold in a relatively organized manner. Therefore, in order to anticipate the stages to come, it is useful to present a model that places the phases of an educational crisis on a continuum. This model is based on our research and projects, which have supported, to varying degrees, post-crisis education systems (following coups d’état and armed conflicts) in Africa, South America, and the Middle East.
It is obviously desirable that the health crisis be resolved quickly and that education systems return to «normal.» However, based on our experience—as well as on knowledge in the field of education during emergencies—we hypothesize that the process of returning to normal will occur in distinct phases.
As this figure shows, the crisis continuum consists of five phases, ranging from the crisis itself to a stable, institutionalized system, passing through the emergency, recovery, reconstruction, and development phases.
What is a crisis?
A crisis is defined as a sudden and unforeseen event that rapidly disrupts the functioning of a system. It is a situation that requires major decisions to be made within a short period of time and depends on a number of variables: the nature of the event, its significance for foreign and local governments, and its impact on other organizations, companies, or industries.
A crisis is often associated with panic, fear, danger, or shock, and can happen to any organization. In fact, there is no universal or widely accepted definition of what constitutes a crisis, nor are there any criteria for defining it.
The Emergency
The emergency phase refers to the overall situation that follows a sudden and generally unforeseen event. It requires immediate action to meet basic survival needs and save lives.
In retrospect, the first few weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic fell within this phase: governments initially implemented various lockdown measures, including school closures, without presenting an action plan.
The Recovery
The primary goal of this phase is to restore the capacity of a government and communities to reorganize themselves, so they can take steps to recover from the crisis, but also—and this is crucial—to prevent relapses.
The recovery phase is therefore characterized by the implementation of temporary measures that will enable stakeholders in the education system to resume their activities.
For example, after a few days or weeks of dealing with the emergency, several systems announced temporary educational measures designed to ensure the continuity of learning. For example, the Quebec government launched a portal featuring a list of educational resources to help parents keep their children engaged.
The "L’école ouverte" portal, launched by the Quebec Ministry of Education, enables elementary and secondary school students to continue their learning.
Reconstruction
»While the recovery phase focuses on short-term measures, reconstruction encompasses all activities aimed at addressing the negative impacts of the crisis on education systems in the medium or even long term.".
While recovery efforts are often implemented hastily, reconstruction efforts tend to be more institutionalized. Whether implemented during or after a crisis, these efforts aim to mitigate some of the consequences of the crisis itself.
For example, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, many education systems have implemented—albeit temporary—distance learning arrangements, whether through emails sent to families, digital learning environments, or educational programs on radio or television.
Development
Most common in emerging countries, the development phase aims to improve an education system as a whole. It involves measures to build the capacity of its stakeholders and includes, for example, activities such as curriculum reform, teacher training, and various reorganizations of educational governance structures.
It is highly likely that the current pandemic will raise international awareness of the fragility of all education systems, even those that were considered stable and well-established. COVID-19 now forces us to completely rethink our education systems and develop action plans to better cope with this type of crisis in the future.
Institutionalization
In terms of its ultimate goal, every system—no matter how perfectible it may be—aims to reach the stage of institutionalization. This stage is the result of various processes of formalization, consolidation, structuring, and acceptance of a system of social relations within a state.
The crisis into which the pandemic has plunged us leads us to question the need—both here and elsewhere—to reevaluate the institutional framework of our education systems in order to make them more resilient.
Although these phases were presented in stages, the current context allows us to emphasize that this is not a linear process. Rather, it is a recursive cycle in which systems can move from the emergency phase to institutionalization, then quickly return to the emergency phase in a progression that is sometimes chaotic and rarely predictable, as demonstrated by the current pandemic.
The Fragility of Systems
The current pandemic highlights the fragility of many education systems. Even after experiencing or witnessing environmental disasters, armed conflicts, or epidemics such as SARS (2001), H1N1 (2009), or Ebola (2013–2016), very few countries were truly prepared to deal with the current crisis.
Thus, faced with the possibility of «seasons» of COVID-19, education systems must enter a new phase of development. As with the economy, in-depth analyses will be necessary to assess the effectiveness of various government measures. It is essential that researchers examine the experiences of students, their families, and their teachers. It will be all the more important to cross-reference this data with the strategies for reopening schools implemented in the fall and to assess their impact on student success next year.
Several measures will also need to be implemented, such as action plans for education in crisis situations, revisions to teacher training programs, and the establishment of technology-based distance learning infrastructure that can be rapidly deployed in the future.
Without these action plans, education systems are doomed to relive the stages of the current education crisis.
