Praja Foundation organised a webinar on “Leveraging Technology in Education during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Challenges and Solutions for School Education in India” on July 16, 2020 with different stakeholders including private education institutions, government representatives, technology providers from across India.

“The concept of this webinar emerged from the current situation of the COVID-19 pandemic which has disrupted the conventional processes of imparting education in schools. There are a number of challenges that central, state and city governments are likely to face while trying to ensure continued learning of students”, said Nitai Mehta, Founder and Trustee, Praja Foundation.

“New and innovative techniques will have to be employed to create new methods of teaching while also guaranteeing the safety and health of students. Enabling teaching-learning through the use of technology is one alternative, however this too has numerous challenges”, said Milind Mhaske, Director, Praja Foundation.

Major challenges to adopting technology in education include ensuring inclusivity through access to technology and devices for remote/online learning for all students and educators, training of teachers for using technology, innovative interfaces and mediums to engage students, ensuring physical and mental health of students in remote/online learning, etc.

To understand the current situation in India, Praja which has been working in enabling accountability in public education in Mumbai and Delhi since the past few years, initiated since May 2019 a discussion with major stakeholders (elected representatives, administration and NGOs).

“Across states, the key challenges were similar – inclusivity and implementability aspects of the use of technology while sustaining the quality of teaching during the pandemic imposed lockdown,” added Mhaske.

In this context, the webinar brought together different stakeholders as participants with Shailendra Sharma (Principal Advisor, Directorate of Education, Government of NCT Delhi), Bharat Malik (Founder Member, National Independent Schools Alliance), Archana Chandra (CEO, Jai Vakeel Foundation), Bikkrama Daulet Singh (Co-Managing Director, Central Square Foundation) and Dr. Vinnie Jauhari (Director Education – Industry Expert, Microsoft Corporation- India) as panel speakers.

“The webinar aimed to address challenges in school education through technology by discussing probable solutions that can be adopted by various educators and governments across the country”, added Mehta.