Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has disrupted socio-economic activities, including formal and non-formal education, across the world at lightning speed. By mid-April 2020, it had interrupted the formal education of nearly 1.6 billion students in 192 countries. COVID-19’s disruption of education...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Environmental Association of Southern Africa
2020-12-01
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| Series: | Southern African Journal of Environmental Education |
| Online Access: | https://www.ajol.info/index.php/sajee/article/view/198219 |
| _version_ | 1818952851328598016 |
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| author | Mutizwa Mukute Jane Burt Buhle Francis Ben de Souza |
| author_facet | Mutizwa Mukute Jane Burt Buhle Francis Ben de Souza |
| author_sort | Mutizwa Mukute |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has disrupted socio-economic activities, including formal and non-formal education, across the world at lightning speed. By mid-April 2020, it had interrupted the formal education of nearly 1.6 billion students in 192 countries. COVID-19’s disruption of education in Africa, and especially in southern Africa, has been severe for several reasons. However, educational responses to COVID-19 suggest that it has stimulated the appetite for developing educational innovations – silver linings to the COVID-19 cloud.
This paper is based on interviews conducted with 56 parents, students and educators involved in formal and non-formal education in Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. We identified the main educational challenges in these countries as being concerned with adapting to: (i) online education and learning, (ii) continuity of education from home, and (iii) community-based learning in small groups. The silver linings that we identified are: (i) putting greater emphasis on finding context-specific solutions to education and health problems (improvisation), which is important for educational relevance and reveals the value of local actors, (ii) making linkages between social and ecological systems clearer, which is making the value of education for sustainable development (ESD) in this century more explicit, and (iii) revealing structural inequality and justice issues in education, which draws attention to the need for urgently addressing them as part of transformative change in education and sustainable development. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-20T09:56:57Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-ac0a1fca28c34d0d8a019fae4dc842f6 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2411-5959 2411-5959 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-20T09:56:57Z |
| publishDate | 2020-12-01 |
| publisher | Environmental Association of Southern Africa |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Southern African Journal of Environmental Education |
| spelling | doaj.art-ac0a1fca28c34d0d8a019fae4dc842f62022-12-21T19:44:26ZengEnvironmental Association of Southern AfricaSouthern African Journal of Environmental Education2411-59592411-59592020-12-0136210.4314/sajee.v36i1.7Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational ResponsesMutizwa Mukute0Jane Burt1Buhle Francis2Ben de Souza3Environmental Learning Research Centre, Rhodes UniversityEnvironmental Learning Research Centre, Rhodes UniversityEnvironmental Learning Research Centre, Rhodes UniversityEnvironmental Learning Research Centre, Rhodes UniversityCoronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has disrupted socio-economic activities, including formal and non-formal education, across the world at lightning speed. By mid-April 2020, it had interrupted the formal education of nearly 1.6 billion students in 192 countries. COVID-19’s disruption of education in Africa, and especially in southern Africa, has been severe for several reasons. However, educational responses to COVID-19 suggest that it has stimulated the appetite for developing educational innovations – silver linings to the COVID-19 cloud. This paper is based on interviews conducted with 56 parents, students and educators involved in formal and non-formal education in Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. We identified the main educational challenges in these countries as being concerned with adapting to: (i) online education and learning, (ii) continuity of education from home, and (iii) community-based learning in small groups. The silver linings that we identified are: (i) putting greater emphasis on finding context-specific solutions to education and health problems (improvisation), which is important for educational relevance and reveals the value of local actors, (ii) making linkages between social and ecological systems clearer, which is making the value of education for sustainable development (ESD) in this century more explicit, and (iii) revealing structural inequality and justice issues in education, which draws attention to the need for urgently addressing them as part of transformative change in education and sustainable development.https://www.ajol.info/index.php/sajee/article/view/198219 |
| spellingShingle | Mutizwa Mukute Jane Burt Buhle Francis Ben de Souza Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses Southern African Journal of Environmental Education |
| title | Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses |
| title_full | Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses |
| title_fullStr | Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses |
| title_full_unstemmed | Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses |
| title_short | Education in Times of COVID-19: Looking for Silver Linings in the Southern Africa’s Educational Responses |
| title_sort | education in times of covid 19 looking for silver linings in the southern africa s educational responses |
| url | https://www.ajol.info/index.php/sajee/article/view/198219 |
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