Greetings to our readers, both new and old!
We enjoyed this break to be able to pause and brainstorm our upcoming issues. It was also an opportunity for me to travel back to Tahiti and experience prophylactic isolation. That’s a story for another issue but I’ll tell you this: it’s not fun.
The good news is that I’m out of isolation now and so is The Global Tiller. But one of us has a new logo, so don’t miss it 👆🏽 and let us know what you think.
Our summer break may not have been as long as your kids’ but we’re here to help you navigate this back-to-school season. So let’s dig in.
Parents around most countries of the world are preparing for their children to go back to school. If you are in Tahiti, you are nervously hoping for the best as case numbers and hospitalisations soar. If you’re in Pakistan, you are putting off buying your child a school uniform considering they outgrew last year’s without wearing it once.
Students as far apart as the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and India have had their education disrupted as wave after wave of the pandemic ravages their communities. Many parents in India pulled their children out of school when the choice came down to putting food on the table or paying school fees. In Indonesia, parents are hiring private tutors to teach their children until schools reopen.
So far, the saving grace of this horrendous pandemic was the fact that it had mostly spared children, who seemed to be less affected by the virus. Unfortunately, that’s not the case anymore.
The Delta variant, by its very nature of being more contagious, is affecting a large number of children, significantly more than any of the previous variants of Covid-19 did. It is still unknown whether children who are infected with Delta are getting sicker than they would’ve had they caught a different strain, or it is just a number’s game where Delta’s high transmissibility makes it more likely for children to be infected.
What we do know for sure is that most of these children are not even eligible for the vaccines. So far, the only way out of this crisis is to make sure that as many as possible children over 12 and adults are getting vaccinated so that the spread of the Delta variant slows down because, even if children are more resilient, those who have suffered from long Covid are sharing just how terrible it has been for them.
Doctors are saying that youths with even mild or asymptomatic initial infections may experience long Covid: confounding, sometimes debilitating issues that disrupt their schooling, sleep, extracurricular activities and other aspects of life. High performers in class are experiencing brain fog, unusual fatigue and displaying all the symptoms for anxiety and depression. Covid isn’t something that will come to pass, but it seems like something that’s going to affect the rest of their lives.
If you had asked me last year, I really wish I wasn’t still writing about Covid-19 right now. I wish we were well into the somewhat promising future that the vaccines offered. But it seems like this pandemic is here for longer and you are not alone, if you feel like you are ready to snap. We are too exhausted from the pandemic to deal with the latest twist, and I feel your pain if you have to sit down your child and tell them they will have to begin their new school year at home.
This generation starting school this week, also known as Generation Alpha, is having a tough time but researchers are saying they will be the most transformative age group ever. So maybe, they will make it in the end? For us, the questions remain: How can we make sure that this generation is equipped to transform the world for the better? If their formative phase is dominated by a global pandemic, how will it impact their world view? Will they grow up withdrawing into their silos, or will they learn to see themselves as global citizens?
Do let us know how your children, or young ones around you are coping with the pandemic.
Until next week, take care and stay safe!
Hira - Editor - The Global Tiller
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…and now what?
I do agree with Hira: we were definitely not planning to still be talking about Covid by this time of the year. We’re almost done with 2021 and still trying to get over 2020! As cases are soaring we’re back to the same questions again: how to reopen safely, how to make sure we manage to keep the kids learning, how do we make sure they all learn with the same chances?
As I follow the news on back-to-school strategies, I’m also wondering if we are thinking only of the technical elements to maintain schooling even though, in the context of this crisis, we should also be reflecting on what the curriculum should be.
It’s clear now that we are in a different world. So shouldn’t this mean that we should teach different topics and in different ways? The pandemic brought some changes to the curriculum and the pedagogies (more digital tools, for example) but are we planning to teach our kids how to be adaptive? Are we going to help them learn how to live in an age of persistent change, to understand existential challenges? To cope with mental health?
This week has been another proof that our lives during the pandemic will be the new normal. Climate change is gaining full speed and we have to expect harsher times. I don’t want to sound depressing here but we have to face reality. And, more than anything we have to prepare our kids for this reality.
Because if we want them to be this game-changing generation in the decades to come, we have to make sure they are provided the right tools now to be ready for the challenges to come. We can’t educate them as we used to in the 1970s, considering we have to prepare them for 2070!
It is important to teach history, but teaching the future is important too. Technical skills are fundamental but so are social and interpersonal ones in an age of diversity.
This is valid not just for environmental challenges but also for the social challenges to come. Because, as we can see, the current education system has failed us to enter into the digital age.
This morning at a workshop I was delivering, some participants were telling me how kids are trapped in their smartphones and are not socialising anymore. Is it their fault or ours? Maybe if smartphones were not left out of the classroom, we could teach our children how to use them efficiently? Maybe if we stopped treating it as 'just a gadget'?
The education system must be more future-oriented and develop curriculums for the future. It also has to adapt to an age when education is no longer about gaining knowledge, but about learning how to approach this knowledge wisely: through critical thinking, self-awareness, epistemic humility.
It’s time for school to go…well, back to school! As our kids are bravely going back to satisfy their quest of learning and betting on their own future, we have to also bravely take up the challenge to create a school fit for them. For times to come, we have to have the courage to build the school for others after us to be able to pursue humanity’s journey into the future.
Philippe - Founder - Pacific Ventury