Needed: A Fair Assessment of EdTech

Whether liked or not, new technologies make forays into lives, impact them in a way that people get accustomed to them and even the initial naysayers succumb to their lure and fall victim to them. This is how human life and civilization has progressed.

Bakeries, laundries, dairies, flour mills, mixers and garment factories made the household work for women redundant and forced urban households to willy-nilly opt for these technologies, free the women from drudgery and forced a rethink on the role of the weaker gender. It is time to ask if a similar rethink is not being forced upon the human race with regard to education following the great pandemic that shot a hole in the life of the current generation and forced shifts in several realms of human society. EdTech entered our lives as a necessity tool during the pandemic.

But, as we realise, it has come to stay and is changing the way learning is transferred. Technology is an enabler and if its efficacy is proven, it needs to be leveraged to aid the process of learning. And now when the pandemic is clearly at our back, it is still being pursued, not by way of necessity, but as a commercial proposition. A recent panel discussion has revealed that the subcontinent has turned into the world’s second largest market for EdTech companies. It was even mentioned that the sector’s future evaluation is pegged at $30 billion.

This potential market should be read together with the savagery of EdTech competitors who are getting used to predatory and intimidating techniques to lure students in the no-holds barred game of expanding market. As a people who have gained notoriety for exceeding limits, we have watched the rise of umpteen companies on EdTech sector during the last three years. Essence of education lies in meaningful teacher-student interaction.

The objective implies that EdTech platform could be a tool to complement the job of a teacher, but not as a substitute. They could be tools to upscale the reach and efficacy of pedagogy. But it is doubtful if remote learning can be an alternative to classroom. The children learn more through body languages, facial expressions, and interactions with peers. Sans all such elements, what the kids can carry could be a matter of guess.

No wonder then how midway through the pandemic, experts had raised questions about the effectiveness of EdTech and advised against replacing formal education. Post-pandemic evaluations have also highlighted the gaps in learning outcomes among school-going children. E-learning is integrated with availability and accessibility of technology. It presupposes power connection, affordability for varied digital devices, Internet connectivity for recipients of learning.

Looked at from this prism, the yawning chasm between the haves and have-nots, rural and the urban and elite and the middle class portray an India that is highly unequal in terms of affordability and accessibility. If evidence is required, the Ministry of Rural Development had found only 47% of Indian households receiving more than 12 hours of electricity and more than 36% of schools in the country operating without electricity.

It therefore does not require much wisdom to conclude that the learning gaps between children from the elite and the underprivileged backgrounds are bound to grow wider, something that would negate the legislation such as Right to Education Act and the objective of imparting quality education to all. It is time our planners look at the contextual relevance of EdTech keeping the socio-economic milieu of the impoverished masses and temper their enthusiasm with realism.