As home and work fold into each other again, the exclusionary premise of online education and the deja vu of disparate learning that had also been the outcome of the pandemic have returned to haunt.
Nov 22, 2024 04:52 IST First published on: Nov 22, 2024 at 04:52 IST
In the pall of smog that has the Capital in a chokehold, a less acknowledged but no less debilitating pollutant is disparity. It manifests itself in the helplessness of those whose lives and livelihoods are imperiled by the spiraling Air Quality Index (AQI) that has breached the World Health Organisation’s permissible limit by staggering margins many times over in recent days. As home and work fold into each other again, the exclusionary premise of online education and the deja vu of disparate learning that had also been the outcome of the pandemic have returned to haunt.
The many restrictions mandated or suggested by the Graded Response Action Plan (Grap) IV include discontinuation of physical lessons for primary school children and for those in middle and senior school, as well as a work-from-home option for half the strength of public, municipal and private offices. In the last decade, air pollution in India has been consistently above WHO’s recommended levels. What this has progressively resulted in is an unevenness in learning outcomes, skewed as always against those at a disadvantage. While the shift to online education promises a continuity, availing it is dependent on the availability of necessary infrastructure — devices, a seamless internet connection and an environment conducive to learning. For those with more than one child and on the lower end of the economic spectrum, this could mean prioritising the education of one child at the cost of others. Covid-19 had seen one of the world’s longest school closures in India. The ASER 2022 report, published after the pandemic, showed that it had resulted in learning loss and higher dropout rates, especially among older children, due to constrained family budgets. There are other perils to a constant exposure to an online environment, especially for those without the necessary umbrella of parental or adult supervision — cyber bullying, vulnerability to age-inappropriate sexual content and digital addiction.
The collapse of structures also affects women, irrespective of their economic status. The upending of an already fragile care infrastructure means they have to bear a disproportionate burden. Reports suggest that the work-from-home option is mostly availed by women, given that the onus of managing home — a never-ending, invisible “mental load” — lies almost always with them. The fight for clean air must factor everybody in.
