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Though the country was well on its way towards rapid digitisation, the unprecedented health and economic crisis just accelerated the pace of that transformation. Now with the second wave of COVID currently underway, seemingly more severe than the first one, the ‘new normal’ will only evolve with time and demonstrate its impact across everything around us, as ‘evolutions’ normally do. We have all heard the popular adage, “Change is the only constant!” Nothing can be truer than this and it is relevant across everything we can think of, including education.
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant socio-economic turmoil across the world. Education was one of the key sectors that was massively impacted by COVID. Around 87% of the world's student population was affected by lockdowns and quarantines, and 1.52 billion students were absent from school and other educational institutions, as per the UNESCO Learning Portal, 2020. COVID-19's suddenness, ambiguity, and volatility forced the educational system to react quickly and adapt to the new learning landscape.
In March 2020, the pandemic compelled business schools to close their campuses. As lockdowns and social distancing norms came into effect, education moved online with virtual classes and hybrid learning approaches starting to rule the roost. While it did take some time for B-schools to adapt to the new learning normal, online education had and still has, its inherent benefits. It meant that any student residing anywhere in the world can now get affordable access to the best of faculty and courses in any part of the world, through digital channels. Professors, who earlier couldn’t visit colleges because of their busy work schedules, could now easily guide their students through the internet. What seemed as a challenge initially, actually started becoming an opportunity? Online education bridged the gap between academicians, scholars and teachers.
In order to cater to the learning needs of the "digital native", educators started rethinking of strategies to make online education more effective, streamlined and competitive, compared to what it was before. As the pandemic and its impact intensified, all physical classes moved to platforms such as Zoom calls, Skype, VCs and webinars. New learning experiences were imagined so that students get the most out of his or her time in the virtual classroom. Many B-schools started offering unique variations of remote E-MBAs which students can easily access and learn from their homes.
At all B-schools, the pandemic prompted considerable reassessment. The majority of them have adapted to online learning and teaching. As other B-schools around the world were unsure of what to do, Harvard Business School took the lead and organized a series of "free" webinars in March and April 2020.
Much credit is to be attributed to them for taking the initiative to share what they've learned about teaching remotely. In a Zoom class, there were special sessions on teaching cases. These classes were beneficial to many B-schools in India as well. When we come to think of it, several Indian B-schools have been offering long-distance programmers for more than a decade. However, in all of those circumstances, the students were required to gather at a delivery facility, which were located across 30 different locations. Now, you're instructing a wider group of students from the comfort of their own homes.
Another interesting aspect that was observed was that, during the pandemic, parents wanted to keep their children near. This helped B Schools in smaller cities and towns to attract talent that earlier would have chosen to migrate to bigger cities or a more prestigious institution. Smaller business schools always have a dearth of quality students and quality faculty and online teaching pedagogy, bridged that gap to a large extent.
Further, the opportunity to bring in expert speakers and influencers from all around the world into the classroom has been one of the unique features of teaching from home or from anywhere. Moreover, 'Flipped classrooms' have become quite a popular trend in the higher education domain, in the United States. The students, all of whom live on campus, attend the lecture via video and then meet in class to discuss an issue or a case. This could catch up in Indian business schools as well.
With the pandemic altering business dynamics with digitization at its very core, many B- School graduates are now expected to solve newer and complex business challenges. In the midst of the pandemic, business leaders realized that today’s employee will need to learn new skills, upskill themselves to stay relevant in the digitally driven future.
In line with this latent demand, in the recent past, we saw many Business schools to custom build their programmes and curriculum to cater to the learning needs prevalent today. Several MBA programmes also witnessed an increase in the number of applications as a result of the increased demand for MBA education. This is a positive indicator and there is an opportunity to create courses that are tailored to the demands of today's business needs.
The management domain is known for being able to address complex issues and deal with difficult problems. B schools can explore into more specialty areas as they are now reaching out to a larger audience base by providing education online.
With the pandemic showing no signs of ending anytime soon, the new normal is here to stay. In the initial months of 2020, nobody had any idea about how things are going to work out as offices shut and businesses were forced to work remotely, schools and colleges closed down and education transitioned onto the laptop, desktop, tablets and the mobile, human interactions became predominantly digital. Now, we see that most things are working out. The pandemic also made academic institutions realize that hybrid models of teaching are in many ways better than the conventional teaching methodologies, because of its aforementioned advantages. Not only access to quality education has become more convenient, it has become far more affordable to what it used to be earlier. This translates not only to better job prospects and opportunities for each and every one, but also more number of industry-ready relevantly skilled employable youth.
As the digital era flourish going forward, education, employment, hiring, content requirement and the overall ecosystem will evolve to become more dynamic and future-ready in its essence.
The author is a strategic communication consultant and visiting faculty in leading colleges.
