Background
Prior to the COVID-19 Pandemic, many were concerned that the digital divide in education had the potential to widen economic and other social divides. This was true in both the United States and internationally, especially in developing countries.
The digital education divide in developing countries has many causes. Among them are a lack of access to stable electricity that run a classroom of computers, lack of broadband Internet access and educators familiar with technology, funding for purchasing and maintaining equipment, and a lack of perceived need to make it a priority when there are many facing challenges meeting basic needs.
In the U.S, some of those same issues can be found, but often to a lesser extent, though many homes in the U.S still lack access to high speed Internet. There are digital education divides caused by lack of resources in the home, both in Internet access and computers. The book, Stuck in the Shallow End: Education, Race, and Computing by Jane Margolis, does an excellent job describing how, even within a single high school in a large city, the digital divide and exasperates many issues for underprivileged students.
Another concern expressed about the digital divide is between content consumers and content producers on the Internet. Being a content creator requires a digital education. Internet users create blogs, Web pages, videos, and product reviews. Being a content creator empowers a user to communicate his or her message to a large number of people. The Internet can be a strong agent for change for those who have the skills, education, and tools to create content. Content creators tend to be more educated, and the content-production divide shows a gap among users based on socioeconomic status.
With the onset of the COVID-19 Pandemic, many schools moved to an online format to continue education. Schools in the United States were able to get funding for Chromebook or other low cost devices and many Internet service provides allows free or reduced cost access for homes with school aged children. In some cases, it narrowed the digital education divide where these resources were available. Though, many lower income families still struggled with provide good locations for students to perform their work or were challenged with multiple children needed to share a single computer for classes.
Internationally, the situation was far more grave. Schools shutdown. Others tried to move online, but relying on poor Internet connections proved nearly unworkable. There was no funding for schools to by devices for students to use at home. My 6 year-old niece in Honduras struggled to attend her first grade class and complete assignments on a smart phone. She was lucky enough to have an adult nearby who could help and answer questions, but that was not the case for most of the students in her school. The pandemic took a broken education system and crippled it farther. Schools in Nigeria used WhatsApp as a means to communicate and submit assignments since many did not have an LMS (Learning Management System).
As the United States pulls out of the worst of the pandemic, developing countries continue to struggle with COVID-19 and its impact to education.
Your Task:
Write an essay of 900 - 1200 words that addresses the current and future state of the digital education divide.
Research challenges faced with moving education online in developing countries during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Some things to consider when writing your essay:
Give a brief summary of information from at least three to five articles or papers on the topic.
What do your see as the long term impacts of an digital education divide?
How should we view the digital education divide compared with education before the Internet?
You can optionally address these questions:
What can be done by technology companies?
What are alternatives that can be implemented by schools?