Union opposes online classes as ‘violation of equality’

A Tunisian students’ union has roundly rejected a proposal by the government to move classes online and has called for a boycott of enrolment on online education platforms, raising questions about how feasible an option online education is in many African countries.

In a statement on 22 March, the General Tunisian Union of Students (UGET) rejected the proposal of the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research to deliver university and other educational courses through online learning as a violation of the principle of equality and equal opportunity because not all students have personal computers, tablets, smartphones or reliable internet access.

“[We are] inviting all students to boycott enrolment on platforms for distance learning,” the statement says.

It also calls for an extension of the current academic year 2019-20 following an end to the coronavirus pandemic crisis.

In a video clip on the official UGET Facebook page, UGET Secretary General Warda Ateek said distance learning was a "type of social discrimination and inequality among students”.

The limitations facing many students in Africa – exemplified by the Tunisian situation – has been recognised at various levels.

David Baratoux, research director of the Institute of Research for Development at the University of Toulouse, France, told University World News that in his opinion, based on 15 years of university teaching experience and tentative experience of e-learning in West Africa, remote education is not able, for the moment, to replace 'real' education.

"Students need to practise and interact with a teacher," he said.

"Education will never be cheap. Transfer of knowledge to the next generation is essential, and we should better think on how to improve this transfer of knowledge, rather than exploring possible solutions to save money on education," Baratoux said.

Dr Violet Makuku, quality assurance specialist and the project officer for the Harmonisation of African Higher Education Quality Assurance and Accreditation (HAQAA) initiative at the Association of African Universities (AAU), said in trying to find solutions to the challenges brought by COVID-19, people were failing to include “marginalised and disadvantaged groups”.

"If students are in deep rural areas where there is no internet and in some countries no electricity, how then will they access the online and uploaded materials as well as participate in ICT-aided teaching and learning?" she said.

"Even where there may be internet, some students cannot afford the [data] bundles, so what are institutions doing to help such students? These are big and real issues which need to be addressed," she said.

However, Makuku said the COVID-19 outbreak was a “catastrophe that nobody could plan for and many institutions were caught unaware".

Under the circumstances, the AAU could offer little practical support other than to encourage institutions to use ICT-aided learning, Makuku said.

To this end the AAU will host a webinar on 30 March aimed at guiding institutions unfamiliar with ICT-aided learning. The discussion will be led by Professor Safary Wa-Mbaleka, director of the Adventist University of Africa Online, based in Nairobi, Kenya.

Speaking ahead of the webinar to University World News, Wa-Mbaleka said for countries without strong basic technical infrastructure, and wide internet connectivity, online education may not be effective.

"Most online education will heavily depend on stable internet access during this COVID-19 period when students and educators cannot easily move from one place to another to connect to the internet.

"Therefore, government must immediately collaborate with internet providers and other telecommunication companies to provide more and better internet services.”

Another challenge was access to computers or devices.

"It is true that a number of students are now using different gadgets that can access the internet. However, not all of them can … Even if online education is provided, obviously those financially-challenged students will be left out.

"One of the ways to deal with this would be to allow students to take the classes when they are able to access a computer or any other device that can connect to the internet."

This would require flexible timeframes.

"Delivering education without any deadline, and focusing on competency-based education, may help all the students to meet the academic requirements eventually," Wa-Mbaleka said.

Another option was to use national TV stations to deliver education.

There are several African educational TV channels in existence, including Algeria's Knowledge Channel managed by the University of Continuing Education, the Open University of Sudan Learning Channel, Egypt's Nile Channel for Higher Education and Egypt's El-Manara Channel for Scientific Research.

"Different TV channels can be used and schedules developed to deliver content … Although this can be done, there are still some problems such as not being able to meet all educational needs … and not all courses can be effectively scheduled on TV. There is only one-way delivery of the content without student interaction, and there's no way to ensure that students are attending classes,” said Wa-Mbaleka.

A final option would be for schools, colleges, and universities to focus on non-academic programmes that can be delivered on TV and radio stations to enable students to learn a specific skill, language, moral values, life skills or something similar.

"At least time will be well spent until educational institutions resume after COVID-19,” Wa-Mbaleka said.