Panaji: Pinnacle, a Goa University students club organised its first webinar on re-imagining Goa’s education scenario amid COVID-19 pandemic. Academic community along with other citizens across the state joined the webinar and poured in their suggestions, recommendations and comments regarding the same topic.
Ramrao Wagh, faculty member of Goa University joined the webinar as lead discussant and through his brief presentation explained several steps and initiatives taken by Goa University to tackle the education crisis faced during the lockdown. Pinnacle Club held the discussion in association with Dept. Of Political Science and was moderated by Ramrai Naik. Webinar was hosted on Google meet platform and a copy of the same is uploaded on YouTube for general public.
Discussion saw long deliberation about the future of learning and increasing use of technology in the coming times. Participants were able to express their concern regarding the online learning and the challenges it might bring. Some speakers even asserted that, online learning may never replace the normal classroom learning and it will bring a massive challenge to implement it in remote places of Goa due to inadequate infrastructure.
The participants stressed on improving the last mile digital connectivity in schools and village localities for distance learning to be a reality in Goa. It was mentioned that while online teaching had a lot of possibilities, online assessment is still difficult. Besides classrooms, teachers also need to adopt a digital friendly approach in making their lectures reach a wider audience.
