Equality of opportunity as well as digitalisation are themes that tie in with distance learning and the effect that it is having on children’s educational prospects. “For example, is it up to the state to ensure that all schoolchildren have access to the necessary digital infrastructure at home?” asks Rösler. There also needs to be a debate on the future of homework in her opinion, because the circumstances are similar. “Well educated parents can help their children. Less well educated parents cannot.”
The implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on future schooling are of little interest to the current generation of schoolchildren, whose perspective is a different one. Now back at school after weeks spent at home, many will be pleased to reacquaint themselves with the classroom, because interaction with their peers was one of the things that they sorely missed. Ultimately, only the future will tell how the coronavirus home-schooling experience has affected them.
“Some children benefit, others lose out”
Distance learning may have an impact on the mental development of children and teenagers. Andrea Kramer, psychotherapist and lecturer at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences: “There are certain factors that help to make a child more resilient and more capable of coping with crises.” These include knowing that you can master new challenges and have strong relationships with other people. According to Kramer, distance learning has offered precisely these experiences: “Children and teenagers were able to learn new skills such as time management and digital learning. They also practised how to nurture relationships with other people while socially distanced.” However, people deal with crises in different ways. Kramer again: “Some children benefit, but others lose out. The coming months will give us a better understanding of how many children coped with the lockdown and how many are reliant on support from their teachers, for example.”
Many teenagers are worried about not finding the apprenticeship they want
The COVID-19 pandemic has made it harder for Swiss teenagers to enter the world of work in Switzerland. After completing elementary school, 60 per cent normally start an apprenticeship. However, all trial apprenticeships had to be cancelled because of the lockdown. Interviews were also virtually impossible. Furthermore, many businesses put their employees on furlough while suspending recruitment. Consequently, fewer apprenticeship contracts were signed. New apprenticeships in French- and Italian-speaking Switzerland by early summer were a mere 30 per cent of what they were in 2019, while the corresponding figure in German-speaking Switzerland was also down on the previous year. “Our biggest concern is that businesses will suddenly no longer offer apprenticeships or terminate existing ones,” says Theo Ninck, member of the government task force on vocational and professional education and training. Nevertheless, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs is optimistic, saying in June that the apprenticeship market is more or less stable.
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