Three years after the COVID-19 pandemic, video telephony platforms, like Zoom, continue to impact both the workplace and classrooms. The obvious benefit of such technology was it allowed the world to operate amid very restrictive conditions and gain some semblance of normalcy.
For schools and universities around the world, the technology benefitted from an unforeseen inclusivity dividend. In the post-Covid world, students can now enroll in schools or attend classes regardless of geographic distance. Online and distance learning has also made education more affordable for many people with limited financial resources.
According to the World Economic Forum, enrollment numbers around the world more than doubled in 2020, increased by 32% the following year, and peaked at 189 million.
With schools and students benefitting mutually from this transformational change, it looks like online learning, as well as home-based work, is here to stay.
Reflecting its mission to become a more inclusive school, universities like Japan-owned Globis USA hire staff and faculty members with very diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds.
“We have people from the Philippines, Canada, Thailand and China. And when officials from the Ministry of Education visit, they are surprised to see that not only is our faculty international but the staff is as well,” said Globis USA University President Tomoyo Nakamura.
Globis University is not alone. Japan’s Waseda University has also recognized the value of including inclusivity in its curriculum.
“The world is full of geopolitical risks, like climate change, armed conflict, and energy and food crises. We are updating our research and educational capacities to cope with these challenges by teaching our students to have a good understanding of diversity and inclusivity and make them better prepared,” said Waseda USA President Prof. Masahiko Gemma.
What started as a tool to maintain some normalcy in classroom instruction became a catalyst to democratize education around the world. In the right hands, online communication technology can contribute to building a more stable, more prosperous world.
