UNESCO Survey on Remote Working and Schooling leads to new Training Opportunities for Educators

UNESCO Office Jakarta conducted a survey on the perspectives and experience of working from home or school from home during the early COVID-19 pandemic situation. Conducted from 1 June to 10 July 2020 with a total of 214 respondents, the survey collected information on regional perspectives and experiences working from home or schooling from home.

102 teacher respondents adopted a neutral perspective when comparing the digital and conventional working or teaching methods, while expressing a medium to a high level of satisfaction with remote working and schooling. However, several raised concern that some aspects of the schooling experience cannot be delivered through online platforms: the lack of direct interactions leads to decreased interpersonal and social skill development for students.

More than 50% of the respondents indicated they have adequate available support and equipment for remote working and schooling, such as dedicated working time within conventional working hours, a dedicated workspace, and reliable and constant internet and electricity supply. Zoom, WhatsApp, and Google Classroom were identified as the three most popular platforms used in the region to support remote working and schooling due to their fun, innovative, versatile, and easy-to-use features. Most respondents used WhatsApp and Google Classroom, especially because they are free and consume relatively low internet data.

As a direct outcome of the survey, UNESCO is now – in collaboration with the Australian National University’s Science Circus International – organizing a series of online workshops to support teachers, teacher trainers, educators, and science communicators with the challenges and opportunities of teaching STEM online from March to June 2021.

The survey and teaching STEM online workshop contribute to 2030 Agenda implementation in Asia and the Pacific, especially on understanding and reaching SDG 4, SDG 9, and SDG 17.

For further information, please refer to the infographic and contact Dr Ai Sugiura, Programme Specialist for Science, Policy and Capacity Building ([email protected](link sends e-mail)).

Register for the UNESCO-ANU Science Circus International second workshop for teachers here. The Second Workshop will be organized on 7 April 2021.