Educational continuity during the pandemic: Challenges to pedagogical management in segregated Chilean schools

Melanie Ehren ,Paul Armstrong ,Romina Madrid ,Paige H Fisher ,Sara Romiti ,Doris Mcwhorter

doi:10.18820/2519593x/pie.v39.i1.5

Abstract

The COVID-19 outbreak has created an uncertain scenario for educational systems, leading many countries to deploy unprecedented remote learning programmes. Chilean schools have not been the exception and have thus developed and put in place several actions to uphold effective pedagogical management (PM) and continuity of learning; however, as we emphasise in this paper, the Chilean educational system is highly segregated. PM encompasses actions and decisions aimed at safeguarding quality education by focusing on four domains: technological, curricular, methodological and assessment. This descriptive and exploratory quantitative study seeks to explore the challenges facing PM, as perceived by actors working in Chile’s three different administrative and financial school governance systems in the framework of remote education during the COVID-19 pandemic.Our findings highlight the disparities among actors belonging to the three types of administrative and financial governance systems regarding the perceived challenges facing PM. Thus, publicly funded schools face greater challenges in practically all four PM domains as compared to private schools. The main differences among schools revolve around the technological and assessment domains. While the technological domain is more of a concern for public schools, the assessment domain presents more challenges for private schools. Beyond the schools´ administrative and financial governance system, an important finding was the scant importance attached to the curriculum as a challenging issue as well as an excessive focus on the methodological domain, indicative of a prevailing logic of efficiency as applied to the learning process.

Highlights

2020 has been a year marked by the outbreak of COVID-19 and its dramatic effects, at the health level but in all other realms of daily life
Beyond the schoolsadministrative and financial governance system, an important finding was the scant importance attached to the curriculum as a challenging issue as well as an excessive focus on the methodological domain, indicative of a prevailing logic of efficiency as applied to the learning process
Our findings illustrate participants’ answers to the multiple-choice question: “Which of the following specific aspects of pedagogical management have you found challenging during the process of remote education?”, regarding each domain of pedagogical management

Summary

Introduction

2020 has been a year marked by the outbreak of COVID-19 and its dramatic effects, at the health level but in all other realms of daily life. Educational continuity during the pandemic physical distancing have been some of the main actions implemented by countries to prevent the spread of the virus (Flaxman et al, 2020). In Chile, schools have adopted remote learning using different formats, such as online platforms, social networks, telephone calls, families picking up materials at the school and, in more isolated locations, teacher visits to students’ homes to provide resources, among others (González et al, 2020). In this context, one may ask: what are the elements guiding pedagogical decision-making at schools? Preliminary data, revealed by Quiroz (2020), indicate that through the pandemic, private schools seem to have had better chances to develop more sophisticated remote learning modalities than publicly subsidised schools that serve vulnerable students

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Conclusion