Flipping the Script: Post-COVID-19 Opportunities, Challenges, and Threats amidst the Digital Revolution in Higher Education

Abstract

Once considered a marginal and untrustworthy pedagogical approach by higher education institutions, online learning has become mainstream. Consider this - the entire educational system - at the global level, from P-12 to the college level, shut down following the declaration of the lockdown period of the novel coronavirus disease 2019. Education's long-term effects of the abrupt 2020 closing of schools' and universities' buildings and the transition to online learning environments are yet to be known; the adoption of online learning has exponentially grown over the last decade. Higher education's forced adoption of online learning, with no other limited options in response to COVID-19, has accelerated the curve. With this unanticipated shift from the classroom to the virtual sphere at the global level, some wonder whether the adaption of online learning will persist post-pandemic and what impact such a shift would have on global demand for education and institutional strategic plans. This work aims to formulate and add a new perspective to the growing literature on transitions and sustaining quality education in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era.