Abstract
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 outbreak, an emergency policy initiative called “Suspending Classes Without Stopping Learning” was launched by the Chinese government to continue teaching activities as schools across the country were closed to contain the virus. However, there is ambiguity and disagreement about what to teach, how to teach, the workload of teachers and students, the teaching environment, and the implications for education equity. Possible difficulties that the policy faces include: the weakness of the online teaching infrastructure, the inexperience of teachers (including unequal learning outcomes caused by teachers’ varied experience), the information gap, the complex environment at home, and so forth. To tackle the problems, we suggest that the government needs to further promote the construction of the educational information superhighway, consider equipping teachers and students with standardized home-based teaching/learning equipment, conduct online teacher training, include the development of massive online education in the national strategic plan, and support academic research into online education, especially education to help students with online learning difficulties.
Highlights
“Public Emergency Management” is a major activity of public administration in the face of emergencies (Guo et al 2008)
In response to the outbreak, the Chinese government initiated a series of emergency management mechanisms including social distancing—for example, the lockdown of cities and shutting down schools (McAleer 2020; Wang et al 2020; Yue et al 2020)
Despite the careful planning and arrangements by the government, and the concerted efforts made by a wide range of parties in society, including schools and families, the implementation of the policy of “Suspending Classes Without Stopping Learning” still faces at least five problems
Summary
“Public Emergency Management” is a major activity of public administration in the face of emergencies (Guo et al 2008). The COVID-19 outbreak, which began in late 2019, rapidly evolved into a national emergency in China. In response to the outbreak, the Chinese government initiated a series of emergency management mechanisms including social distancing—for example, the lockdown of cities and shutting down schools (McAleer 2020; Wang et al 2020; Yue et al 2020). An emergency policy initiative called “Suspending Classes Without Stopping Learning” was launched by the Ministry of Education to switch teaching activities into large-scale online teaching while schools were closed. Promulgated as an emergency policy, “Suspending Classes Without Stopping Learning” did not follow a normal policy-making process, and the meaning, implementation conditions, implementation process, and effects of the policy remain unclear. The gains and losses in the implementation process of the policy are worthy of careful consideration and study
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