in Russia In General technological readiness of students to distance education is quite high: 85 percent of boys have a home personal computer or laptop, Internet access is almost everyone. But in terms of a pandemic, about a quarter of the Russian students was virtually no access to free General education. First and foremost, these are children from families whose income is below the subsistence level, and children from large families are also often not very well with income. One problem – not enough gadgets at home, in remote areas lacking power and Internet connectivity for sustainable work online.
According to experts, all students from low-income families risk being left out of the education system in terms of total transfer on the remote online format.
But we must pay tribute to some regions: it is the period of the pandemic to low-income families were allocated a school laptop. This largely helped to finish the school year “without loss”. But not everywhere can boast such capacity. Almost every third subject of the Russian Federation, according to the researchers, the HSE, there is a lack of gadgets in the homes and in schools. Such regions constitute the main risk group. Among them – the Republic of Dagestan, Adygea, Mari El, Tyva, Jewish Autonomous oblast, and others.
What else was out in the HSE? For example, the organization “udalenka” in rural schools worse than in the city.
“In 12 percent of schools in the village the teacher will need up to two working days to download the lesson material from the Internet in video format” – the study says. And all because in 40 percent schools Internet speed not exceeding 2 Mbit/s. This is not enough to conduct simultaneous remote sessions, where you need quality sound and video. Moreover, this is not enough if at the same time from the school their distance learning are multiple teachers. The larger the school, the higher demands on the speed of your Internet connection. For the urban school of average size she should be below 30 Mbps.
But as it turns out, the technical complexity is not the only obstacle in the transition to distance education, even if only partially. No less urgent is the question of readiness of teachers to it. Often it depends on the age of the teacher. According to the HSE, more than half of teachers are over 60 years of little or no use the Internet, and almost every fifth teacher in Russia does not have sufficient skills to operate in remote mode.
According to statistics, to Internet the people of Russia, especially pupils and students, are more likely to use mobile devices (phones, smartphones, etc.), and this trend is increasing. Therefore, one main requirement for educational services and platforms today the availability of mobile apps to from your mobile device you can learn without any loss of quality.
