){kind=logo}
){kind=icon}
){kind=logo}
){kind=icon}
“We are experiencing an irreversible change in education driven by the health contingency due to COVID-19.”
The first response to the contingency of COVID-19 was the school closures throughout Mexico from preschool to the university level. This measure helped control the number of contagions among the children and youth population; however, it jeopardized the completion of the 2019-2020 school year, mainly in the public schools.
Due to the advance of the contagion, the federal government proposes to start the next school year 2020-2021 with distance education, using television stations to bring educational content to all the homes in Mexico. With this proposal, it would seem that the next school year’s challenge is solved; however, distance education presents many challenges to reach all the school-age population of children and young people.
To explain the challenges of public education in Mexico during the pandemic, in this article, we present three public schools and discuss how they faced the health emergency so they could complete the school year in elementary, middle school, and high school grades. There are three contexts, namely, an urban school in the north of the country and two rural schools, one in the west and the other in southeastern Mexico. We also analyze the possibilities for starting the next school year 2020-2021 and the new post-Covid19 educational methodologies.
How do three Mexican public schools face the health emergency for COVID-19?
I. General Francisco Naranjo Elementary School
Five years ago, Héctor Azael Hernández Moreno became the principal of this elementary school through an opposition review, a momentous event in the teaching body of Nuevo León. In less than five years, he managed to transform the deteriorating school both materially and spiritually into a community of students and their families.
Located in the colony, Las Flores, in the center of the Metropolitan Zone of Monterrey, the elementary school has 168 students, eight classrooms, and two bathroom areas. There is also an office building at the location and a dining room to provide school breakfasts granted by the DIF (National System for the Integral Development of the Family).
Most of the children who attend this school come from families engaged in the trades and are in the mid-low socioeconomic status. CONEVAL classifies the colony as lagging socially, with 18 % to 34 % of the population in poverty.
Ahead of his time, five years ago, the principal designed a weekly school day from the students’ homes, using the EDMODO platform. When the contingency occurred, they continued to use the platform to meet each student’s specific needs and the school in particular. It was in contrast to the generalized educational program used elsewhere throughout the state of Nuevo León. Each class and grade teacher had access to and follow-up to the activities, so the teacher implemented them and reviewed the students’ areas of opportunity.
In this way, using the EDMODO platform and other communication channels such as WhatsApp and the Facebook page of the primary school, the school community continued the distance learning. It was able to complete the 2019-2020 school year.
II. Telesecundaria Emiliano Zapata Tele-Secondary School in Limón de la Luna, Mexico
Alfredo Díaz Miranda is the Director Commissioner of this remote school. In addition to his primary role as a teacher in front of a class, he must attend to the administrative and management responsibilities of the remote control. He is an agronomist. Continuously trains to know the pedagogical principles of teaching.
“El Limón de la Luna” (“Lemon of the Moon”) is a rural community in the municipality of Buena Vista, near the border with Jalisco and 60 km from Apatzingán, the so-called “Hot Land” of Michoacán. The population of Limón de la Luna does not exceed 300 inhabitants, so the students of this remote-access school come from surrounding communities.
The vast majority of the population are shareholders of common land, dedicated to the cultivation of seasonal maize (corn), blackberries, and planting for the tomato or cucumber seasons. Those who do not own cultivated land work as day laborers. CONEVAL considers Buenavista’s municipality to lag considerably socially because 60.10 % of the population is below the income poverty line.
The Telesecundaria serves 35 students in three grades. It sits on a one-hectare plot of land; it has three classrooms and a multi-purpose athletic field built by the community. It is noteworthy that the maintenance of the facilities is performed by the community and sometimes does not get done.
During this contingency, Alfredo and his teachers managed to continue their academic activities, mainly through using cell phones and the WhatsApp application. The teachers sent texts, videos, some audios, and photographs of pages with step-by-step solved exercises and explanations. The students returned their activities by the same means. On several occasions, there were delays in the return of assignments related to the lack of balance for the use of data on their cell phones. (Not all the students had home internet, and in the best of those cases, they share it with neighbors.)
In this situation, not all the students responded in the same way. Twenty percent of the students turned in all the homework, and another 20 % sent between 80 and 85 % of the activities. The rest of the students complied with 30-60 % of the tasks. One reason was the lack of access to Internet data. Another was the students’ low interest, who took advantage of the contingency to work as day laborers. (Being a rural population, the confinement of quarantine was not total.)
As Director Commissioner, Alfredo Díaz sent the documentation and final grades to the tele-secondary government system in the state of Michoacán. Alfredo had to drive to a nearby town (Pareo, Michoacán) and pay in an internet café to send all the documentation.
III. Quintana Roo State Baccalaureate College, Rio Hondo Campus
Located on the border with Belize, the community of Javier Rojo Gómez, Quintana Roo, houses the College of Baccalaureates that serves 368 students from the surrounding towns within a radius of 2 to 20 km. The vast majority of the communities are rural, with a predominant agricultural vocation. The main crop is sugar cane. CONEVAL considers the municipality Othón P. Blanco to lag socially, considering that 43.20 % of the population is below the income poverty line.
The campus has nine classrooms, three laboratories, a library, six administrative areas, a dance club area, a cafeteria, sports courts, and a fruit tree area.
The students are divided into seven classes, two second-semester, four fourth-semester, and one is sixth-semester. Different teachers teach the subjects in each category. In particular, Ramón teaches mathematics, supported by his training in many courses related to education and pedagogy. He has several diplomas with the same focus, and he is helped by his internship for the Master’s Degree in Education.
Caught by the surprise suspension of the classes due to the COVID-19 contingency without an official platform where they could lecture on theory and related activities, the teachers shared the class activities on social networks. They accepted the delivery of completed assignments using any commonly used systems, such as Messenger, email, and even WhatsApp. This situation complicated the control of academic time and the formats for turning in activities; besides, the contact through social networks was awkward because students used pseudonyms for their names.
Interest in pursuing their studies at a higher level motivated some students to complete their online activities. However, some of the students trusted the rumor that there would be no failing grades, and so they did not turn in their activity assignments. It was an additional problem on top of the difficulty accessing the internet, as it is a rural community.
What does the next school year 2020-2021, hold for us?
On August 3, the national strategy for public education was announced, that television transmissions would stream educational content. The question arises from this scenario: Is distance-or-online education feasible in public school?
In primary education, the blunt answer is no. Even with the five-years of experience using the EDMODO platform, Professor Hector Azael believes that students at that age cannot be autonomous in learning. The most worrisome challenge lies with the first and second-grade children because teaching them the process of literacy is the concern that presents itself in the next school year.
Alfredo and Ramon agree on the reasoning about the age of elementary school students. They do not have the responsibility to learn for themselves. By not having anyone who is insisting that they do the activities, the children let them accumulate. The moment arrives when it is difficult for them to complete their assignments in a timely and correct manner. It is the moment when parents must be attentive so that their children comply.
Also, the generation of content for television has limitations and the instructional designs of tele-education systems in Mexico (Tele-secondary schools, Tele-high schools, and Superior Distance Middle Education “EMSaD”). Tele-education systems have been elaborated for subject content to be projected on television or computer screens. The teacher serves as an advisor in case of questions about the content. In many cases, the teachers end up teaching their classes like face-to-face education (prioritizing subjects according to their mastery or likes). On some EMSaD campuses, the teachers give packets of 3 or 4 topics, setting the distance education content to the side.
The need to improve the infrastructure in rural schools to have internet access, computer equipment, and easily-accessed technology platforms on mobile phones must not be forgotten. Also, one must consider teachers’ and managers’ training on how to use these technologies to maintain effective communication with the parents, the remote monitoring of the students, and the flexibility to receive and grade overdue activities.
At higher education (middle school and high school), the possibility of 100 % online education is feasible. The more mature age of the students and their particular interests mean that parental involvement can be reduced considerably to monitoring whether the activities have been completed.
Post-COVID-19 Education
We are experiencing a schism in education that is driven by the health contingency of COVID-19. The truth is that the educational change we are undergoing is irreversible. The next school year, 2020-2021, is the start of new education and, in particular, a new type of public school.
The change will begin with the technological part, taking the best elements of online or distance education, supplying the equipment, and training the staff, teachers, and students. However, the most significant change will occur when we revalue education: the learning paradigm will replace the standard of grading. It will lead to meaningful learning that is useful and applicable, and that the students can put into practice for the benefit of their family, community, and themselves.
Post-COVID-19 education will aim to benefit all society, creating a better world. It is essential to initiate the change of mindset, generate a culture of greater thirst for knowledge, a value of mutual respect, respect for the community, and care of the environment, all this, to counteract the culture of violence, deceit, and indifference that is present in a part of society and among youth.
About the authors
Rodrigo Ponce Díaz (rponce@tec.mx) is Principal of PrepaTec Eugenio Garza Lagüera. He teaches physics classes for the International Baccalaureate. He holds a Ph.D. in Information and Communications Technologies from Tecnológico de Monterrey.
Héctor Azael Hernández (lic.hahm@hotmail.com) is Principal of the General Francisco Naranjo Elementary School, Monterrey, N.L. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Primary And Law Education, a Master’s and a PH.D. from the National Pedagogical University, and eight years of teaching experience.
Alfredo Díaz Miranda (alfdimi@yahoo.com.mx) He is Director Commissioner at the Emiliano Zapata Telesondary School in El Limón de la Luna, Michoacán. He has a degree in Agricultural Engineering from Michoacana University of San Nicolás de Hidalgo. He has been teaching tele-secondary school since 1995.
Ramón Díaz Gaona (radi_ga@hotmail.com) is a full-time professor of mathematics at Colegio de Bachilleres of Quintana Roo, Campus Río Hondo, since 1998. He received a degree in Agricultural Engineering with a specialty in zootechnics at the Autonomous University of Chapingo in 1983.
References
CONEVAL. (2015). Visor Geoespacial Pobreza-COVID-19. August 5, 2020, from CONEVAL website: https://www.coneval.org.mx/Medicion/MP/Paginas/Visor_Geoespacial_Pobreza_COVID-19.aspx
INEGI. (2015). 2015 Intercensal Survey. August 5, 2020, from INEGI website: https://www.inegi.org.mx/programas/intercensal/2015/
INEGI. (2015). Statistical Model 2015 for the continuity of the MCS-ENIGH. August 5, 2020, from INEGI website: https://www.inegi.org.mx/investigacion/eash/2015/default.html
Interviews with three teachers:
Héctor Azael Hernández – General Francisco Naranjo Primary School, Monterrey, N.L. Mexico
Alfredo Díaz Miranda – Emiliano Zapata Tele-Secondary School, Limón de la Luna, Michoacán
Ramón Díaz Gaona – Colegio de Bachilleres of the State of Quintana Roo, Campus Río Hondo, Quintana Roo
Editing by Rubí Román (rubi.roman@tec.mx) – Observatory of Educational Innovation.
Translation by Daniel Wetta.
){kind=icon}
){kind=icon}
This article from Observatory of the Institute for the Future of Education may be shared under the terms of the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 
)