H E Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani and other speakers during the panel discussion organised by Qatar Foundation as part of its contribution to the 2020 Global Goals Week, yesterday.
Doha: H E Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, Vice-Chairperson and CEO of Qatar Foundation, has emphasised during a global panel discussion on the future of learning yesterday, that the quick fixes enforced by COVID-19 must not detract from education’s ultimate goal.
Speaking at a panel discussion organised by Qatar Foundation as part of its contribution to the 2020 Global Goals Week, H E Sheikha Hind said that the purpose of education should not be limited to access to technology.
‘COVID-19 and Education: The Largest Disruption in the History of Education’ brought together international experts and education advocates to focus on whether the pandemic serve as a catalyst to support transformative changes in education and a greater shared sense of global responsibility.
“We talk about access to technology, but it is just a tool — it doesn’t really look at whether our children are learning or not, or how it will help them prosper in the world. We have to go back to what we are teaching our children, and for what purpose,” said H E Sheikha Hind.
“Technology is not a fix for everything. Now, we are in a pandemic and we have to make do with what we have, so our reaction is to try to continue education by doing it online. But is that the ultimate for my children? Absolutely not. We can’t create technology that substitutes for a learning environment that encompasses so many different elements, and is not just about the content and the knowledge that a child acquires,” she said.
While, sharing her vision for the future of education, H E Sheikha Hind said, “Moving forward, we must recognise that whatever we have been doing for centuries is obviously not working, and the pandemic has proven to us that even the quick fixes we have had are also not working. “The question now is how we work in parallel — providing the short-term solutions we do need for children, parents, and teachers who are suffering, but at the same time having a long-term vision to understand what our ultimate goal is. Is it to graduate a number of students every year, or is there really a purpose behind what we do?” she said.
H E Sheikha Hind was joined by a panel of experts and advocates for education including, Danilo Türk, former President of Slovenia; Sarah Cliffe, Director of the Center on International Cooperation at New York University; Achim Steiner, Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme; Gabriela Cuevas Barron, President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union; and Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University.
The panel discussion attempted to find answers to issues such as if the ongoing pandemic an opportunity to rethink and revitalise our global education model, how can COVID-19 trigger a more effective and meaningful mindset shift in the way we approach education in communities and how to regain the trust and decrease the gap of expectations between communities and educational institutions.
