Lest we forget, in the in the killing fields of a different kind during the last 2000 years of our existence mankind has confronted more than 20 different epidemics and has lost over 400 million lives. In these times of the unprecedented Novel Corona or the COVID19 epidemic outbreak, it is estimated that we may lose over a million lives with over 10 million infected. How vulnerable mankind is even in this day and times. Yes, in this age communicable diseases still contribute 30% of disease burden across the globe. Indeed, hundreds of epidemics occur each year and we fail to respond and contain most of them. Apart from various biological and behavioral public health interventions, we need to closely look at the structural intervention, that is, the legal framework to review health system preparedness.

Humanity faces fast forward being on crossroads for the first time in our century and the choices we make will shape our future for generations to come that goes beyond the immediate threat we confront. To inherit a world that is disease free is an obligation that we owe to our future generations. Ofcourse we will pass the storm but the world will never be the same again as the real dangers from dangerous decisions, knee jerk reactions and technologies that will be pressed for fear of doing nothing do remains bigger. We face difficult choices such as draconian geo tagging, surveillance before freedom and citizen empowerment reminding us of George Orwellian prophecy. A struggle between nationalism, isolation and global comradiere and solidarity has already ensued whence large scale and real time social experimentation on human psychology and social behavior are being conducted by governments. These are not normal times where work from home and distance and online mode become a new normal even for schools and universities, governments and businesses. In these precarious times we do realize that our health and families come first, we more than ever before trust science and technology, though superfluous travel gets a setback but philanthropy and humanitarian aid and empathy now go beyond political, geographical and racial barriers.

It is in this context that we examine as to how COVID-19 crisis is throwing up new challenges, but more importantly on a note of cautious optimism also some emerging opportunities, both in near and distant futures,

For Environment and Climate Change,

It is going to be a future positive for the environment and climate change as already evidenced by lower consumption of fossil fuels, aviation turbine fuels and the aerosols. 

Low nitrogen dioxide levels in many population hot spots and urban conglomerations is already in evidence and so is the case for reduced carbon dioxide levels estimated by International Climate Research in Oslo that predicts a 1.2% decline in 2020 using global GDP forecasts of OECD.

For Business and the Industry,

Economic slowdown will be driven by the west leading to recession globally but would tend to stabilize at 1% to 2 % on cues from India and China in a post corona conundrum. There would be a dramatic and drastic change in not only the existing business practices but also in reinventing the very models and the much touted  and erstwhile successful industries. Other changes post slowdown will include but not limited to:

Long-term business planning and models will be reduced to short term plans and models where good cash flow will be the key to success. 

It is important to protect the brand from drowning in the corona flood through imagination and creativity.

It would be a good idea to wait and watch than to go in for riskier and unpredictable returns in the time to come

Digitization will be embedded into the very ethos of all business architecture so best is to prepare now.

Almost half of workplaces will be automated in the days to come as per new McKinsey report.

Employment as we know will cease to exist to be replaced by creativity and innovation.

For Finance,

Capital expenditure will be reduced in favor of short term working capital with minimum leverage and employment generating returns.

Value for money will be the new mantra and quick return even if risky investments, will thrive in a world seeking easy wealth.

Stocks and Trading will get fully virtual in the long run where more and more individuals will find it easy to invest.

For Entertainment,

No frill lifestyle and entertainment expenses as also savings instruments will receive a big boost in place of permanent salary, rent and travel.

Entertainment and Gaming will be virtual and interactive on distance mode e platforms with limited physical encounters.

For Real Estate,

Ownerships, credits and mortgages will be minimized in favor of rentals and co ownership of apartments and houses.

For Governments,

Authoritative governments’ even benevolent autocracies will thrive with full controls on social media and individual freedoms.

The bureaucracy will become lean and mean but better paid and efficient with participative approaches.

More respect and trust in empowered local governments will now be more permanent and will lead to better discipline of civil society.

Social security plans and subsidies, youth and unemployment benefits and schemes by governments will take a heavy toll on state exchequers.

For Travel and Tourism,

Travel that is non essential will be sure off our sights, whereas tourism will become more select and specific, and as a result the entire industry and hotel chains will be impacted in both short and medium term futures.

For Women and Families,

Familial bonds of love, hope and empathy will evolve out of confinement and bondage in the near future.

Women driven enterprise will tend to benefit on a long term basis during the slowdown as they will tend to work from homes.

Socio psychological pressures in the short run will give vent to quarrels and disputes and even divorces that will take a long time to heal.

Family institutions will get a fillip and a more equal role for both men and women more so in the west.

Family disputes and quarrels will rise and will have to be handled by separate courts.

For Services,

Small service enterprises including home deliveries will boom in short term but will be overcome in the long term by authentic and branded chains.

For Technology,

Technology and Artificial Intelligence will be integrated into the erstwhile industries and embedded in every business model.

For Corporations,

Essential commodities will receive a big demand in near future to be replaced by others and big monolith corporations will produce and run these enterprises.

Efficiency improvement and innovation will be the cornerstone for every business enterprise in the time to come.

New ideas and new technological breakthroughs will drive the future of industry where distance mode will be the key.

For Health and Wellness,

Rise in investments in health products, naturopathy, yoga, ayurveda and spiritual endeavors will get a big boost.

Doctors and health care workers will see a big demand followed by a more institutionalized set up driven by telemedicine.

Pharmacies will be shopped on online malls and on demand will be home delivered.

For Schooling, 

As per UNESCO over 188 countries across the globe have closed schools having launched home schooling programs enabling parents to be participants in discovering their kids talents and enhancing their innate skills.

Both Primary and Secondary education as also assessments will be technology driven where neighborhood play schools will get a boost and instructions will based on games through virtual, interactive and online modes.

For Higher and University Education,

In the short term it is important to keep the admissions afloat and completely online by better use of existing resources and adapting relevant social and digital outreach. 

In the short term and to ride the corona storm it is better to remain exposed through webinars and online dissemination to attract aspirants by going completely online.

Degrees will be delivered by online and interactive instructions and teaching where even the assessments will be carried out online.

Qualitative and Quantitative Metrics and Key Performance Indicators operating on cloud-based technology platforms will become a buzz word in the immediate future.

More and more skill based education and training will take over the academic and theoretical classroom teaching.

Virtual Classroom solutions will be sought by big corporate in place of tedious consultations in a digital marketplace.

Immersive experiences will include all augmented reality and virtual reality for marketing and learning will become a rule.

E-Learning endeavors, E Commerce development and services would be led by scientists and technologists in a digital world.

E Courses and development E-Textbook creation – digital content development will be a collaborative enterprise.

For Management,

Management Information Systems will be real time and human resource productivity will be judged by their output that will be instant and evidence based.
Learning Management System will be synchronous and integral to all strategic and tactical enterprise resource planning. 

Logistics and operations management will be agile and organic where the role of robotics will become more prominent.

Virtualization solutions – digital authentication for digital attendance & secured fee payments will dominate all transactions worldwide.

For Individuals and Family 

During Corona times and in the near future as an individual or a family unit please do hold back any avoidable or high risk investments where visibility of returns is difficult to predict You may also minimize expenditure on the routine stuff and develop a frugal mindset. Develop yourself on improving competencies and skills to become more effective, relevant and efficient. Share the financial situation with your family members and educate them on the family financial position and the plans to improve If you have to invest do invest selectively in right business models and track risks based on good research. This is a great opportunity to spend more time for yourself particularly on things you have missed in your life time be it family, friends, painting, photography, dramatics, study, music and even spirituality or meditation.

For Youth,

I do have a piece of advice for most of our youth so that they may like to prepare themselves for the emerging and future global paradigm,

Dependence to independence during Corona times will be overtaken by interdependence and the key to success will be through creativity, character and collaboration for the individuals and the society.

Instead of individuals there would be Teams across spread wide geographically working in collusion with technology integration for all operations.

Days of patriarchal organizations are over and self driven individuals instead of being curated by leaders will become a centerpiece to success.

For Entrepreneurs,

In the immediate and short term future please show a big heart and take care of employees. This will be wise as it will reap you good returns in due course. To be reasonable and transparent with them will be a great step forward for your own success.

The customers and suppliers will remain loyal, even more than before if you remain caring and supportive to their own personal crisis.

Investing in right business model and right technology will for sure improve your own reach in adding value customers

This is a time to keep capital expenditure on hold or low based on returns as also frugal in working capital and operating expenditure

The slow down can be put to advantage in improving  your processes and a great time to restrategize. Yes when the competitors is down it is a good time to catch up with large players if you plan right.

One important lesson during these times indeed is that nothing is constant in an ever changing world where even this crisis will change. As an optimist I have believe that the human enterprise is again going to triumph and the economy will shine again. In a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex & ambiguous) world we can be resilient and creative to prepare and plan for a bright future.

On International Efforts,

International efforts are best coordinated and enforced through the United Nations. Indeed the world needs a special UN force to fight COVID-19 as the World Health Organization (WHO) has neither been prepared nor equipped to fight a pandemic of this proportion. The responsibility of WHO until now was only to monitor threats to public health, to inform and advise the member states. Also the UN Security Council (UNSC) stands ill prepared and highly politicized due to petty battles, awkward veto rights and the need for transparency. No emergency meeting to authorise the UN Secretary General for a force under Chapter VII of the UN Charter has been held to date. The fight against COVID-19 has to be on a war footing and need of a composite force with capabilities of treatment, coordinating international collaborative efforts, massive sanitization, testing, hospitalization and providing quick support is the need of the hour. In such an emergency, it is the Department of Peace Operations that can advise the member states to not only send troops, but also medical professionals, police, health workers and equipment. No doubt we need a UN force to enforce social distancing and lockdowns and prevent a catastrophe in the developed and the developing world alike using global and optimal resources is very much possible.

Yes, these are grave times that will pass, with courage and fortitude, forbearance and far-sight. Let us not forget Shelley; ‘if winter comes can spring be far behind’. With a heavy heart, I pen a poem on the very essence of life to revoke and rekindle hope in mankind’s own efforts and endeavors from the ashes, for a brighter future positive ahead.

Corona times and essence of Life

“In times of corona, gloom and the chaos,  

Lest we forget, that in times of distress,

Humanity will strive, endeavor and rise,

To a  life worth living, caring and daring,

To exist on earth and persevere for others,

We shall prevail for a world even better,

In times of corona, gloom and the chaos,  

No more of death, doom or destruction,

But we pray, struggle and strive for life,

To a world that believes, cares and shares,

To life so profound that dares and endures,

Driven by courage, fortitude and invention.

In times of corona, gloom and the chaos,  

Humanity be reborn, cherish and to live,  

To reap and resurrect, restore and reward,

To love and grow, embrace and give solace,

Like water on blue earth in skies and earth,

Let each of us nourish, nurture and innovate.

In times of corona, gloom and the chaos,  

Our world, all life and the land that we grow,

To live and carry let us live and be merry,

To music and dance together so simple,

Where everyone can live, give and achieve,

For a life of love, dignity and the glory.”

Bates however (2015, 15) argued that there is a real danger in tying the university too closely to immediate industry needs and labour market needs. From India’s perspective as tuition and fee increase and public funding for universities gets tied to the ratings driven more by indicators such as placements and employability quotients rather than any infrastructure or quality imperatives students do tend to be allured by education abroad. Indeed many students are already judging higher education as a poor economic investment given their chance of employment after graduation. Well it is often quoted that the mediocre teacher tells, the good teacher explains, the superior teacher demonstrates, the great teacher inspires.

Let me cite from my own experience of Australia, as a student at Swinburne and much later at Monash University where I taught, on the evolving teaching and learning process. The question being asked now in light of the pandemic ‘’whether a university education’’ is at all a good investment for working life and citizenship in the new century or, more precisely, whether it is good value for money, (Barber, et al., 2013:1). Ernst & Young (2012:4) in a report argue that the dominant university model in Australia, where I once learned and taught, where a broad-based teaching and research institution, supported by a large asset base and a large, predominantly in-house back office — is proving to be unviable. This remains equally valid in India and elsewhere. Thus, a key challenge for higher education elsewhere as much as in our country, in these pandemic times, is the force of remote and online learning, technological change, intense competition and constrained resourcing ‘to have the optimal mix of online and on-campus teaching as was argued by Gallagher & Garrett, 2013:9. As Plutarch, the Greek philosopher is oft quoted, the mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled and to kindle that fire, we at times may need even brick and mortar teaching and learning.

Let me briefly go to the root of the issue of the ‘’Teaching and Learning Process’’ in our country and elsewhere in the world, where we follow the basic paradigm in higher education set out in Bloom’s Taxonomy as modified to date. Indeed it is a case in point that most Universities here have not moved beyond Benjamin Bloom and his collaborators who laid emphasis on just six major categories: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation. Let me state that the New Education Policy does try and address the issues of critical thinking and imagination but a lot more needs to be done for value education, character building and man making so critical to a diverse country as ours. Let me remind what Albert Einstein had to say, it is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.

Following on Bates (2015:327), who questions the considerations regarding course design to include issues as to what kind of learners are likely to take this course? What are their needs? Which mode(s) of delivery will be most appropriate? What is the preferred method(s) of teaching? What is the main content (facts, theory, data, and processes) to be covered on this course? How to assess understanding of this content? What are the main skills that learners will need to develop for the course? What ways in which they can develop and practice these skills? How can technology help with the presentation of contents? What resources are required for this course in terms of: professional help from instructional designers and media producers; possible sources of funding for release time and media production; good quality open educational resources?

Peter Drucker mentions that teaching is the only major occupation of man for which we have not yet developed tools that make an average person capable of competence and performance. In teaching we rely on the ‘naturals’, the ones who somehow know how to teach. Indeed yes we learn as, in our country as abroad these questions become paramount in a post pandemic world. Let us have no doubt that the online and virtual or digital world takes precedence on the issue of mode of delivery. The commonly available learning technologies have been: learning management systems, such as Blackboard, Moodle, Desire2Learn, Canvas; synchronous technologies, such as Blackboard Collaborate, Adobe Connect, and Big Blue Button; lecture recording technologies, such as podcasts and lecture capture using tablets and mobile devices, such as iPads, mobile phones, and apps; MOOCs and their many variants (SPOCs, TOOCs, etc.); other social media, such as blogging software, wikis, Google Hangout, Google Docs, and Twitter; learner-generated tools, such as e-portfolios. Critical new advances in educational technology and the teaching learning process for higher education include, Consumer technologies, such as 3D Video Drones, Electronic Publishing Mobile Apps, Quantified Self Tablet Computing, Telepresence; Wearable Technology and Internet Technologies, such as Cloud Computing The Internet of Things Real-Time Translation Semantic Applications Single Sign-On Syndication Tools Social Media Technologies, Collaborative Environments, Collective Intelligence, Crowd funding, Crowd sourcing, Digital Identity Social Networks, Tacit Intelligence; Digital Strategies, such as Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), Flipped Classroom, Games and Gamification, using Location Intelligence Makerspaces, Preservation/Conservation Technologies, Learning Technologies, such as Badges/Microcredit Learning Analytics, Massive Open Online Courses, using Mobile Learning, Online Learning, Open Content, Open Licensing, Virtual and Remote Laboratories; Visualization Technologies, such as 3D Printing/Rapid Prototyping, Augmented Reality, Information Visualization, using Visual Data Analysis, Volumetric and Holographic Displays; and Enabling Technologies, such as Affective Computing, Cellular Networks, Electro vibration, Flexible Displays, Geolocation Location-Based Services, Machine Learning, Mesh Networks, Mobile Broadband, using Natural User Interfaces, Near Field Communication, Next-Generation Batteries, Open Hardware, Speech-to-Speech Translation, Statistical Machine, Translation Virtual Assistants and Wireless Power. Here I would reiterate that here or anywhere in the world, he who dares to teach must never cease to learn and not to forget, what Mahatma Gandhi once said, live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever. So let us learn to unlearn and re learn these new normal techniques.

Yes, post Covid-19 teaching and learning process and pedagogies will be disruptive and technology will bring about a decisive change in higher education through an online and virtual learning to start with followed by blended learning and internships. My favorite poet, Robert Frost, once quipped, I am not a teacher, but an awakener.

The teachers and the universities have to be adaptive and flexible to provide real-time feedback and support to the students in smaller groups and peer-to-peer learning. The integration of pedagogy, technology and virtual reality of the new normal will define the emerging model of blended teaching and active learning with particular attention being paid to remote mobility, flexibility and multiple device and technology fusion and usage. To conclude, let me quote, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, and as teachers for us to remember, that a good teacher is like a candle – it consumes itself to light the way for others. And the challenge before us, in the new normal has to be taken by the horns for the New Positive.

References

Altback, P.G., Reisberg, L., & Rumbley, L.E., (2009). Trends in Global Higher Education: Tracking an Academic Revolution. A Report prepared for the UNESCO 2009 Conference on Higher Education, UNESCO. Retrieved from: http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0018/001831/183168e.pdf

Barber, M., Donnelly, K., & Rizve, S. (2013). An avalanche is coming: Higher education and the revolution ahead. Institute for Public Policy Research, London, UK. Retrieved from:

http://med.stanford.edu/smili/support/FINAL%20Avalanche%20Paper%20110313%20(2).pdf

Bates, A.W. (2015) Teaching in a digital age. BC Open Textbook. Retrieved from: (http://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/)

Bloom, B. S.; Engelhart, M. D.; Furst, E. J.; Hill, W. H.; Krathwohl, D. R. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of educational goals. Handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay Company.

Christa McAuliffe,  by Hohler, Robert T. (1986). “I Touch the Future …” The Story of Christa McAuliffe. New York, NY: Random House. ISBN 0-394-55721-2.

Ernst & Young (2012). University of the Future: A thousand year industry on the cusp of profound change. Ernst & Young, Australia. Retrieved from: http://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/University_of_the_future/$FILE/University_of_th e_future_2012.pdf

European Parliament (2006). Key competencies for lifelong learning: A European reference framework. Official Journal of European Union. Retrieved from:

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2006:394:0010:0018:EN:PDF

Gallagher, S., & Garrett, G. (2013). Disruptive Education: Technology Enabled Universities’. The United States Studies Centre at The University of Sydney, NSW Government. Retrieved from:

http://ussc.edu.au/ussc/assets/media/docs/publications/130801_DisruptiveEducatio_Gallag herGarrett.pdf

Robertson, S.L. (2010) Challenges Facing Universities in a Globalising World, published by the Centre for Globalisation, Education and Societies, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK. Retrieved from:

https://susanleerobertson.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/2010-robertson-challenges.pdf