ეკონომიკური პროფილი (May 2021)
სწავლებისა და საქმიანობის ფორმატის ტრანსფორმაცია კორონავირუსის პანდემიის პირობებში
Abstract
Despite the fact that the coronavirus pandemic caused an economic crisis and a significant reduction in demand and supply, it gave a strong impetus to the development and massive use of information technology, in the beginning of a new long wave of the economic cycle. The pandemic is not a challenge only to the world community, but it also tests it - to what extent it is able to quickly and efficiently digitize the economy, transfer production to a new technological level, and ultimately, implement the fourth technological revolution. The Internet, telecommunications already have the opportunity to improve their qualifications in their own or promising specialties of interested persons through appropriate online courses. In countries with developed market economies and before the pandemic, the number of students in such courses was almost equal to the number of university students, and in the coming years, in all likelihood, it will significantly exceed it. This fully fits into the life-long learning trend caused by rapid technological changes, which nullifies the "eternal status" of the acquired profession. In less than a year since the beginning of the global coronavirus pandemic, there have been significant changes in the organization of forms of study and teaching in universities. The latter have to seriously revise their teaching methods in the "rapid chess" mode and abandon outdated forms of teaching. COVID-19 has paved the way for distance learning and work, online lessons, lectures, video conferences. However, the distance, online form of training and work has not only advantages, but also disadvantages, the ultimate level of efficiency. At the same time, at present, not all students, students and even educational institutions have the technical and material capabilities to provide online learning. Knowledge is a multifunctional tool with the help of which a person copes with certain tasks. Taking this into account, the university should equip young people with such knowledge that will have not only informational load, but also great applied value. In the context of the pandemic, universities are faced with serious challenges, most of them are like a downward spiral orbit: on the one hand, online teaching saves money on the maintenance and operation of classrooms, but on the other hand, this means reducing the costs of students (their parents, sponsors, etc. etc.), the appropriate adjustment of their mobility plans, which makes the administration and the state the need to pursue a new, changed educational and economic policy. In the context of a pandemic, the implementation of these tasks faces a serious danger: traditional forms of study and knowledge transfer are disrupted and the market requirements become not entirely clear due to its significant narrowing. The question of the need to reduce the dependence of the cost of studying at universities on the contributions of the students themselves (their parents, sponsors, etc.) is becoming increasingly acute. Such expenses in state universities should be completely borne by the state, which will practically reduce to zero the motivation of the universities to maintain undisciplined students within the walls of the university and will significantly increase the demand towards them (and, accordingly, the quality of education). Which place can online learning take in a pandemic period? In general (without taking into account the mention in the context of the pandemic), the advantage of online education is unambiguous for those specialties, the perspective of which presupposes predominantly the same format. However, it should be remembered that the online format is a specific, actually surrogate form of social relations and professional and personal self-confidence and communication skills are practically not based on it. So, instead of a tug of war between online and offline forms, it is necessary to find the optimal balance between the forms of their complementarity and not interchangeability. Online courses for stakeholders are no less mobilizing. Listening to a lecture in this format is possible at a convenient time (at home, while traveling, while waiting for a bus or waiting in line for purchases, etc.). These courses are a subjective choice of everyone and are not a forced form for gaining some number of so-called credits. Due to high motivation, the degree of development is more stable and higher. Over time, the knowledge gained through such courses will become more valuable in the selection of an employee for a vacant position. Distance learning, in spite of the fact that it has a number of advantages (convenient, economical - it saves costs on transport, time, egalitarian, etc.) is still a substitute - it only partially replaces, but does not replace fully relations between the lecturer and student (as well as between academic staff). It does not replace such aspects of full-fledged student life as the living relations of students, their joint participation in public events. In the online format, it is possible to transfer knowledge, but not the nuances of culture, behavior, creativity, national and regional sensitivity, humor, etc. Online learning and relationships is, figuratively speaking, a movie shot on a flat screen, while classroom learning is a movie in 3D. The focus on distance learning has one very significant side effect: it creates a danger to the level and frequency of mutual communication of academic staff. Because of this, departments and social and professional unions can undergo a serious deformation of their significance. Accordingly, this will increase the degree of alienation of the academic staff from the universities that provided them with jobs. The problem of socialization, from a slightly different perspective, is also faced by persons engaged exclusively in scientific work - how will scientific links, "chained" by common ideas and goals, be formed? The final effectiveness of the chosen training format (online vs. offline format) is determined by the effectiveness of the training process. The latter is largely determined by compliance with the requirements of the labor market. In turn, this compliance is largely predetermined by the systemic (instead of episodic) contact of potential employers with universities. The coronavirus pandemic is directly reflected in the scale and format of employment - it reduces the overall contingent and significantly changes the employment situation, "throws" a significant part of the employees who have retained their jobs online. Remote forms of work, which were already pioneered by higher and general education schools, will develop even more, new, more sophisticated forms of intensification of work of employees employed at remote locations will appear. Here, as in other spheres of economic and social life, the boundaries between the traditional division of working and non-working (free) time will actually be erased. However, online work has refrained level of efficiency. For example, it is very problematic to create a workplace at home - not everyone has the opportunity to organize a separate office, a desk for such work, which creates psychological and, often, physical discomfort. The fact is that online work has a concomitant negative effect. It causes the atomization of the collective, the corrosion of its unity. To the extent that representatives of higher education and the academic sphere can lead the students who have switched online, not only in their studies, but also in the development of skills and feelings of socialization and empathy in them, the future and the maturity of civil society will largely depend on this. It is necessary to find a kind of "golden mean" of relations both between students and academic staff, and with representatives of "their own cluster", in which direct live relationships may not be as intense and daily as before. The rest of the time will be completely transferred to their self-organizing and self-fulfilling "box of time". The final victory over the pandemic will eliminate or significantly alleviate most of the above problems, however, the need to adapt everyday life, study, work to the online format of relationships will remain highly relevant.
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