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Pandemic highlighting the need for technology in education

NLPS tech
Technology has played a crucial role in allowing NLPS to continue to deliver learning to students during the coronavirus closures. File photo.

BONNYVILLE – The use of technology looks a little different than it typically does for Northern Lights Public Schools (NLPS).

During the board of trustees May 27 meeting, associate superintendent Bill Driedger discussed how important technology continues to be for their staff and students during the coronavirus pandemic and that access continues to be a hurdle in rural communities.

“What’s kind of unique to the education setting is we use technology to assist our students in their learning journey and that, of course, changes over time,” he detailed. “It’s changed significantly in the last 20 years and it’s changed significantly in the last two months and it’s going to continue to change moving forward as well.”

When schools were closed in March due to COVID-19, school boards across the province had to figure out the best measures to continue offering their students learning outside of the classroom.

According to Driedger, the change forced NLPS to look at technology in a different way.

“Two months ago when we talked about the purpose of technology, we wouldn’t have necessarily been talking as focused on the fact that we’re now doing meetings (and lessons) in this current environment,” he said. “It’s starting to change how we operate as a system and more importantly we’ve done a lot of remote learning here in the last little bit.”

Driedger stressed how this situation reinforced “the need for a very reliable and secure technology network.”

“Access to the Internet and Wifi continues to be an issue in our rural communities, and never have we felt that more than in the last two or three months,” he noted. “I know that there’s work being done provincially and I know various service providers are doing pieces on their end as well to either bring down costs or to provide more opportunity around connectivity. But, from a governance perspective, I think there’s always an opportunity for folks to understand that in rural areas this is and continues to be an important resource that we need to have in place for our students and families.”

As NLPS prepares to reopen their schools when they’re given the go-ahead from the provincial government, Driedger said they have time to prepare themselves for what the future brings when it comes to education and technology.

“We’re focusing more and more on how we properly prepare ourselves, how do we properly prepare our technology, and more importantly how do we prepare our teaching staff to be prepared to continue to instruct our students next year, regardless of what relaunch looks like,” he stated. “Two months ago, we were forced into it very quickly and we now have a little bit of time to look at how to best get ourselves ready for what that looks like to make sure that we’re prepared to meet the needs of our students.” 

Robynne Henry, Bonnyville Nouvelle

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