UK Edition
Remote learning could come at the expense of poorer families
Most homes in the UK now have internet access, but many students may struggle to get the right equipment to continue their studies
For many families in the UK, the closure of the nation’s schools due to coronavirus will see their children sat in their bedrooms or at the kitchen table, using their laptops to access online learning platforms.
But for hundreds of thousands of students, access to remote learning is far from guaranteed.
Experts have for years warned of a “digital divide” between students who are able to log on to online learning services and those who find it difficult.
Children and teenagers without laptops or internet access at home, who previously used school or library computers, now face an uncertain period.
“It is a huge problem nationally, and it's an absolutely vast problem internationally,” says Simon Nelson, the chief executive of online learning service FutureLearn.
In 2018, 12pc of students between the ages of 11 and 18 said they had no internet access from a computer or tablet, according to data from the Office for National Statistics. That leaves 700,000 students struggling to log into remote learning services.
A further 60,000 students said they had no home internet access at all, cutting off any route for them to carry on their education during social isolation.
With parents using laptops and family PCs to work from home, many students could be left using aging laptops or their smartphones to try to access online learning systems.
“Both my husband and I are working from home and we have one family laptop and two children,” says Caroline Wright, the director general of the British Educational Suppliers Association, “that will be the challenge most households will face.”
Research released in 2017 by Middlesex University found that students often face difficulties accessing online learning sites as they are sometimes not designed for access from their specific devices.
“The modern digital divide is not a question of whether users possess the right technology at hand,” the paper says, “however with new technology being constantly introduced in the market, discrepancies arise which in turn cause a new form of divide.”
The researchers proposed the creation of an online learning website which automatically tailors itself to whichever device students use to access it, potentially ending the issue of parts of websites disappearing offscreen or loading incorrectly.
In desperate times such as these, with the availability of internet-connected devices at a premium in many households, students may be forced to make-do with less than ideal devices.
“You can use Xboxes for internet access,” Wright says, “you can use the TV as well.”
Many students will also be left trying to use their smartphones to access courses online. Nelson says his business currently sees around 50pc of online courses in the UK accessed through smartphones rather than desktop devices.
“Many online learning platforms still degrade when you're looking at them on smartphones or tablets,” he says, adding that his business makes sure all courses are accessible through mobile phones.
Another key issue is internet access. Access to the internet at home is closely linked to household income, research has found.
Only 51pc of homes in Scotland with a household income between £6,000 and £10,000 had internet access, according to a 2014 survey commissioned by the Carnegie Trust, while higher income bands had progressively greater access to broadband at home. As household income increased, so did access to the internet at home.
Families living in rural areas often struggle to maintain reliable internet connections at home. It’s a problem the Government is attempting to address through a £5bn investment announced in the budget.
But families in these so-called “notspots” face immediate challenges.
Wright says she has encouraged the Government to work with educational suppliers to post packages of teaching materials to students in areas with poor internet access.
Systems like these can only work if schools know which of their students are likely to have trouble accessing the internet, otherwise they can be left using the list of students who get free school meals as an unreliable substitute.
Teachers are excited by the prospect of holding virtual classes through video calls, but these can use excessive amounts of data. For students logging on with unlimited broadband connections, it doesn’t pose a problem.
But for students using capped home broadband services, or who are using smartphone data to view lessons, the latest advances in education technology could prove costly.