RIYADH — Minister of Education Dr. Hamad Bin Mohammed Al Al-Sheikh stressed that the world has been forced to carry out various preventive and precautionary measures to combat and contain Coronavirus pandemic, including closing educational institutions, leading to changing spontaneous and conventional mechanisms of our educational systems.

The minister, presiding over virtual and extraordinary meeting with his counterparts of the G20 member states here in its capacity as the G20 president, conveyed greetings of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman and Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman to the delegations taking part in the meeting.

He pointed out that the meeting is taking place not only out of necessity but also to project hope, as it spotlights on what has been achieved in our countries and to keep cooperating as an international community dedicating its endeavors to back up education system, worldwide.

Drawing attention to the virtual meeting of the G20, he said it discussed collective commitment, as ministers of education, to mitigate the unprecedented impact due to the coronavirus pandemic on education systems along with exchange of expertise and applicable approaches, in the member states.

He also indicated an array of structurally, fiscally and socially effective initiatives based on policies set by education leaders to alleviate disorders resulting from the pandemic, appreciating G20 contribution of a great percentage of these solutions.

He explained the significance of collective efforts exerted to guarantee continuation and resilience, during the outbreak of the pandemic, as well as working together to set forth educational systems to deal with future crises.

The minister presented a brief narration of the path the Kingdom marched on to overcome the fallouts caused by the pandemic on the educational process, since the coronavirus outbreak, pointing that the Ministry of Education has promptly moved in advance to guarantee continuation of education.

The action was taken to face off a possible spread and the ministry had begun setting up contingency plans and carried out awareness campaigns following suspension of tuition and closure of academic institutions comprising as many as 8.4 million male and female pupils.

Shedding light on the Saudi experiment on distance education as a solution and the mechanisms set for all male and female students in the Kingdom to avail, he said that the experiment has taken place through the interactive national education portal, which witnessed over 53 million visits and the YouTube Ein educational channel, witnessing 61 million viewers of its recorded lessons.

It further provided them with 20 TV channels presenting recorded lessons suiting all students' categories across the Kingdom, pointing out that the ongoing and gradual back up of 8 million-hour long content of tuition, 3 million digitally-administered content and 3.5 million virtual classrooms have not stopped.

The minister drew attention to the guaranteed fair access for all and measures to fill the digital gap in local communities have been carried out in collaboration with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.

The communications companies, for their part, have provided students with 30,000 tablets, in addition to free packages of the Internet data for accredited educational platforms and furnished 100,000 SIM chips.

The experiment, the minister added, was very fruitful as we learned a lot during carrying out these solutions, which were mainly based on the essentially strong infrastructure, a system of resilient tuition syllabus with its mechanisms and timetables, as well as a comprehensive and concerted response by the ministry to meet the needs of all stakeholders, in addition to the presence of communications systems.

There are also the plain and well organized plans to get out and recover from the crisis, he stated, calling for increasing investment in the e-education infrastructure and approaches of digital education to devise methods, based on age and appropriate subjects.

There are simultaneous and non-simultaneous provision of education platforms, taking into consideration the ability and potential of students to access the Internet and computers as well as assessing education outputs, before and following the pandemic.

He also referred to the significance of the role of the family in backing distance education, taking into account the framework of the general education, standards and prerequisites that add to the prowess of education outputs.

Al Al-Sheikh drew attention that through continuation of cooperation, exchange of experience and sharing the best practices, we will build stronger and more resilient educational systems that would guarantee cautious accessibility to good education, especially, during emergency and crisis times.

The meeting witnessed participation of the G20 ministers of education, who for their part, expressed significance of sharing and tackling the main themes that underscore the importance of what the world is experiencing today.

They also stressed the need to adopt alternative experiments forcing all, under the coronavirus pandemic, to be taken into consideration, to guarantee the safety of our boys and girls, reasserting seeking integration of all components that would contribute to developing educational process in the G20 member states and realize the objective towards establishing ongoing, developed and participating education, in the economic development.

Participants in the meeting also discussed several themes that underline the importance of continuing exerting efforts to back up world education systems, reactivating distance education systems and supporting the infrastructure for continuous educational process, in the future.

In addition they called on to provide male and female students, parents or guardians and teachers, with all psychological and social backup and providing fiscal support for education, in areas that in need for intensive efforts be exerted, in order to promote educational services, out there.

The meeting strongly supported public and private efforts to sustain education continuity for all by leveraging new pedagogical methods, as well as diverse modalities of and approaches to instruction.

It recognized the benefits of both in-person (face-to-face) and distance learning, and the importance of strengthening blended learning approaches and related elements, ranging from sustainable infrastructure, accessibility, and funding, to digital skills, teacher training, student support, and assessment tools.

The meeting stressed the need to address the digital divides and inequities that occur in learning opportunities. It acknowledged the substantial efforts put forward by teachers, educators, leaders of educational institutions, students, and their families to support continued learning during the crisis.

To prepare more effectively for potential future disruptions, the G20 participants committed to working towards stronger and more innovative approaches to build resilience into the education systems and improve teaching and learning. — SPA