A former Department of Education member has accused it of ’abdicating responsibility’ in ensuring high standards of remote learning will be provided when required.

Lawrie Hooper (LibVannin, Ramsey) has expressed concern that his former department was placing the bulk of responsibility for remote learning provision onto individual schools.

In the House of Keys last week, MHKs discussed the findings of a review of remote learning provision that found disparities between different schools.

Mr Hooper said: ’The document talks about schools setting clear expectations on how regularly work should be undertaken and what kind of work should be undertaken, and also talks very clearly about schools undertaking monitoring of the quality of the remote learning that they themselves provide.

’I would like to know why the department is abdicating responsibility for quality assurance and handing it over to the schools to say they will provide the work and they will quality assess the work that they are providing.’

But Education Minister Dr Alex Allinson insisted that was not the case.

He said: ’Whether you use remote learning or conventional learning in a classroom, the prime responsibility for the quality of that comes down to the teacher and the head teacher of that school, and what we are trying to do through this review is draw similarities with remote learning and classroom learning and have the same clear criteria for both.’

The review of remote learning during the lockdown was published last week. It found 86.7% of school staff were satisfied or very satisfied with the quality of remote learning provided, compared with 44.1% of carers, parents and pupils. In all, 76.1% of parents/carers said new learning was provided either daily or weekly.

The report praises teachers as ’first responders to the health emergency’.

It recommends schools should have a ’continuity of learning’ protocol and be ready to share plans with parents and pupils, as well as set clear expectations on the level of contact teachers should have with pupils.

guidance

Dr Allinson said: ’The island guidance and protocols have been developed by department officers and school leaders, with the involvement of teacher unions.

’These now ensure parents and school communities know what to expect for their children, should schools be required once again to switch to a blended or fully remote form of provision in the future.’

Chris Robertshaw (Douglas East) highlighted the levels of adaptability that teachers had been called on to show.

’It is a completely different world when a class teacher has to both engage fully and wholly with the physical class in front of him or her, but it is a whole new dynamic to also parallel that for the remote-learning child,’ he said.

’The class teacher will, of course, be concerned that that remote learning parallels as far as possible what is being taught in the class room.’

Dr Allinson agreed and said it was important that teachers were given the right resources to deal with provide remote learning in tandem with teaching physically.

Referring to the lockdown, the minister said: ’Teachers, during this difficult period, had to rearrange their timetables very quickly and also share responsibilities very quickly to provide what was a very good offering for most children.’