Education Resilience in the Time of COVID-19

Abstract

Due to the world pandemic, COVID-19, higher education institutions (HEIs) have found themselves in an unprecedented situation. Like no other time before, this pandemic has posed a serious test of resilience of HEIs – hence, the current study sets off to seize this opportunity to study the resilience of Omani HEIs. HEIs in Oman have devised contingency plans in light of the directives and declarations received from the government Supreme Committee responsible for handling the impact of COVID-19. The study aimed at examining the directives received by Omani HEIs against the framework of the securitization theory in order to identify the substances of the basis on which HEIs built their teaching and learning plans. The study was also planned to closely investigate the individual experiences of various stakeholders directly involved in the implementation of the contingency of the teaching and learning plans. Data were collected using document analysis and analysis of reflective texts. Discourse content analysis was applied in order to understand the lived experiences of stakeholders and to identify what shaped their experiences. The discourse of the collected data was analysed using the approach of thematic analysis which helped to identify recurrent patterns concerning the teaching and learning plans of some Omani HEIs during COVID-19. A number of challenges along with the challenges of other HEIs worldwide were identified, such as uncertainty and lack of resources and experience in online teaching and learning. The discussion of the findings in this study revealed dichotomies, as well as agreement, in the way stakeholders perceive aspects of the contingency plans of teaching, learning and assessment. On the basis of this finding, the study calls for a more nuanced approach to strengthen the resilience of higher education. Particularly, the study recommends incorporating processes of normalization of teaching and learning as well as of assessment in HEIs delivery modes as a way to consolidate HEIs’ resilience.