By Marie-Claude Harnois, MA, Executive Director and Teacher of ÉtudeSecours
Over the past year, Marie-Claude Harnois, general manager and educator of ÉtudeSecours, and her team have been at the forefront of seeing how schools have found themselves in very complex and restrictive situations in order to respond effectively to needs. of their students. She shares with us her feedback on this period full of twists and turns.
For several months now, the various players in the education sector have expressed their great and legitimate concerns with regard to the progress of their students, their (de) motivation and even their psychological health. The pandemic has struck hard in the education sector, as much for the various school stakeholders as for the students and parents.
We are all concerned about it, and we will be for some time to come. Among the hundreds of calls and emails, not to write the thousands, that my team received over the last 15 months, all were in solution mode and wanted to find the best avenue to support their students who were going through a difficult situation in their school. course.
Each time, it was a singular and unique story. It was gratifying to contribute and to feel that we were making a difference.
We are good!
Since the start of the crisis, my team and I have been at the forefront of seeing how schools have found themselves in very complex and restrictive situations in order to meet the needs of their students.
The management and organization of online courses (and evaluation!), Reports, absences, health instructions, class bubbles, anxiety, support for teaching and professional staff, training, fatigue, headache schedules, etc. have undoubtedly been a great challenge, particularly in the context where ministerial instructions and orientations were sometimes trickled in. We all learned in the storm.
Now it's time to take a look in the rearview mirror. What a road traveled! We can give ourselves a nice pat on the back and tell ourselves we're good. Just like that. We are very tired, but we held on! And we will be during the next school year, because our intrinsic motivation is the well-being and success of our students.
We have been very lucky to support schools and parents over the past few months, despite the crisis that overwhelmed us and fatigue. I want to draw something positive from it.
This confirms to me that the online school model that is ÉtudeSecours meets real needs. The digital will have to be structured more in the educational environment. It's inevitable. And this requires, among other things, the recognition of entrepreneurs in the industry edtech from here, who put their creativity to work to help schools and students.
Theedtech from Quebec responded “present” loud and clear to help the school community in the challenges that have arisen in recent months. Beautiful collaborations were born and continue to develop. It is a great pride to see this pooling of our respective expertise for the benefit of our young people, who demonstrate such resilience. And that's just the beginning.
