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> If they happen anywhere, it’ll only be rich kids. This is a very sad truth. We are very fortunate and were able to afford private tuition for our son along

> If they happen anywhere, it’ll only be rich kids. This is a very sad truth. We are very fortunate and were able to afford private tuition for our son along with more free time to put into home schooling during the lockdowns to ensure he didn't fall behind. Unfortunately a lot cannot afford private tutors nor have free time they can commit to consistent home schooling so it will further separate those on lower incomes. Something we will not truly see for maybe a decade or more when younger kids (my sons age) enter higher education. This is something I feel strongly about and have written to our local education governmental body about but all I have had back is generic soundbites :( Part of me is wondering if I should just take this into my own hands and try to organise something with the local schools and social centres directly for weekend and summer programmes.

makomk 4y ago
The fundamental problem here is that when we chose to shut down society, most of the capacity that went unused is gone and cannot be brought forward into 2022 to fill in the gaps left behind. So for example, all of the teaching time that was wasted on ineffective distance learning or just didn't happen is gone. Want to organise a bunch of catch up sessions? You'll have to find a bunch of extra teaching time from somewhere (and likely a bunch of extra teachers) on top of normal teaching along with extra time in those kids' days - easy enough to do small scale for a wealthy few, much harder for all of society. The same has happened everywhere, from factory production to restaurant meals and hotel stays, which limits our ability to pay teachers to do this - in order to pay them more in real terms they have to be able to buy more, but the amount of stuff available to buy isn't even enough to support people's existing quality of life. Any attempt to pay teachers generous overtime to teach extra would have to come out of other peoples' real-terms income in a world where that is already dropping for most, and the bigger the program the more painful and broadly felt that would be.

makomk 4y ago

The fundamental problem here is that when we chose to shut down society, most of the capacity that went unused is gone and cannot be brought forward into 2022 to fill in the gaps left behind. So for example, all of the teaching time that was wasted on ineffective distance learning or just didn't happen is gone. Want to organise a bunch of catch up sessions? You'll have to find a bunch of extra teaching time from somewhere (and likely a bunch of extra teachers) on top of normal teaching along with extra time in those kids' days - easy enough to do small scale for a wealthy few, much harder for all of society. The same has happened everywhere, from factory production to restaurant meals and hotel stays, which limits our ability to pay teachers to do this - in order to pay them more in real terms they have to be able to buy more, but the amount of stuff available to buy isn't even enough to support people's existing quality of life. Any attempt to pay teachers generous overtime to teach extra would have to come out of other peoples' real-terms income in a world where that is already dropping for most, and the bigger the program the more painful and broadly felt that would be.