here to discuss more Andy bird ceo of Pearson Andy
thank you so much for joining us wondering first,
hear what your reaction is to this massive return to remote learning
and how do you think schools should operate this time around?
Well, good morning asia and thank you for having me on the show.
I mean the word disruption I think is the way to define what's happening and it's
disrupting for I think three cohorts first and
foremost students and their their ability to learn.
But secondly, and often not spoken his faculty
and there was rightly so a lot of focus on the impact on students,
but there's been a great deal of impact on faculty who have had to adapt from
an in classroom environment to a remote teaching
experience and to adapt their tools accordingly.
And then I think the third cohort also, our parents,
not only are they being affected in their work, but also in their child care. So,
and it is another
unfortunate occurrence of this pandemic as it continues, but very disruptive.
Yeah.
And when schools initially went remote back in 2020,
a lot of the student challenges
and maybe vulnerabilities and education were revealed
like having a dedicated learning space or even tech-related issues for families.
So what do you think educators can do right
now to address some of those remote learning problems?
And how exactly is Pearson supporting learners during this time?
Yeah,
I think that we've all made a lot of progress since the
first wave of the pandemic when when it was kind of zoom school
technology has come on leaps and bounds and I think there are some parallels.
I was enjoying your discussion earlier around mirror.
Um and you look in the fitness world and see how technology has impacted
the world of fitness.
And the same is happening now in education and learning.
And in fact a Pearson,
we've been leaning heavily pre pandemic to
be a digital first media learning company.
And actually we've been in the remote learning K through
12 business in the United States for over 20 years.
And so we have a lot of learnings in terms of how we're adapting with connections
academy which if it were a US school district would be the 20th largest U.
S. School district
wow.
And speaking of connection,
I think one of the biggest arguments that schools
make whenever these situations arise is that for students,
social, emotional learning takes a hit.
Mental health takes a hit. It's really difficult to operate in a virtual aspect.
So how do you think schools can better prioritize these things like mental health?
Um in these remote or hybrid settings?
It's a great question.
And I think mental health is, you know,
we're all just feeling burnt out and certainly a Pearson with our employees,
we have 22,000 employees.
That's first
and foremost in my thinking around the mental welfare
and the emotional welfare of our employees. And the same is true for students
and I think one of the keys is flexibility.
You cannot take a rigid
timetable that works in the analog world and replicate that
in the digital world you need to have flexibility.
Asynchronous learning I think is a very important part.
Individuals learn at different speeds.
And one of the advantages of hybrid learning or remote learning is actually,
you can tailor the learning experience
to the needs of an individual student
rather than having to necessarily address a classroom
full of 30 students who are all at different
learning abilities. So there are some positives
that that can come out of this.
Yeah.
And also want to ask you really quickly where you see the future of education,
not just K through 12, but beyond,
especially as we face a lot of these challenges still with public health,
the teacher and educator shortage and also maybe issues like we said,
lack of resources and connectivity.
Well, it also links into, as you mentioned at the beginning, the great resignation
define
how and where people learn, particularly the definition of higher education,
it's an area we're very much focused on it at Pearson A few years ago,
higher education was only
achievable through formal college or university.
Now one could argue that some of the big corporations amazon, for example,
are becoming some of the biggest universities in the world
where you go and you earn while you learn.
And so the options for an individual are
not only through the formal college university route,
but increasingly coming through the workplace.
And I think that's enabling employers to
differentiate their offering and attract talent.
Such a good point there. That's Andy be a bird
ceo of Pearson. Thank you so much for joining us, Andy.