Even if the pandemic is over! Lessons learnt from the challenges of online education in Pakistan

Abstract

The year 2020 marked the beginning of an era that affected lives entirely worldwide. As a result of mandated measures (such as complete lockdowns, social distancing, and working from home), apart from the economy, the most suffered areas in Pakistan are Health and Education. Medical institutions during the COVID-19 pandemic were pushed to use technology as a pedagogical means to ensure the continuity of medical education; the most significant challenges were ensuring the quality of delivery of the content and ensuring that the students can extract maximum out of it. The technical support department provides the operational platform while faculty and students are central online teaching and learning users. Vast differences exist between developing and developed countries as far as the end-users' infrastructure, resources, and mindsets are concerned. This short communication points out some challenges and recommends specific steps to ensure continuous good quality online teaching even if the situation stays for long or if it happens again.