Quality vs. responsiveness
It’s good to meet people where they are and aim to be responsive to what people—especially students—are facing. Do we do that at the expense of quality? At some point, will we have to choose between quality and people?
My experience has been similar to Professor Theresa MacPhail’s description that continuing to meet student’s “where they are” as conditions decline can begin to feel like being “a cruise director organizing games of shuffleboard” as the pressure on our students build and they have less and less capacity.
It’s possible that we won’t be able to meet people where they are as general rule because if conditions continue to get worse (👀 climate change), it will also mean a significant decline in quality. Maybe that is already happening…
Is a pandemic something to consider?
There’s that saying that “rising tides lifts all boats,” which we can use the opposite of to think about the impact of the COVID pandemic: “receding tides lowers all boats.” It was a global impact, increasingly impact those already in low tides.
Unlike some who would argue that the pandemic is an “excuse” that doesn’t have to be addressed because it impacted everyone, I would argue that acknowledging the large scale impact requires our attention and effort.
A global pandemic isn’t a co-occurring factor; it requires us to explore how it is a causal factor.