Guadalajara, Jalisco – Reinforcing the use of technology to strengthen distance education, the Jalisco State Government on Friday began delivering tablets to students from the 50 schools in 14 municipalities that are enrolled in the ‘Recrea, Escuela para la Vida’ program.
“They [the tablets] are going to be distributed to 50 schools in this first stage, but our commitment is to unfold the program in every last corner of the State. There are no magic solutions to anything, you cannot solve the many years of abandonment and neglect that explain why our country’s educational policy lagged behind so much but, today, we have in our hands the possibility of taking advantage of everything we’ve learned during this year of pandemic,” said the Governor.
“The health emergency taught us enormous lessons, it allowed us to understand the importance of technology to be able to have educational models that work,” he added.
He recalled that this year it was necessary to adhere to the new teaching model (remote learning), saying that these tablets reinforce that accompaniment, however, he stressed that it will never be possible to replace teachers or face-to-face classes.
“We want them [students] to return [to school] with the necessary equipment so that we can now take advantage of the technological tool of the internet and make all these platforms a reinforcement of the educational process, the teaching and learning process,” he said.
“…technology can help our children learn better, our teachers teach better, and that is what we want to do. We are a few months away from returning to classes, from [our kids] going back to classrooms and schools, but we are going to have to do it very carefully,” he said.
The Government of Jalisco, through the Ministry of Education, will deliver a total of 11,083 tablets to the same number of students with the aim of implementing new measures and strategies for learning. In addition to this technological tool, students will have the benefit provided by the Red Jalisco project, which consists of providing Internet to all schools in the state via a fiber optic network.
They also have other tools to facilitate distance learning that the pandemic forced.
In order to give continuity to the educational agenda by adding technological tools, the Government of Jalisco endorsed its alliance with Google in the Aulas de Innovación Educativa – Aulas Google project, which currently operates in 100 schools and is projected to reach 225 more schools this year, which will benefit 100,000 students in the state.
The Secretary of Education, Juan Carlos Flores Miramontes, reported that the ReCrea app has interactive content for long-term learning designed for the needs of students who are studying at home.
“Recrea Digital is a collection of content based on problem solving that definitely adheres to the new modality of education that Jalisco is looking for. It is a principle of the ‘School for Life’ program,” he explained. “A structure and services have been designed and implemented to reinforce and make functional virtual tools to face the difficulties of teaching in Jalisco,” he reiterated.
He added that the constant training of teachers is also essential to make use of the tools, which is why special attention has been paid since the beginning of the virtual modality.
Jalisco State Government press release translated and edited by Lorena Sonrisas for BanderasNews.com.