COVID Graduates

Unknown to many, 2024 is a year to sigh in curiosity. Schools across the country will graduate this year the first batches of Covid entrants, i.e. those students who first enrolled in 2020, the year that the Covid pandemic struck the planet. Those who will graduate college this year entered as first year students four years ago. Those who will graduate this year in the law school or graduate school (doctoral) entered as freshmen four years ago. Those who graduated this year in SHS Grade 12 entered as junior high school (Grade 8) four years ago. These are the Covid entrants in 2020; they are also the Covid graduates in 2024. What is common among them?

Covid entrants generally had their classes online for the next two years, from 2020-2022. These were the most difficult years, fraught with several months of lockdowns and restrictive quarantine movements. All classes were done online at home. The restrictions on classes only started to relax beginning in 2023.

These two years are foundational years that required a lot of face-to-face (F2F), residential, and in-person (or in-campus) classroom interactions. But the lectures were delivered via video conferencing platforms (Zoom, Collaborate, Teams, WebEx, etc). Laboratory exercises were replaced with online proxies, but many were really prohibited such as gun assembly/disassembly at home for Criminology, or use of chemical agents, among science classes. F2F internships, field trips, field studies, research fieldwork, and other demonstrable experiential or learning assessments were prohibited and substituted with ridiculous online activities (swimming was replaced with imaginary swimming exercises at home; driving was proxied with simulation racing games online). Many were forced to just watch DIY clips on YouTube. And we are only talking here of those who had access to the internet for online classes. Students from public schools or smaller private schools had to contend with printed modules for readings and assignments. They did not have the benefit of technology.

These two years sacrificed a lot of coverage and expected learning competencies designed to cultivate a good and comprehensive foundational academic formation. These include classroom interactions among teachers and learners, library experience, laboratory exposure, fieldwork, and research work (especially for conducting interviews and gathering data), among others.

The teachers and their students were compelled to catch up in the last two years of schooling and recover those that got lost in the first two years of formation. No wonder there were a lot of mental health issues among the students (and teachers) during the pandemic up to the present time (post-pandemic). The catching up was unprecedented and could have been too much, if not very difficult or impossible. The so-called learning deficit has turned into accelerated learning compression just to catch up. Hahabulin sa dalawang taon ang pang-apat na taong pag-aaral. Hangak! It can be likened to driving at 130 kph from Davao to Tagum all throughout; very risky and exhausting. Unsafe. Hazardous. Uncertain. Unsustainable.

Scarring effect. Are Covid SHS graduates prepared to go to college? The PISA data are not good. Are Covid college graduates employable? Will employers employ graduates who had serious learning deficits due to Covid? The signs may be precarious or uncertain, to say the least.

According to a 2021 study by the UK-based Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS), people aged 18-24 shall bear the brunt of economic difficulties and employment challenges as a result of the pandemic. This is the age group of college graduates affected during the Covid period. In the survey of more than 2,800 graduates, the study found that about 75% noticed a fall in the number of available opportunities since March 2020; that the vast majority (83%) felt that the pandemic has had a detrimental impact on graduates’ employment prospects; that most graduates have become less confident about their future employment prospects (72.6%) and faced greater challenges finding employment than they expected (71.9%); that over 80% of graduates who had been unemployed, underemployed, made redundant or furloughed felt that their morale had been affected; that about 70% felt that their experience had made them question the value of their degree, had negatively affected their employment outlook, or had affected their confidence about what they can offer to employers. This is the so-called scarring effect of the pandemic.

In 2022, the columnist Robert Ubell (Alternative Pathways, EdSurge) claimed that “there’s long been the concern that employers won’t take online degrees as seriously as campus-based ones” and that “students enrolled in online degrees are often far less well-off than others who attend residential campuses.”

As per the latest study (2024) by the Philippine Business for Education (PBEd), while employers are willing to hire Covid graduates, the following continue to persist: lack of suitable or qualified applicants; job candidates lacking technical capabilities; lacking employability skills, especially soft skills among the Covid graduates; shortage of applicants from Covid graduates; and continuing job-skills mismatch.

Covid graduates are somehow scarred by the pandemic, and they still need to compete with the unemployed graduates before the pandemic. Covid graduates are doubly burdened. They need extra-effort and double time in catching up.

It was relieving that the restrictive Covid lockdowns and quarantines ran for two years only. Imagine if the pandemic did not stop for four years. We will have graduates produced purely online, without seeing and experiencing actual classroom classes and other learning activities on campus.