Pat McFadden: Let’s help local children bridge the digital divide

The Covid pandemic has been termed the great acceleration. Some have talked of ten years of change in one year as the way we work, shop and learn has changed rapidly.

Nowhere is this more true than in education where two long shutdowns of schools have forced both teachers and pupils to adapt to online learning, with big knock on effects for parents too as they struggle to help their children learn while still trying to do their own jobs.

Whilst teachers have done their best to offer children as good an online learning experience as they can, the overall effect of the process has been very unequal.

Last week the National Audit Office reported that better off children had spent 30 per cent more time learning online compared to poorer pupils.

And the attainment gap between richer and poorer pupils is thought to have grown by more than a third. The Sutton Trust estimates one in five children don’t have the equipment they need.

Both the Government and our local council have provided schools with more laptops, but even after that effort schools still report some children having to share devices with siblings or even trying to do online learning through a parent’s mobile phone.

With children back at school, there is still an ongoing need for more digital equipment for children.

Teachers point to long term changes in the way education is delivered and homework is set, the huge need for catch up programmes for children who have lost out over the past year and of course the risk of further outbreaks of Covid which could force schools to send groups of pupils home.

The truth is a computer is becoming as essential for today’s schoolchildren as pens and paper were for previous ones. And as education becomes more digital, it must not also become more unequal.

That is why a partnership has been forged in Wolverhampton to appeal to businesses and individuals to donate used computers which can then be recycled, digitally cleaned and made ready for educational use.

The computers will then be donated to local schools who can distribute them to the pupils who need them most.

The project is called Wolves Tech Aid and has the support of Wolverhampton City Council, the Black Country Chamber of Commerce, the Wolves FC Foundation and the LearnPlay Foundation – a fantastic local not for profit organisation which has worked hard to get this off the ground. The first deliveries have already been made to local schools with hopefully more to follow.

Reusing computers in this way will not only help children who need the equipment. By extending the life of equipment which might otherwise be thrown away it is also good for the environment.

Some might say, shouldn’t the Government do all this? Perhaps they should but I have been in politics long enough to learn that even if you can’t change everything, at least change something.

And this is something we can do right now to help local children who have lost out over the past year or who face a loss of opportunity in the future.

If you are a business or an individual who has machines you can donate, or you can donate to the costs of recycling the computers, please visit www.wolvestechaid.com to find out how the project works.

When I was growing up in Glasgow, the youngest of seven children, my parents were determined that their children would have better educational opportunities than they had.

They had left school young with no chance of further education or university.

Fast forward to today and I believe we need to do all we can to ensure the Covid pandemic does not result in long term damage to the prospects of children growing up here in the Black Country.

Wolves Tech Aid is one small contribution towards that goal.