Thanks, Emily! Great example to show that translating everything is completely impractical; but so is the policy to not allow Japanese communications – was that lifted at all during the emergency?

Milly, I agree with you that many of the solutions to the new challenges in education due to Covid-19 are known. However, the implementation of solutions and communication between relevant branches of government, teachers and administrators in schools, with parents and students is lagging far behind the urgent need. In particular, multilingual solutions are often lower on the list of priorities for decision-makers in positions of authority. Let’s hope that this pandemic raises peoples’ awareness of these critical needs and brings about broad, urgently needed changes and positive results in education for multilingual students in the near future.

Hi Chen
I am sorry to hear you were unable to get the linguisitic and educational support you needed in your first term. I have not studied in any of my other languages but I have lived in countries where I am a minority, learning the dominant language, while adjusting to a new cultural environment. It is truly overwhelming, stressful and exhausting speaking a new language especially in a different culture. As a teachers these experiences have helped me empathise with my students in these situations and provide extra support when I can. The problem is teachers are not compensated for this extra time and the demands of teaching, marking, creating curriculum etc is already very stressful and takes a huge number of extra unpaid hours. New positions to support students are urgently needed in all levels of education. However, in tertiary education where international students pay much high fees, are often living away from their families and support systems, there is added urgency and no excuse for not providing adequate services. I hope it’s getting easier for you and wish you success in your studies.

With its vast inland areas and scattered population, Australia has some well-established systems for educating children at home. Education departments have provided teaching materials for children living on Aboriginal homelands, and each mainland state has “Schools of the Air” for children living in isolated locations such as cattle stations. There are also community-based organisations such as the Isolated Children’s Parents Association.

Clearly, there are vast differences in family circumstances across the nation but as the saying goes, “we are all the same under the skin”. Perhaps some of the hard work and frustrations could have been eased by those in decision-making roles sharing resources and facilitating access to supports which already exist.

Thanks for your article. While the Covid situation would be hard for anyone, your experience shows once more how it exacerbated the condition of students who are already disadvantaged given their lack of linguistic proficiency and low socioeconomic status.
Some issues risen from your article are similar to those experienced by some students living in Italy during both lockdowns. Especially in poorer regions e.g. Sicily, students are often ill-equipped for online learning, lacking internet connection or access to a device suitable for online learning. Furthermore, it is important to notice that schools in Italy are far more multicultural and multilingual compared to the past, with a higher rate of foreign students attending. However, overall, one can observe a lack of support system for these students, as teachers of Italian as an L2 are often a distant reality for Italian schools relying on government funding. To my knowledge, nothing comparable to what your school did was implemented (e.g., multilingual communication).
Sadly, probably as a consequence of these challenging times, the rate of dropouts in Italy, which was already bad, worsened considerably.