A study by Pearson, a British-owned education publishing and assessment services company, affirms something that the educational world strongly anticipated of late - there is little likelihood of ever returning to the pre-COVID world of full-time work and learning. Pearson commissioned the study with Harris Insights & Analytics to provide learners in seven countries the potential to express their views on primary, secondary, and higher education, careers, and the future of employment during the pandemic. More than 7,000 people aged from 16 to 70 years, participated in the poll.

"As learners adjust to a world forever altered by pandemic, they understand that the future of work and learning is now a dynamic mix of online and in person experiences," said John Fallon, chief executive of Pearson.

"While they learn and work online, people are learning to move forward in new ways that can help them seize opportunity, no matter what the future holds."

According to the survey, learners see COVID-19 revolutionizing the way they learn and work, as 88 percent of them opine that online learning will be a permanent part of primary, secondary and higher education moving forward. 77 percent of the participants say that the pandemic has permanently changed the way that people work. 82 percent of people say that new kinds of jobs are likely to pope up from the pandemic and almost 75 percent of them are rethinking their own career path because of COVID-19.

However, the survey also reveals that even with the massive COVID-19 disruption, trust and confidence in education systems is on the rise. Having witnessed a heroic response from educators to the pandemic, two-thirds of people across the world said their education system did a good job adjusting to the pandemic. Furthermore, this year, even more people rate their country's primary, secondary and higher education systems as great or good compared to other countries. The notable exception to this is Brazil, the only country in the survey where faith in the education system declined in 2020.

If online is here to stay, participants in the survey want it to be better. 88 percent of learners globally want educational institutions to optimize learning through technology, 67 percent of them perceiving that education institutions lag behind industries such as healthcare and banking in terms of leveraging the technologies. When it comes to investments in public education, providing technology for underserved learners and ensuring schools are better prepared for online learning were the top priorities revealed.