ABSTRACT
The sudden strike of COVID-19 pushed technology much sooner to the forefront in social work education than anticipated in a highly unequal society. While online teaching saved the academic year and contributed to many gains, it exposed challenges of virtual platforms with no easy solutions. A new reality emerged; turning back to pre-COVID-19 teaching was not an option, nor continuing with the teaching status quo post-COVID-19. By simply returning to face-to-face teaching without integrating the wealth of COVID-19 experiences would not do justice to the sacrifices, innovations and adaptions students, lecturers, field placement organizations, and service users made during COVID-19. What emerged as the real challenge was to find the balance between humans and technology in a hybrid teaching and learning approach in the context of a highly unequal South African society. The chapter presents the South African and University of Pretoria's contexts in which social work is taught and practiced, the transition to an online platform during COVID-19, and the lessons learnt from online teaching and learning for future social work education. The aim of the chapter is to explore a pathway for new strategies for social work education is embedded in adopting a hybrid approach that bridges the digital divide of an unequal society and finding a balance between information and communication technology and human-centered teaching and learning.
