The novel Coronavirus pandemic is an ongoing pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 i.e. COVID-19. Corona Virus is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus. As of March 27, more than 536,000 cases of COVID-19 have been reported in many countries.
Due to COVID-19, many people died and lots of people are going through the treatment. To stop the COVID-19, the Government in many countries has decided to lock down their countries for a period. Lockdown has impacted many businesses and other IT industries.
The COVID-19 has also affected many of the educational systems worldwide which are leading to the widespread closures of schools and universities.
Salesforce.org Education Cloud
With educational institutes coming to a complete halt across the globe, it is now very essential for the educational institutes to deploy the right tools to manage the communication between students and teachers and result in no loss of education. Salesforce Education Cloud is one such product which addresses educational challenges with the following features:
- It can empower educational institutions to achieve an online connected campus allowing schools to better serve students, staff and aluminis.
- The product provides a complete view of students across multiple universities and educational institutes.
- Salesforce education cloud has its own Admissions, Student Success, and Advancement solutions to the educational institutes with the right set of arsenal to fuel education online.
According to UNESCO monitoring, over the 160 countries have implemented school closures, impacting over 87% of the world's student population. Many other countries also have implemented school closures. The school’s closures are in response to the COVID-19 pandemic affecting access to education.
As of March 12, more than 370 million children and youth are not attending school and universities because of the temporary school closures as to stop the spread of COVID-19. As of March 20, over 70% of the world's students were impacted by school closures.
School closures impacted not only the students, teachers, and families, but also had far-reaching economic and societal consequences. In response to school closures, UNESCO recommends the use of distance learning programs and open the educational applications and platforms that schools, universities and teachers can use to reach the learners remotely and limit the disruption of education.
Different Educational Systems Adopted Remote Learning
Many countries followed their Government's decision and started closing their schools and universities to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Educational systems have decided to adopt remote learning. Some schools and universities have decided to start taking the online exams where the teachers can monitor their students through webcam and will make their results as per their exams.
Even some schools have decided not to take any exams and will give the grades to the students as per their performance in the class.
Some of the steps different countries are taking following Covid-19 outbreak:
- As being the origin of the virus, China was the first country to mandate the school closures and asked their students to stay home and continue their education online.
- On March 12, all of the Dutch universities suspended physical teaching and started giving the online classes to their students.
- On March 14, the Jordanian government of Education announced launching TV channels to broadcast the different lessons to the high school students. Private schools and universities also announced their schedules of online learning classes using different channels.
- On 14 March, the Russian Ministry of Education also advised the schools across the country to adopt remote learning.
Recommendation from UNESCO for Student's learning program
- Ensure implementation of the distance learning programs.
- Prioritize the solutions to address the psychosocial challenges before teaching.
- Plan the study schedule of the distance learning programs for the students.
- Provide support to the teachers and parents on the use of digital tools to provide sessions successfully.
- Develop distance learning rules and monitor the students learning process.
- Create communities of teachers, parents and school managers to address the sense of loneliness or helplessness and facilitate sharing of knowledge and discussion on coping strategies when facing the learning difficulties.