Before we jump right into the impact of coronavirus COVID-19 on educational institutions, let us first know more about what this coronavirus is. How is it caused, and precautions to be taken to prevent it from spreading? As there is a widespread of rumour’s among most of the people. Also, how cloud telephony in the education sector helps to ease the problems faced by students, teachers and parents?
According to an article published by WHO, Coronaviruses (CoV) is the strain of viruses that belongs to the large family of viruses that causes a different range of illnesses ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases. Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-CoV) belong to the same coronavirus family earlier known to humankind. COVID-19 is the new strain of virus belonging to the coronavirus family. Discovered recently in the year 2019 and has not been previously affected humans.
Coronaviruses are zoonotic and transmitted between animals and people. As per the WHO reports, detailed investigations found that transmission of SARS-CoV was from civet cats to humans and MERS-CoV from dromedary camels to humans. There are many more different strains of coronaviruses presently residing in animals as of today that has not yet infected humans.
How does it spread?
The best way to stop the sickness is to avoid getting exposed to this virus. The virus is mainly spread throughout the world from person to person through respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs or sneezes. When these droplets come in touch with a healthy human through the mouth, eyes and nose or when these droplets get inhaled through the lungs.
What precautions need to be taken?
- Clean your hands frequently you can, with soap or sanitiser.
- Avoid unnecessary touching your nose, eyes and mouth with unwashed hands.
- Distance between yourself and other people who are sneezing or coughing.
- Clean and disinfect frequently touched surfaces of your surroundings.
Coronavirus has triggered massive havoc among people. It is spreading exponentially, and the best way not to incur COVID-19 is to quarantine yourself. In this regard, many universities, colleges and schools have closed their operation till the coronavirus situation stabilises. Coronavirus spreads in students from elementary school to college out of the classroom. Let us look at the impact on students, teachers and families and the education system.
With the school’s closure, the only option left with a student is to opt for virtual/distance learning. However, this has a significant negative effect on low-income families, as they lack access to technology, the internet, nutritious food and childcare services. Also, students with disabilities and special needs can be the hardest to teach virtually. Schools’ closure also affects working parents since students require adult supervision and guidance to work around the virtual/distance learning setup. Even great teachers lack expertise in creating online lessons, and not every teacher is trained for a virtual/distance learning setup. Also, student dropout rates tend to increase as an effect of school closures. It is a challenge to get back all the students to return to school once school closures end.
How can cloud telephony aid in this crisis?
- Schools and colleges closed for students, whereas administrative departments and teachers work as scheduled for the exam preparation of secondary and higher secondary students amid coronavirus outbreaks. In this regard, schools and colleges are flooded with inquires calls from both parents and students. They are enquiring about the exam schedule and admissions for the upcoming academic year. In this quarantine situation, cloud telephony in the education sector may come to the rescue.
- Cloud telephony has a wide variety of features that can help students, parents, teachers and even the administrative department. Now, as per enquire calls are concerned, you can employ a toll-free number that allows all the inquiries to be free of cost. This establishes a sense of credibility for the institution and trust in the minds of students and parents who call for the question.
- Cloud telephony even allows you to respond to each call and never miss an inquiry by call transferring and call forwarding to different personal if one is busy.
- Furthermore, you can even employ an IVR setup that can help in a crisis. By diverting calls to the proper department or personal such as account, finance, enquiry, administration, security, etc.
- There should be no misunderstanding between students and parents regarding the exam schedule. Each student can be informed regarding the plan with cloud telephony’s auto-dialer feature that allows you to call each student without any manual dialing with just a click of a button.
- If, by chance, you were not able to pick the enquiry call, then both the caller and callee will be updated with a text message whose content can be prepared and changed as per requirement.
- Also, mass calls and SMS campaigns can be scheduled as per requirement and ease the enquiry process.
Now coming to the admission process. With the quarantine situation, all the admission enquiry and other methods can be conducted with the help of cloud telephony in the education sector.
- You can dedicate a separate IVR setup for the admission process and enquiry related to admission.
- You can even start an SMS campaign by sending bulk SMS to inform the parent how to go about the admission process for the upcoming year.
- The institution can even start a miss call campaign. Wherein students and parents can be instructed to give a miscall for registering to the admission process. Furthermore, other methods that accompany the admission process can be carried out online.
- You can even make the payments by online banking and don’t need to roam around in a crisis.
Wrapping up,
Coronavirus has created panic and unease among people. With the flexible solution, people may avoid getting in contact with widespread pandemics. Proper care and maintaining personal and environmental hygiene could stop and evade the virus outbreak. Flexible cloud telephony solutions in the education sector can help spread awareness. To get hands-on experience on cloud telephony solutions, visit www.mcube.com.
