EdScrib is actively working with Higher Education Institutions in several countries to support their efforts in getting their content ready for remote learning formats, especially while campuses are closed due to COVID-19. It is time for your Educational Institution to move beyond the day-to-day crisis management mode and really prepare for the long term solution.
As more and more Higher Education Institutions partner with us to get their content ready for the post-COVID-19 learning format, in this series of blogs we will share some steps on how your University should prepare for the post COVID-19 learners.
Who are these post-COVID-19 learners?
The world is not going to be the same after COVID-19. Likewise, universities, students and learning won’t be the same. Universities have been forced to shift to remote learning. Students have experienced the ease of studying online. Previously, the general belief was that a quality university programme had to be a physical face-to-face and in-classroom or lecture hall experience. The public would look down at an online university degree. Now, this bubble has been burst by necessity and the world is teaching and learning remotely these days. The current and coming generations will know that remote learning is an actual option. In fact, you can study anywhere in the world from the comfort of your own home. Travelling is a good experience for many, however, travelling whenever you want and staying at home whenever you want is even better. The learners today are more remote-learning-ready than ever before.
The question is:
Is your University programme ready for it?
If your University is not fully ready yet, then it urgently needs to take the following steps:
1. Offer more remote learning programmes
Offering remote learning university programmes does not mean shutting down the campus. It also doesn’t mean all learning should exclusively take place online. What it does mean is that learning should not be dependent upon the campus, as it can take place remotely from anywhere and at any time. Your programmes can have a blended learning mode where the in-classroom is blended with the remote learning experience. This way your learners can stay in close contact with professors and have in-person learning and guidance sessions, while maintaining the comfort of remote learning, as well as ensuring your University’s continuity in case of any unforeseen circumstances. Likewise, through these remote learning programmes your University is able to offer excellent university programmes to students from all around the world.
Now the question is:
Is your University offering remote learning programmes to meet this growing demand?
2. Use the right e-learning platforms
There’s a huge demand for digital transformation in Higher Education Institutions, with campuses forced to shut down around the globe. In the midst of the crisis for many educators, they have been struggling to move classes online as quickly and painlessly as possible. It is time for your Educational Institution to move beyond this and really prepare for the long-term solution. It goes without saying that a shift towards the remote learning programmes requires an e-learning platform solution. Therefore, it is crucial to check the suitability of the platform for your remote learning programmes. Your learning objectives result in a particular type of content in order to engage your learners and provide them with an interactive learning experience.
At times, it may not be easy for students to follow classroom assignments when teachers are not there face-to-face. However, with the right e-learning platform that allows the usage of engaging content it will be a much more pleasant learning journey. We will provide more tips and best practices on how to identify and select the right e-learning platform in our upcoming blog posts in this series.
3. Prepare a fresh learning format
You will need the content of your programmes to be refreshed, upgraded, updated, and redeveloped, so that it is ready to be used in a remote learning format. Surely, your University has great learning programmes with outstanding content created by outstanding Subject Matter Experts (SME’s). But, even the most excellent of programmes do need to be updated, upgraded to a new format or even redeveloped at times. More so, when the world changes and learners and learning change along with it, then your once excellent programme becomes outdated and obsolete, unless you stay ahead of the curve. Be sure not to stay behind and prepare a refreshed learning format, so that it is ready to be used as a remote learning programme.
Once your Higher Education Institution has taken the above steps, you are set up to embark on this journey. To ease the implementation of these steps, we will share more practical steps in our coming blog posts.