Virtual classrooms: The future of education

THERE is no doubt the covid19 pandemic has changed the way teachers teach and children learn. Many individuals and companies have seized the opportunity this pandemic presents to develop virtual classrooms to change the way education is dispensed in the future.

One such software company WizdomCRM has risen to the challenge to roll out an e-learning programme “costing less than a KFC meal” and which will make it possible for principals to manage their schools from a laptop or phone.

Owner and managing director Michelle Beharry who comes from a scientific background of compliance, research and development, seized the opportunity to become a Microsoft gold partner after consulting with key stakeholders in the education industry and listening to the challenges teachers, students and parents were facing as a result of covid19.

She said with this partnership, users of WizdomCRM, whether school administration, teacher or students can now get Microsoft 365 account licenses for free with 23 plus e-learning apps and online training. Although the programme is being offered at no cost for one year when that period ends, Beharry said they would adapt to a simple and affordable subscription model per child catering to each school’s needs

Unlike other learning platforms which have either student and teacher collaboration tools, online classroom, content creation, homework assignments, with Wizdom each school will get their own school management system and website with super admin control.

“Principals can manage their entire school from their laptop or smart phone, from student admissions, school inventory management, HR, and real time attendance reporting to name a few.

“The principal can move through each class and view the assignments and work being done by each student and each class, automatically generate report cards or view the overall performance for each child.”

Students can also log into the platform directly from their phone, get access to their learning materials online at any place and time. They can take a picture of homework and submit within the platform for the teacher to mark.

Since the launch in April 2020, over 3000 students from both private and public schools including, Trinity Junior Private, Cocorite Government, Richmond Boys and North Trace Government have used the platform.

Beharry is currently in discussions with several school boards and associations in the education industry to come on board as well as with the Commonwealth’s International Council for Open and Distance Learning and The Caribbean Association of Principals.

She said the goal is to seek an alliance to promote this technology within their network for use by schools throughout the member states.

“With a modern user-friendly interface, from the click of a button, teachers can manage their entire class curriculum, host online classes similar to Zoom, manage attendance, assign homework and submit quizzes in real time all from one dashboard.

Anyone wishing to access the programme can do so by visiting www.wizdomcrm.com to sign up and within 12 hours will be contacted by an educational specialist for a consultation and to coordinate a date to demo the platform capabilities before onboarding.

“Each school will now become their own administrators meaning they will get a complimentary website and URL, their own school management software with super admin access to all their data.

“This process eliminates the need for all users logging into the same place and issues around data privacy is eliminated while empowering the schools to have full control of their own information. The schools can also comply with the Ministry of Education (MOE) curriculum.”

Schools with its own website can simply integrate the software on their website to gain access.

With regards to training and support, an automated help desk into the platform has been built for teachers and students to get real time assistance.

“We have a five-week roster routine for each school to participate in online training to educate the admin staff and teachers on the various features and functions and how to manoeuvre the platform effectively with their students”.

While onsite classrooms will remain a part of schooling for some time, she said e-learning needs to be combined with onsite learning as part of the curriculum for students now and the future.

A telehealth platform within the schools to treat with the pandemic and other associated stress is also on the cards. As such an alliance has been formed with the Psychologist Association to offer counselling services virtually for the students, parents and teachers.

In terms of the future she said they are presently integrating animated and interactive content such as games, multimedia image pairing content to cater to the needs of children that learn differently.

Their next major milestone is to save the teachers a lot of time by digitising the weekly record and evaluation sheet.

By digitising this process, the principals can easily review each subject and what is being taught and seamlessly submit the school’s evaluations to the MOE directly from WizdomCRM in real time.

With respect to cyber bullies safeguards she said the school’s administrators are the supervisors that manage the teachers and student’s online activity with different access privileges

“Students have restricted access to communicate with their class teacher and to retrieve their learning materials and submission of homework and assignments.”