Web Based Education with H1N1 Breakout

My son is senior in the American International School - Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. Last week we received a letter outlining the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Education's directive regarding school closure in the event that the H1N1 virus becomes widespread. The Ministry had requested that AIS-R monitor the percentage of students with flu symptoms closely and act if the school reached a 10% flu rate. This implied that the school would not delay reopening after the Eid break that normally follows the end of Ramadan in Saudi Arabia as only two cases have been confirmed in the school thus far.

This news was definitely not what my son wanted to hear, as is the case with most boys he was looking forward to a longer break.

Yesterday, however, we received another directive from the school indicating that the Ministry was requesting that the school remain closed to students after Eid in order to avoid the spread of H1N1. The Saudi government's goal of course is to ensure that students remain healthy and safe from this potentially dangerous virus.

Fortunately the American International School in Riyadh has been utilizing, for quite some time now, a system called Blackboard as an educational support tool and to communicate with parents and students.

Blackboard is an online web based system that helps both teachers and students by providing a foundation for engaging and also provides a real time tool for parents to assess the progress that their children is making in the classroom.

The Blackboard system contains a section where teachers can easily record and publish a wide variety of performance related results. This capability is almost indispensable with the advent of outcomes based education. This web based system also provides parents and teachers an easy to use tool that offers a powerful analysis capability. The system provides the ideal platform where the teachers can design and publish assignments and automatically provide students with crucial almost instant feedback.

As a result of the H1N1 letter received from the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Education the Superintendent with the support of the AIS-R Board of Trustees decided to initiate temporarily "on-line" classes by using the Blackboard system.

This of cause required the teachers to modify educational programming to a "virtual" learning environment for the short period of time that "on-site' classes will be temporarily suspended.

It is true that many of our teachers have been trained in online delivery of lessons and/or have taken course work in this format but it just shows what can be done if one plans properly. Utilizing the Blackboard system will provide a seamless transition to continue the learning process of our students.

Today it is the H1N1 virus, tomorrow it will be something else. The only certainty we have is that there will me more and more interruptions in schools. The schools that have neglected to plan for these interruptions only do so at the educational cost of our children. It is time that we embrace the computer age and make it part of out lives.

© 2009 Carl Marx