Education industry quickly moving online

Primary and middle schools started new semesters online for the first time in China, while educational organizations are still prohibited from offline operations. Shanghai was among the first to suspend offline lessons on January 23, with authorities continuing the suspension until further notice. 

The education industry was among the most impacted amidst the COVID-19 outbreak as many organizations quickly moved operations online.

“Based on advice from the government, we took very quick action and closed all our schools. But even if schools are now closed across the country, learning with EF keeps going,” Jacob Toren, CEO of EF Education First China, told Shanghai Daily.

“Over the past three weeks following Chinese New Year, we have migrated 150,000 students who were enrolled in our traditional learning program to online. And right now we are adding up to 10,000 students per day.”

The company has also given free access to some of its highest-rated content and apps for people stuck at home. 

EF was among hundreds of such organizations quickly adapting to the current situation. 

Interior designer Wendy Gao received notices from five organizations that her two children attended before Chinese New Year ended.

“I always prefer in-person classes because you don’t have the same level of interaction with teachers and classmates when doing it online, but this is a special time. I’m actually quite amazed at how quickly the organizations turned online,” she said.

“Overall the online platform has turned out to be better than I expected, but I will still prefer offline classes once the situation is normal.”

Some organizations will not see that day, as they went bankrupt over the past month, but others may find themselves with a different and possibly brighter future, according to Charles Lim, a Shanghai-based investor specialized in the technology industry.

“The virus outbreak is a tragic incident, but it also brings many long-term changes to our daily lives. The outbreak of SARS in 2003 turned Chinese to buying online and brightened China’s e-commerce industry, which is now leading in the world. This time, it may well change the education industry, which has been adding increasingly more online content in the past two to three years.”

It also changed the daily routine of foreign teachers who stayed in the city during the outbreak, requiring them to quickly pick up online platforms previously used as complementary to classrooms.

“My students range from around 4 to 14 years. They have all shown a positive attitude to their online group lessons. Many of them have also been sending us regular videos of them practicing at home,” said EF teacher Sophie Newell.

“Teaching online differs from offline as we are unable to interact using our usual classroom activities. However, we have developed numerous interactive activities to use in our online classroom. I’m ready to return to normality, but I’m very happy with the way EF has handled everything during the outbreak as an employer.”

Her colleague Connor Mortimer put the organization’s self-designed cartoon characters used predominantly in offline programs to creative use in online platforms, and found them cheering up both students and himself.

“Because of our technology, and innovation we have done in the last couple of years, we have been able to offer to move all of our students online, at an unprecedented scale and speed,” Toren said.

“It’s in moments like this that the mindset of ‘nothing is impossible’ is more important than ever.”