Splashtop Survey Results Indicate How Educational Institutions Can Make Distance Learning an Effective Option
SAN JOSE, Calif., November 10, 2020—After surveying over 2,500 teachers, IT administrators, and students worldwide during the COVID-19 pandemic, Splashtop Inc.—a worldwide leader in remote access, collaboration, and remote support solutions—confirms the importance of having the right technology tools in place for distance learning. Specifically, the survey indicates that distance learning can be made more effective by providing remote access to on-campus computer lab resources and remote IT support for students and faculty.
During September and October, Splashtop conducted an online survey of more than 2,500 randomly selected individuals in 42 countries who are currently involved in a learning program. The goal was to find out how their educational institutions are adapting to the COVID-19 pandemic. A majority (60%) of those surveyed belong to a higher-education institution, 22% are at a K-12 school and the remaining 18% are engaged in a vocational training program.
“By creating an integrated ecosystem of collaboration tools, e-learning platforms, and remote-access tools, distance learning can be an effective option not just during COVID-19, but beyond it, as well,” said Splashtop CEO Mark Lee. “With the rapidly shifting education landscape and the rise of both remote and hybrid learning, educational institutions can deliver a more consistent learning experience through smart technology choices.”
Making Remote Learning Better, Together
While the social aspects of face-to-face interaction are irreplaceable, technology can go a long way toward ensuring that distance learning is productive, effective, and widely available. Two ways educational institutions can achieve their remote learning goals are:
Provide remote access to computer labs:
University and college campuses and K-12 districts often maintain on-campus computer labs with high-performance workstations and software applications such as the Microsoft Office Suite, Adobe Photoshop, and Illustrator, AutoCAD, and those for programming languages including C++, Java, and Python. Students learning from home rarely have the computing resources to run such expensive, sophisticated software. Next-generation remote-access tools, however, enable both students and instructors to use on-campus workstations and software applications through any device—including laptops, tablets, and inexpensive Chromebooks—and from a bedroom desk, kitchen table, or living room couch.
Provide remote IT support to students and faculty:
With so many students and instructors relying on home-based computing devices, it’s inevitable that technical issues will arise. Educational institutions can arm their IT teams with remote support software that allows them to troubleshoot and fix problems remotely for both at-home and on-campus students and faculty.
Survey findings include:
A majority (55%) of educational institutions currently deliver either entirely remote learning or hybrid learning programs. Globally, 38% of institutions continue in-person learning, 30% are conducting all-remote instruction and 25% are taking a hybrid approach, combining both remote and in-person instruction.
Geography makes a difference. For example, in the UK and India, the majority of respondents are at institutions conducting remote or hybrid classes. In France, the vast majority have begun in-person classes. For North America, it varies further depending on individual state or province guidelines.
Nearly 53% of survey respondents feel that remote learning is more effective or on par with in-person instruction. For those who find remote learning less effective, reasons include a lack of the right technology solutions and technical issues encountered during remote sessions.
While fewer than half of the institutions conducting remote learning are making their on-campus computer resources remotely available to students and faculty, those that do provide remote computer lab access are doing so by leveraging next-generation remote access technology such as Splashtop.
About Splashtop
Based in Silicon Valley, Splashtop Inc. delivers the best value and best-in-class remote access and remote support solutions for academic institutions, business professionals, MSPs, IT departments, and help desks. Splashtop is a popular alternative to VPN/RDP, VNC, RD Gateway, and other remote access software. More than 30 million users enjoy Splashtop products globally.