English Language Partners New Zealand, an English Language institution operating with 22 centers across New Zealand, has benefited from increased flexibility to deliver remote learning with Tribal ebs in the cloud.
Prior to the pandemic shaking up the way education is delivered across the globe, English Language Partners New Zealand (ELPNZ) had adopted Tribal Cloud Services as part of its student management system (Tribal ebs) delivery.
This enabled the language school’s small team to rely on a dedicated team of technical experts to help them with monitoring, upgrading and patching the system.
Jordi Cordwell, ELPNZ Business Analyst, said: “ELPNZ doesn’t have a dedicated IT team in the way that some other institutions have. Pre-pandemic, ELPNZ did not offer any online classes to learners across our different centers. Then COVID-19 hit the world, and everything changed, including the way in which education is delivered and managed.
“Having ebs in the cloud was a godsend during the pandemic. We transitioned to online classes very quickly and also changed some business processes which necessitated some adjustments within ebs.
“These changes were able to be rapidly implemented and facilitated the management of our business through this changing environment. Tribal ebs has been very adaptable and flexible during the pandemic which we’ve been super grateful for. I believe it would have been very difficult to achieve the same results with our old system.”
Pivoting with the restraints of the pandemic
With a sudden shift from face-to-face to online learning globally, a negative impact to the education market was bound to happen but surprisingly not for ELPNZ. With its system already set up in the cloud, they were in a good position.
“I don’t think we would’ve considered online classes before the pandemic. We now have some learners who have only ever attended classes online,” said Cordwell.
The combination of Tribal Cloud Services and Tribal ebs provided several benefits, including:
- The ability to get set-up to work from home quickly. This would have been more difficult to achieve prior to moving to ebs as each of ELPNZ’s 22 remote centers had its own local database. With ebs in the cloud, every member of staff was immediately able to work from home and access the same, centralized management system.
“The fact that ebs is in the cloud was fantastic for when we all needed to work from home during lockdowns,” said Cordwell. “We didn’t have that option with our old system. If staff and teachers were stuck at home with their own IT equipment, they could still access ebs and Ontrack to perform their usual tasks. Also, when they did have work equipment, it was just a really simple setup to access ebs and ontrack. You’re not having to download a database/system to your laptop, everyone can access the system via a url link.”
- Flexibility to deliver remote learning. ELPNZ could quickly respond to the changing needs of its staff and learners, with new ebs features to track and manage group sessions taking place virtually.
Cordwell said: “I think one of the great strengths of ebs and Ontrack is that they are adaptable, flexible and in the cloud. Nothing is certain in the pandemic and there have been several changes that have come along affecting business processes for us, so it’s fantastic that ebs and Ontrack have kept up with our needs.”
- Adaptability to expand student reach. Pre-pandemic, ELPNZ was a 100% in-person education organization, but it now offers both online and face-to-face programs to learners located anywhere in the country and has the tools within ebs to manage this growth.
The results
As an organization in the education sector, ELPNZ was well equipped to handle the challenges brought about by the pandemic, and the organization is now future-ready. ebs delivered in the cloud provides the flexibility, agility and technological advances that has allowed a small team and no dedicated IT department to quickly adapt to the changing landscape.
“I feel that whatever the future brings we’re ready with the Tribal products that we’ve got,” said Cordwell.
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