Eduix participated in the X International Symposium on Research, organized by the Colombian Association of Higher Education Institutions with Professional Technical, Technological or University training (ACIET). The event happened from 29th September until 1st October and addressed the theme “Research Experiences in the Age of Pandemic”. In the event, Eduix presented how our edtech solutions has helped Finnish Higher Education Institutions (HEI) continue running their research endeavors during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The paradigm shift in education
From a global perspective, we all know that many HEIs have faced increased dropout rates due to students’ financial difficulties and inefficient virtual learning environments in the past year. Nevertheless, HEIs with the the appropriate virtual tools were able to keep educational processes running online (synchronous and asynchronous), identify students at risk and retain them, maintain staff efficiency, reduce costs, and attract more students.
The crisis became, then, a transformation opportunity for those who realized that institutions needed to change from a REACTIVE approach to systemic challenges to a FUTURE-ORIENTED modus operandi. In other words, the way forward is toward educational and institutional RESILIENCE. As an example of such approach, the Finnish HEIs equipped with our edtech solutions were able to:
- Continue planning, implementing, managing, and resourcing institutional and educational processes
- Support synchronous and asynchronous teaching, learning and research processes
- Keep staff and students’ stress due to change processes relatively low.
Thanks to these factors, Finnish HEIs had the needed resilience to go through the lockdowns and social distancing measures. In sum, there was no need for radical transformations in Finnish institutions during the pandemic, because students, teachers, researchers and admin staff were already operating with efficient and reliable edtech solutions.
Building resilience
In order to illustrate how we build reslience with our solutions, we presented the study case of the University of Applied Sciences (UAS) Haaga-Helia, our first Wihi customer. Wihi is a platform for the supervision and management of academic projects. It streamlines the process and improves the quality of scientific production. Wihi is intended to be used by students, coordinators, and thesis advisors. Since UAS Haaga-Helia started deploying Wihi in 2016, the following general outcomes were observed, even during the Covid-19 pandemic*:
- Decrease by 1/3 of tasks in the bureaucratic thesis process: a significant part of the ancillary work steps was automated.
- Students have got one week more time to complete their work before graduation thanks to the decrease of bureaucratic work from assistants, the library and the study office.
- Supervisors have more time left to supervise the research work: instructors found the system useful and utilized features that significantly increased allocated time to supervision.
- Increase by 25% the number of theses completed annually in a single degree program.
Serving HEIs for 25 years
Eduix has been serving Finnish HEIs for 25 years. Every decade has witnessed how we significantly contributed to the education quality of students in one of the best education system in the world. In the 2000s, we served HEIs mainly with our online platform for data collection and processing: Formjack. In that time, our focus was still growing on education management systems in close collaboration with the education sector in Finland.
In the 2010s, we started building the biggest education management system (EMS) in Finland, Peppi. Peppi streamlines education processes and unify/integrate operations, reducing duplicate work and avoiding unnecessary extra steps. Peppi is broadly used by the HEIs in Finland, consisting of the EMS de facto of the country.
Based on our large experience on gathering, managing and processing educational data, now Eduix is focusing on data-driven tools for reporting and developing education processes at an everyday level. We are taking advantage of AI-functions to free people’s time from manual tasks to value creative ones. Our way forward is in developing thorough software ecosystems, such as Sutainable Me and the SDG Scorecard tools, to provide data-backed information on all facets of education.
The 2020s decade is full of potential. Eduix team is partnering with innovators from different fields and places of the world in order to create cutting-edge solutions that, beyond supporting education resilience and reliability, generate value and human potential for addressing the challenges of the next decade.
If you want to partner with us in innovating education, contact Lais Oliveira Leite (lais@eduix.it).
*However, not all factors are known and the impact of the developed system is uncertain. Research is under development in order to confirm these results.