Transition to Online Education in Schools during a SARS-CoV-2 Coronavirus (COVID-19) Pandemic in Georgia

Abstract

The situation in general education in Georgia has changed in the spring semester of 2020, when the first case of coronavirus COVID-19 infection was detected rising to 211 local and more than 1,5 million infection cases worldwide by the Apr. 8. 2020. Georgia became one of 188 countries worldwide that has suspended the education process. The paper studies the capacities of the country and its population to continue the education process at the schools in the online form of distance learning, study reviews the different available platforms and indicates the ones that were used by the support of the government, such as online portal, TV School and Microsoft teams for public schools and the alternatives like Zoom, Slack and Google Meet, EduPage platform that can be used for online education and live communication and gives examples of their usage. Authors made a case study, where the Google Meet platform was implemented for online education in a private school with 950 students, shows the usage statistics generated by the system for the first week of the online education process. Results confirm that the quick transition to the online form of education went successful and gained experience can be used in the future. The experience and studies can be useful for other countries that have not found the ways of transition yet. The lesson learned from the pandemic of 2020 will force a generation of new laws, regulations, platforms and solutions for future cases, when the countries, government and population will be more prepared than today.