Ceibal en casa: Fundación Ceibal showcases Uruguay’s experience to the rest of the world

The OECD, the World Bank, Harvard University and the Finnish NGO HundrEd have published an article by Fundación Ceibal providing a systematic analysis of “Ceibal en casa“, Uruguay’s educational continuity plan during the closure of schools in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The article showcased a collaboration between Plan Ceibal and the National Administration of Public Education (ANEP) to transform a programme that was initially aimed at strengthening classroom-based teaching into a fully digital distance learning solution.

Implementation of “Ceibal en casa” (“Ceibal at home”) began immediately after schools were shut down in March 2020. Even before the pandemic, Plan Ceibal had already developed an ecosystem of more than 173,000 educational resources. This included CREA, a content management and communications system available to all public schools in Uruguay; platforms for learning mathematics, with adaptive and gamified functionalities; a digital library featuring more than 7,000 books (Biblioteca País); and a collection of 1,500 open educational resources and schoolbooks.

The article, originally written in English by Fundación Ceibal’s Director, María Florencia Ripani, states that: “The new features introduced by ‘Ceibal en casa’ focused on improving digital interaction between students and teachers, allowing families to participate as key facilitators in the teaching and learning process”.

“Ceibal en casa” turned out to be a unique and interesting programme, as it combined a solid digital infrastructure and pre-existing educational resources with specific innovations and the smart use of data in order to adapt to the new landscape.

The programme adjusted its offer through a two-pronged approach: one related to providing and adapting infrastructure as well as technical and pedagogical resources, and another one that addressed the social and emotional impacts caused by social isolation. Some of the innovations put forward by “Ceibal en casa” included adding videoconferencing tools to the CREA platform, using analytics to interpret usage and user needs, and providing context-specific teacher training. Digital communication channels—including educational platforms and Plan Ceibal’s social networks—were also used to provide key information to promote the well-being of teachers, students and their families during the pandemic.

Read the full article here.

The document provides a detailed account of the challenges encountered during the plan’s implementation, as well as the ways in which they were overcome. Given the exponential increase in demand for digital platforms, technological infrastructure capacity grew by 400%, while the architecture was revamped to enable a higher number of simultaneous logins. On the other hand, agreements with public and private companies—ANTEL and Claro—were established so that educational resources and platforms could be accessed free of data usage costs. These and other actions outlined in the document were carried out while 95% of the staff worked from home.

“Ceibal en casa” made use of its knowledge on how educational resources are used to fit the needs of teachers and students in order to adapt and improve its services. It analyzed statistical data on educational platform usage, taking note of the days and hours in which demand peaked. This data was complemented by telephone calls and e-mail surveys sent to various players within the educational community.

Evaluation of results

“Ceibal en casa” was followed up through data analysis and a survey completed by a representative sample of primary and secondary school teachers at the national level. According to the analysed data, coverage among primary and secondary students was 85% and 90%, respectively, and reached 95% of teachers, which included teaching and training platforms. Logins to Plan Ceibal’s online educational resources increased by 2,452% in March 2020, compared to the same period in 2019.

According to the survey results, Plan Ceibal’s resources were the most frequently used (93%) to support teaching activities in public education. The collected data shows that 98% of public school teachers sent homework to their students through the platform, 90% received activities uploaded by the students and 87% used it to send corrections. According to the teachers, the most common activities included sending assignments, uploading documents and videos to complement those assignments, coordinating with colleagues and creating student groups and shared documents. Video conferences with other teachers were also regarded as regular activities (59% and 60% in primary and secondary education, respectively), although using them to hold meetings with students was less frequent (32% in primary and 27% in secondary education).

According to the survey, 92% of teachers were either satisfied or very satisfied with the training activities provided by Plan Ceibal, although 70% expressed the need for further training to use the resources more effectively. Fundación Ceibal’s article states that these data may underscore a perception by teachers that their teaching practices in digital environments can be improved through a higher level of digital literacy and specific professional development.

The article concludes that the current scenario is a great opportunity to raise awareness about the importance of further developing an ecosystem that deepens the systematized integration of digital solutions for mediating and facilitating teaching and learning.

Regional collaboration

The article, signed by Fundación Ceibal’s Director, highlights that Plan Ceibal’s flexible and comprehensive combination of resources could help to adapt the “Ceibal en casa” program to other countries. This, however, would require further investment and access to infrastructure and digital resources.

Plan Ceibal has a long history of regional collaboration. As such, it has already begun to share the knowledge it has gained within the context of the pandemic with low- and middle-income countries in the rest of Latin America. This has been done in collaboration with Fundación Ceibal, which coordinates the Alliance for the Digitization of Education in Latin America and the Caribbean (ADELA).

This document about Uruguay’s experience stands out among other such papers presented within the framework of the Continuity Stories initiative, led by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the Harvard University School of Education—through its Global Education Innovation Initiative—, the World Bank and the NGO HundrED. This is the only outstanding national experience of a country that has managed to put an end to the school closure phase.

After schools started reopening gradually in June 2020, face-to-face classes resumed in all of Uruguay’s educational centres.

Visit the Continuity Stories website on this link.