The news is being dominated by the worldwide spread of Covid-19, known more widely as the Coronavirus. The UK has responded to the threat robustly so far, with the response to the virus still in the containment stage, but the situation is still worrying.
Restricting mass gatherings, closing workplaces and schools are currently not on the Government’s agenda, but Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has admitted there are “difficult judgements” to make in the weeks ahead to stop the spread, with potential school closures.
If the spread of Coronavirus continues and your school needs to close, how well equipped would your campus be to effectively communicate updates to parents without them attending campus? Would you be able to quickly contact everyone to ensure you respond to an outbreak quickly? Equations has worked with schools up and down the country to ensure they’re ready, should such a situation arise.
What do you need to have in place?
In a closure situation, all schools will share the same goal; making sure that each family knows the latest information as things develop. But how can you make sure that everyone knows the situation safely, limiting the chance for the virus to spread?
If you find that lots of parents are calling in to ask about Coronavirus, NEC’s virtual receptionist function lets you set up pre-recorded answers to those commonly asked queries, freeing up staff from dealing with numerous calls.
If in such a situation, staff need to be notified immediately to keep pupils in class or move them, having an NEC handset in each classroom gives you the option to either relay a message either to individual classrooms quietly, or over a tannoy group informing a number of classrooms at once.
The clever use of NEC automatic operator functionality can also be useful for things like extreme weather events!
Can such a system offer other improvements?
Being prepared for such scenarios is really important, but you’ll want to make sure that any money spent on a new system has added benefits that can improve things like daily communication and operations around the site.
• Lower your costs — Equations can save a school as much as 80% on their infrastructure and call costs!
• Get a system perfect for your campus layout — Equations telephone systems are flexible, enabling schools to simply plug in phones wherever they’re needed. This means that if you need staff working from home or want to change campus layout easily, you can, free from major work or costs.
• Handle busy periods better — Most schools have a large volume of calls in a short period of time, particularly at the start of the day. Equations telephone system’s wide range of functionality, including hunt groups, call divert and virtual receptionists, means these busy periods can be handled as flexibly as possible
For more information on how our phone systems could help your school cope with a Coronavirus closure, or just improve day-to-day communication, give us a call on 01237 420010.
