With the joint efforts of OUC headquarters, OUC branches, local colleges, and learning centres, the OUC's Cloud Classroom Project Phase II has been completed, and the cloud classroom has been officially put into use.
The OUC launched public bidding on Phase II of the Cloud Classroom Project in September 2014. By the end of 2015, 13 branch control centres and 234 cloud classrooms had been built at 19 branches and 110 local colleges nationwide by way of co-construction and co-management.
From December 2015 to March 2016, 8 inspection groups from the OUC’s Information Technology Department, Finance and Asset Management Department, Discipline Inspection and Audit Department, Teaching Affairs Department, and the School of Agroforestry and Medicine went to 12 branches in Gansu, Ningxia, Hunan, Hubei, Chongqing, Yunnan, Shandong, Shenyang, Jiangxi, Hebei, Hainan, and Inner Mongolia to inspect and qualify phase II of the Cloud Classroom Project. They conducted field construction supervision and qualification of the municipal and county-level cloud classrooms via on-site inspections. Additionally, they held interviews and meetings to learn about the needs and gather suggestions from the various locations for the future improvement of cloud classrooms. The inspection groups visited 10 control centres and 41 cloud classrooms, meeting the requirement of on-site inspections of at least 20% of the locations.
OUC branches fully supported the cloud classroom project. According to their comments, the cloud classrooms can easily create new avenues for interaction between local and remote locations, aiding in both online and offline communication between teaching staff, which will be conducive to sharing high quality teaching resources and excellent teachers among different places, supporting the realization of the goal of "sharing one class across the whole province". In addition, the co-construction and co-management mode for the cloud classroom project also reflects the cohesion of the RTVU system, which supports overall system construction and development. Through the cloud classrooms, the tutors in different places can offer support not only in their local areas, but also across the whole province and even the whole country, which offers greater opportunities for their own development. The cloud classrooms throughout the country are like links in a chain, closely uniting the OUC headquarters, branches, and learning centres, jointly building the digital learning environment and serving national lifelong learning.
Since the construction of the cloud classrooms was completed in the branches, the branches have already been carrying out their own various application activities. Gansu RTVU completed the hardware deployment for the cloud classrooms in October 2015. Since then, it has organized live broadcasts and online broadcasting for the final review of 4 courses and 15 classes within the province, comprising over 96 class hours and over 100 GB of video resources. Gansu RTVU also utilized the cloud classrooms to hold seminars on "Lecture on Quality Improvement " and Entrepreneurship and Thinking; promote the implementation of digital books (9) reading activities and the digital library application training meetings, etc. It also organized graduation dissertation and degree awarding ceremony for the students across the RTVU system throughout the province for the first time. The implementation of cloud classrooms has promoted the sharing of high quality education resources across the province, highlighting the advantages of the RTVU's flexibility and simplicity, and more closely integrating open education into peoples' daily life. The cloud classrooms at Shandong RTVU have been put to use in course recording and micro-course recording since they were completed. The "junior college education quality promotion project for grass-roots cadres in rural and urban communities" has been carried out in Shandong Province. The cloud classroom courses recorded for the Shandong learning network intended for grass-roots cadres have been launched and put into use. In the provincial "micro-course" contest, the courses were recorded via the cloud classroom equipment.
The inspection group conducting acceptance check for the cloud classroom in Wendeng County RTVU, Shandong province.
The inspection group conducting acceptance check for the cloud classroom in Yunmeng County RTVU, Xiaogan City, Hubei province.
On March 31, 2016, after the spot checks and acceptances of the cloud classrooms in various branches, OUC’s Finance and Asset Management Department organized a project completion acceptance meeting for the Cloud Classroom Phase II Project and invited three experts from outside the university to carry out the technical acceptance. The Information Technology Department, Discipline Inspection and Audit Department, contractors, and other relevant people attended the acceptance meeting. The meeting was composed of several parts: Information Technology Department introduced the project, then the contractor introduced the construction of the project, followed by a system demonstration, expert inquiry, etc. After completing these processes, the project officially passed the final acceptance test. All parties concerned with giving final approval to the project affirmed their support of the implementation process and effectiveness of this project.
Cloud classrooms have connected the OUC headquarters, branches, local colleges, and learning centres, which effectively promotes high quality education resource sharing, alleviating problems such as inadequate teachers in remote areas. Cloud classrooms provide online face-to-face teaching, remote real-time network teaching, live course recording, live online teaching, video conferencing, remote interview and defense, etc. The integration of the cloud classroom record/play system with the OUC's learning network provides learners with multi-device learning and other enhanced learning experiences, which can support and satisfy teaching, conference, exams, and other educational needs under various network conditions. To maximize the value of the cloud classrooms, the teaching and management departments should play a leading role in teaching business process management, teaching team management, and teaching implementation management; taking full advantage of the technical support role played by the technical department in organizing technology implementation teams, developing customized teaching strategies, as well as providing technical maintenance and operations services. The teaching business department and technical department should strengthen cooperation to form a collaborative mechanism, so as to better leverage and maintain the cloud classrooms.
By Information Technology Department, OUC