School heads and teachers in Croatia satisfied with online classes

ZAGREB, July 26 (Hina) – At the start of this month the Ministry of Science and Education conducted two surveys on the efficiency of online classes during the coronavirus outbreak, which showed a generally high level of satisfaction with remote classes, the ministry said earlier this week. 

One survey covered school heads and the other teachers and expert assistants, and both returned positive results.

The survey for school heads was carried out after the school year was over, in late June and early July, with 1,106 primary and secondary schools responding to it, which is about 85% of all schools in the country.

The survey for teachers and expert assistants was conducted in virtual classrooms. It covered 3,791 respondents, whose participation was voluntary and anonymous.

Survey for school heads

Nearly all school heads completely or mainly agree that their school successfully conducted online classes, while 89% think that the recommendations for the organisation of the school day for students during the time of remote learning were useful. 94% found guidance on assessment and grading useful and 48% said they completely agreed with it.

Respondents said that remote classes were very well prepared despite many challenges and that this was largely thanks to the curricular reform and the part of it relating to online training. They provided useful comments on how to improve online classes and stressed the need for continuous teacher training to standardise and improve remote teaching. They also highlighted the need for additional equipment for vulnerable groups of students and communication with parents.

Survey for teachers and expert assistants

Nearly all teachers (97%) said they were completely or mainly satisfied with remote teaching, and 89% said they thought their students coped well or mostly well with online classes. The same percentage of teachers were satisfied or mainly satisfied with the equipment made available to them for the conduct of online classes.

90% of teachers said they were pleased with video lessons and programmes on television, and 82% said they were capable of conducting online classes on their own.

As many as 95% of teachers said they managed better than they had expected, and 30% noted that students were more active in remote than in physical classes.

Two-thirds of teachers found the recommendations for the organisation of the school day for students completely or mostly useful, and three-quarters said that guidance on assessment and grading was useful.

The findings will be used to improve support to teachers and expert assistants in the teaching process as online classes will likely need to be conducted in some form in the next school year as well, the ministry said.