Supporting remote delivery of education in Tunisia during the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the temporary closure of educational institutions around the world in an attempt to contain the spread of the virus. Tunisia is no exception to this state. Faced with this unprecedented crisis, the Tunisian Computing Center al Khawarizmi (CCK) together with the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research have taken several measures to support remote delivery of education.

To ensure sufficient pedagogical communication between students and teachers, CCK has set up a videoconferencing tool based on Jitsi, which is a set of open-source projects that allows faculty members to easily build and deploy secure video conferencing solutions, to assist them in holding synchronous classroom sessions with their students.

CCK has also set up a VPN-SSL to help the entire academic community in securing access to e-learning platforms and scientific resources published by Elsevier, Springer, IEEE, Wiley, etc., and available via the University National Centre of Scientific and Technical Documentation (CNUDST).

Furthermore, the CCK has been entrusted by the Tunisian Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research to sign contracts with the country’s three main telecom operators. This collaboration will grant Tunisian students free 4G access and ensure that they benefit from the possibility of accessing digital platforms available for distance learning across all Tunisian universities.

CCK General Director, Prof. Habib Youssef emphasized the constant efforts to provide quality education even in these exceptional times: “CCK will strive to make sure that no student is left out, particularly for more disadvantaged areas, and to facilitate the continuity of education for all through remote learning.”