To find students without Internet access, school board sends out an e-survey

They knew it would raise eyebrows. But it's saving school officials from making thousands of phone calls

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As Algoma District School Board ramps up for weeks of COVID-induced e-learning, Joe Maurice, superintendent of education, needs to know how many parents have the needed technology and Internet access.

So, last night, Maurice sent a survey to parents.

An e-survey.

An e-survey asking parents whether they have Internet access.

If that strikes you as a tiny bit outré, you're not alone.

"Thought you might enjoy the irony of this," one mom wrote to SooToday.

"How will we identify the students who don't have access to technology? Why, we'll simply do an e-survey!"

Maurice definitely sees the irony and confesses to chuckling a bit when he sent out the advisory yesterday to parents.

"The survey will cut down the number of families we have to call," he says.

"We have to connect with every family. We have 10,000 families."

Twenty-four hours after Maurice clicked 'send' on his survey invitation email, the school board had already received 3,000 responses.

"That's 3,000 families we don't have to call," he told us.

Today, Ontario Premier Doug Ford ordered publicly funded schools to remain closed until May 1 for teachers and May 4 for students.

"The Algoma District School Board has been identifying opportunities to support the continuity of learning and well-being for all of our students," Maurice said in his email to parents.

"We know that not all of our students have the technology they need to access these resources, and we want to hear from our families. We have created a brief survey to help us understand the technology needs (e.g. devices, Internet access) of our students to support learning at home."

"This survey will help us understand the technology needs (e.g. devices, Internet access) of our students to support learning at home."

The school board is asking that families with more than one school-age child complete a separate survey for each child.

The survey deadline is noon on Wednesday, Apr. 1.

To complete the technology-access survey, please click here.

School officials will follow up with all families that don't submit surveys to ensure they have the necessary devices and Internet access for e-learning.