Educators will rejoice with Zoom
January 27, 2017
Educators will rejoice with Zoom
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Software Version
Other
Overall Satisfaction with Zoom
I use it with my online course that I teach. Each week, I have a Zoom meeting with my students. This gives them an opportunity to ask questions about that week's assignments. I believe what it is also doing is bridging that gap between isolation and classroom interaction. For some students when they take an online course they feel isolated, even though there might be discussion boards to do and they will read other classmates' posts but it doesn't give students that same connection as if they were in a physical classroom. Since I started using Zoom, I have noticed that students who participate in the Zoom meetings that they earn higher grades compared to the students not participating.
Being the Director of Distance Learning, I use Zoom to host monthly meetings with our site coordinators. Before Zoom, there would be annual meetings happening on the main campus. Being able to do monthly meetings, I was able to keep them updated with the latest happening on campus plus I was able to do extensive training on the software that we use every day on the main campus.
Being the Director of Distance Learning, I use Zoom to host monthly meetings with our site coordinators. Before Zoom, there would be annual meetings happening on the main campus. Being able to do monthly meetings, I was able to keep them updated with the latest happening on campus plus I was able to do extensive training on the software that we use every day on the main campus.
- 3 levels of broadcast. This is a fabulous feature that I have not seen on any other video conferencing software. If a participant is on a poor internet service, they will receive a smaller broadcast of the session. Unlike other video conference software, if you don't have good internet connection then you are out of luck.
- Screen Sharing +. So as a host you can share your screen with the audience. I know, "Big Deal, the others can do that", but Zoom expanded it. The audience members can share their screen with everyone or you can give mouse control of your shared screen with an audience member. Which is great for teaching!!!
- Customer Service/Plans. These guys have the best customer service team. You email a question, you get a response within a few hours, not days. Plus if you are an educator or education institution, they have some of the best deals for you.
- There is one thing. I want to have a button in my online class that would let students know that I am available or not for them to communicate with me through Zoom and they would click on the button and it would open up a Zoom meeting. That might already exist, but I just haven't had the time to research it.
- The big one is that is helping our employees who work away from the main campus as being part of the campus again. Many of those employees expressed to me that they felt more like they were on an island and now they feel like they are apart of the campus.
First, Zoom gives great discounts for educators and educational institutions. Second, the others always have some sort of lag issue. Zoom is only one I know that doesn't lag when both of the internet connections is great. It does lag if one of connections is poor, but it's nothing compared to the others.