UETN Resources for Home Connectivity
UETN is actively collaborating to extend services to education and healthcare in response to the Covid-19 novel coronavirus.
The Utah Education and Telehealth Network (UETN) has aggregated multiple resources for education and healthcare as warranted by the impact of the Coronavirus.
Resources for Students and Educators
- Learn @ Home includes lessons for teachers to share online with families
- eMedia video on demand
- Utah's Online Library and Preschool Pioneer
- UEN has licensed over 100 fully online courses for secondary students from BYU Independent Study that can be easily imported to Canvas.
- Canvas Commons can also be activated by local Canvas admins. This is a catalog of already developed resources to share and reshare through Canvas.
- UEN-TV, a 24/7 digital television channel with educational content that students can access from home without computers or the internet. View the schedule here.
- Utah Communities Connect Wifi Locations map show locations of available wifi hotspots throughout the state of Utah.
Resources for Healthcare
- Utah Telehealth Network
- Northwest Regional Telehealth Resource Center
- Utah Department of Health Coronavirus Website
- UEN-TV Monthly Health Programs
UETN is actively collaborating with the Utah Department of Health to identify telehealth resources in the state that may be used to remotely triage patients and direct people to the right level of health care for their medical needs. Telehealth technology can help prevent urgent care facilities and emergency departments from overcrowding and unnecessary use of these services.
While UETN’s statewide backbone currently connects schools, libraries, hospitals and clinics, we realize that those we serve may need robust home connections for telehealth, education and working from home. Thanks to decades of work with private sector telecoms, we are seeking to identify solutions that service providers can implement to support home connectivity.
For more than 95 percent of Utah homes that do have access to internet services, UETN has listed free collaboration and web conferencing solutions below. To students and educators, UETN provides the Instructure Canvas learning management system which supports home study. Canvas is widely used by public education and higher education in Utah.
UETN continues to meet regularly as a leadership team and with stakeholders to assess readiness to respond to the changing needs of schools and healthcare and to comply with directives from the Utah State Department of Health and the University of Utah where UETN is headquartered. The UETN board and advisory councils will also continue to provide guidance and input from the education and healthcare organizations they represent.
UETN connects more than 658,000 public education students at 1,130 schools and facilities. The Network also provides broadband to campuses serving 211,000 postsecondary students and trainees, and connects 77,000 educators and staff from Pre-K through college. In addition, UETN serves more than 70 hospitals, community health centers, clinics, health departments and dialysis centers.
Collaboration Tools
Here are several free collaboration tool options:
Webex has a restricted version that is always free for use. For any Covid 19 issues in education Webex has offered a less restrictive access for free for any required stay at home mandates.
Capabilities:
- Up to 100 participants in each meeting
- Meet as long as you want
- Unlimited number of meetings
- 1 GB of cloud storage
- Video conferencing features
- High-definition (HD) video
- Call-in for audio
- Active speaker and thumbnail view
- Grid view
- Floating view
- Screen sharing
- Webex Personal Room
- Webex Meetings web app
- Calendar integrations
- Instant meetings and scheduled meetings
- Share web-based multimedia content
- MP4 meeting recordings
- Meeting controls for host
- Q & A, polling, and Raise Hand features
- Join from a video system or application
Anyone can sign up for a free Webex Teams account and access to team spaces.
Features:
- Interactive whiteboards
- Unlimited messaging and file sharing
- Search messages, users, and files
- Message threads and quoting messages
- Share emojis, GIFs, and animated GIFs in messages
- Availability status
- Threeway audio/video calling
Offers an always free access to anyone anytime.
Features:
- Host up to 100 participants
- Unlimited 1 to 1 meeting or P2P calls
- 40 minute group meetings
- Unlimited number of meeting
- Online support
- Join by telephone call-in
- Whiteboard
Features:
- Call in Phone and VoIP audio
- 10 participants
- Meeting length 45 minutes
- Screen Share
- Recording
- Mobile Apps
Features:
- 90 minute Meetings
- 25 Participants
- Mobile Apps
- Online support
Features:
- 4 participants
- Video, Audio
- Screen Sharing
Features:
- Need only to have a gmail account to host
- Messaging
- iOS and Android Mobile Apps available
- Can be used to make and receive phone calls
- Screen sharing
System Requirements: All of these have similar system requirements.
- Webcam
- Microphone/Speakers Headphones prefered
- Windows PC or Mac
- Access to a Browsers
- CPU multi-core recommended
- 4 GB RAM
- Internet Access Broadband
- Smartphone for mobile APP access