The Coronavirus shelter-in-place mandates and lockdowns caused a number of adaptations to occur. One of those changes was simple cause and effect: children couldn't go to physical schools, but they still required a semblance of an education. As we previously reported, this was a massive boon for Korean-based online-classroom Classting ($PRIVATE:CLASSTING). Over a three month span, it saw an increase of 18% of registered classrooms.
The number of classes since our last report in March continued to rise until mid-April, but appear to have reached a leveling off-point of ~432K.
The reasons for this leveling off could be multi-fold. Other online classroom providers, such as Chegg ($CHGG) have seen an increase in classroom registration. This could be an artifact of market saturation, with only so many classes needing to be placed. Some countries have already begun phasing back into school attendance, as per cnn.com report. Most schools in the United States are closed for the remainder of the academic year, and plans for Fall enrollment are still being discussed.
Perhaps one of the more interesting educational system questions to arise from this global crisis is what if any changes will remain after the worst has passed? Will tele-education or mixed media classrooms become more accessible to students who might have benefited from the infrastructure and policy pre-COVID-19, such as the disabled? Will the needs of the times spark innovation in textbook or educational material delivery and integration? The opportunities both to improve the current status quo and to capitalize on the ground opened by necessity are endless. We will continue to watch and learn.
About the Data:
Thinknum tracks companies using the information they post online - jobs, social and web traffic, product sales, and app ratings - and creates data sets that measure factors like hiring, revenue, and foot traffic. Data sets may not be fully comprehensive (they only account for what is available on the web), but they can be used to gauge performance factors like staffing and sales.