Errors Including Learning History Save Failures and Video Class Access Delays
Yoo Eun-hye Visits EBS Technical Situation Room Twice in One Week
Due to Tight Schedule and Lack of Completeness in New Service Development
[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] As the new semester begins, students and teachers have expressed inconvenience due to issues such as the learning progress rate not being displayed on the newly revamped EBS Online Class, some video classes not being opened, and problems with invitation links. These problems arose due to the tight development schedule aligned with the school opening.
On the 5th, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Yoo Eun-hye visited the EBS Emergency Technical Situation Room located in Jongno-gu, Seoul, saying, "I know that you have been working day and night since last week before the start of the semester while remodeling the EBS Online Class learning management system for several months," and added, "I ask you to do your best until the weekend to stabilize the online class service." This visit came just a week after her visit on the 25th of last month, where she encouraged the staff and reiterated the importance of service stabilization.
Video Class and Progress Display Errors from the First Day of School
Since remote classes began in April last year, elementary and middle school students have been attending remote classes via e-Hakseupter, while middle and high school students use EBS Online Class. Around 9 a.m. on the first day of the new semester, the 2nd, there were delays in accessing e-Hakseupter, and on EBS Online Class, issues such as the learning progress rate not being displayed, delays in connecting to video classes, inability to open additional video classes, and problems with learning management inquiries or sending student invitation links occurred consecutively.
GS ITM, responsible for service development and operation, explained, "Due to the tight development period, errors occurred in incomplete parts, and a total of 65 people, including 40 additional personnel, have been deployed to make every effort to stabilize the service," adding, "The work that normally takes 10 months was completed in 5 months, and problems arose because the service was opened before stabilization was achieved."
In particular, EBS scrapped the temporarily operated service from last year and started a newly developed service with new features from the ground up. With a total investment of 3.7 billion KRW, the restructuring project began in September to rebuild the service to accommodate 3 million simultaneous connections and up to 300,000 video class participants. Subsequently, a beta test was conducted from February 8 to 14 with leading edutech teachers, followed by a pilot service (open beta) starting on the 19th, and the official service began on the 28th.
Ko Jang-won, head of EBS Edutech, said, "There were various issues due to opening with incomplete readiness, but the problem of learning history not being saved properly is expected to be resolved within three days, and the video class system is operating normally," adding, "The invitation feature requested by schools also started to be provided from the 3rd."
New Service and Tight Schedule... "Full Effort to Stabilize by Next Week"
Teachers also expressed dissatisfaction because the beta service was conducted just before the school opening due to the tight schedule of building a completely new service rather than adding features to the existing one.
Regarding this, Kim Kwang-beom, head of EBS School Education Headquarters, said, "Basic functions were completed by January, and while testing these basic functions, detailed feature development had to be completed," adding, "We conducted the pilot service for all teachers nationwide from February 19, and I think if it had been done earlier, teachers' inconveniences might have been lessened."
EBS and the Online Class service developers stated that they will make every effort to provide stable service starting next week when remote classes become full-scale. They have identified the causes of errors such as learning progress errors and attendance confirmation issues and plan to communicate with teachers in real-time to address other problems as they arise.
Lee Mi-kyung, director of GS ITM, said, "We sincerely apologize for the significant problems caused to school operations, and since the causes of learning history and attendance confirmation errors have been identified, we will take responsibility and fix them so that data can be viewed normally by next week."
Kim Myung-jung, president of EBS, said, "I sincerely apologize to teachers, students, and parents for the inconvenience caused by the newly built Online Class, regardless of the reasons," adding, "EBS will work closely with partner companies to quickly advance and stabilize the remote education system."
Deputy Prime Minister Yoo said, "Introducing a system that supports 200,000 simultaneous users for real-time interactive video classes is the first in Korea and a rare success case worldwide," and explained, "Although it was not perfectly achieved in a short period, I hope that the inconvenience will be quickly improved and supplemented so that the management system for stable operation of 200,000 simultaneous real-time interactive users will be well established."
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