By Ali Jafari, professor, School of Engineering and Technology at IUPUI; founder, CourseNetworking; director, IUPUI CyberLab

CourseNetworking (CN) and CyberLab at IUPUI are offering our Learning Management System (LMS) free to institutions whose educational offerings are affected by the coronavirus and thus need distance-learning tools.

Some governments are closing universities, colleges and schools in response to the coronavirus pandemic. They are suggesting that these institutions’ courses be provided over the internet.

CN and IUPUI CyberLab want to help. Instructors from anywhere in the world are welcome to create and virtually teach their courses. Through CN, instructors can guide students in making posts to the class, taking quizzes, receiving and submitting assignments, reading uploaded documents, conducting live video lectures, awarding badges and more. A 24/5 hotline helpdesk is created to assist instructors. Support is available in English, Chinese, Italian, Farsi, French, German, Malay and Korean.

Offering CN’s system for free to instructors whose courses are affected by the coronavirus is the right thing to do. Education is the foundation of civilized society. There are resources, CN included, to ensure everyone who wants to teach and to learn is able to, regardless of the impact of the coronavirus and other obstacles.