President’s Message
March 22, 2020
Dear Thames Community,
As I mentioned in my message to the community last March 12, 2020, the institution will transform itself and operate as a Virtual Campus as a response to the Global Pandemic and the Lockdown by the Philippine government. Our focus was to ensure no delays in the education of the Thames Students DESPITE COVID-19.
Thames started operating as a Virtual Campus on Monday March 16, 2020 with 100% online classrooms and with the administrators and lecturers working and teaching from home.
The results for our first week were the following:
- 71 % of all students were able enroll thru our payment system. Special arrangements will be made for those who do not have access to banks.
- 85% of all enrolled students are now registered with Freejoo, our new Learning Management System(LMS).
- 96% of all lecturers have been trained on the LMS. We will have weekly trainings to ensure we all get proficient quickly to being “online lecturers.”
- 73% of online classes have started.
- We piloted three (3) full days of an online workshop for the ICE postgraduate participants and received good feedback.
“Thames did a good job of “humanizing technology”. The online class experience went really smoothly and beyond my expectations. The quality of learning that we received was no less than what we could have received if the classes were done in a face-to-face setup. “ – Angela Garong
Our deployment is not yet perfect and we will continually strive to improve in the coming days and weeks.
We are also glad to announce that starting Monday, Student affairs will begin all the virtual activities for the students ranging from Study Habits Online, Wellness & Fitness Sessions and other fun & learning activities. This will allow the students to constantly be engaged with their friends and classmates in Thames while we are all under quarantine.
We continue to adjust as we learn. I however believe that we achieved the most important objective which is to ensure no delay in the education of the Thames Students DESPITE COVID-19.
Let me express our sincerest gratitude to the hardworking and dedicated administrators and lecturers. We would also like to thank the parents and students for your support and patience.
We are all in this together. God Bless you all!
Sincerely,
Jaime Noel (JOEL) Santos, President
joel.santos@thames.edu.ph
“Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble and He delivered them from their distress”
Psalm 107:6
