Coronavirus illustrationEngage has responded to the recent Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by postponing any immediate travel plans that might pose a risk to our team as well as staff, parents and pupils at our school customers

Most immediately this has involved the decision to suspend our User Group Conference in China in the first half of 2020.

Chinese User Group Conference postponed

“Although we have been working hard to finalise venues for a User Group Conference in China, the current situation has prompted us to consider the safety of staff and delegates who would attend,” Engagement Officer Andrea Yates explains. “In addition the travel restrictions being imposed to prevent further spread of the virus would be likely to make getting to the conference extremely difficult.

“For these reasons we have paused our planning for the time being.  We will continue to monitor the situation and will get back to planning an event as soon as it is both practical and safe to do so.  Our thoughts are with all those affected by the virus at this time.’

“We expect our APAC User Group Conference to remain unaffected at this time, except that we gave had to cancel the 16 February pre-event networking activity. We are liaising with our host, HeadStart International in Phuket and you can see a list of the precautionary measures already in place on our APAC User Group Conference page.”

Thoughts with our China schools

The Engage team is currently monitoring the situation carefully regarding travel to its China-based schools and meantime we hope that all staff, pupils and parents manage to remain unaffected.

Impacts on overseas-based pupils of Chinese parents

The Boarding Schools’ Association has issued excellent advice on the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak – including a precautionary note that pupils visiting their homes in China might have to enter quarantine on return to their school. Education consultant Gabbitas has also warned Greater China parents of UK students of potential impacts on examinations and hence it may make sense to remain in the UK for half-term holiday.

Engage school MIS user of course will be able to closely liaise with Chinese parents using in-built school communication tools, including our Parent Portal and integrated school SMS services.