KUALA LUMPUR: Schools finally reopened yesterday for Form Five and Six students, after more than three months’ closure due to the movement control order.
So what was it like, first day of school in the new normal?
In several schools, digital scanning for high temperature is the standard operating procedure as students, teachers and staff members enter the premises.
At SM Cheras Perdana which has about 300 returning students, teachers were stationed at the entry point to greet the students and ensure that the SOP is complied with.
SM Cheras Perdana is among the schools which installed the digital thermal scanning and digital attendance solution by KipleLive Sdn Bhd, a subsidiary of Green Packet Berhad.
With the KipleLive solution, students who are required to go to school had their profiles uploaded onto a cloud-based attendance system.
At SM Cheras Perdana, the floor was marked with yellow tape as a guide for students to walk past the “attendance zone” which is the optimal camera viewpoint for facial detection.
Green Packet has conducted optimisation of student profiles to ensure the algorithm provides maximum accuracy facial recognition.
As the students filed past the school gates, their temperature was recorded and linked to their face ID.
The school administrators were then able to view students’ attendance captured digitally via the face recognition system.
Green Packet’s KipleLive solution employs some of the most advanced technology that can be easily adapted to the setup of the different types of schools.
Both hardware and software backend configurations allow accurate contactless reading and data capturing to be used for tracking in the event a Covid-19 cluster is detected.
On the frontend, there is a digital “clocked in and clocked out” attendance-taking feature which reduces a lot of manual work for school administrators.
When it comes to using face recognition software, SM Cheras Perdana is ahead. The school tested a pilot face recognition programme for digital contactless food collection last year, way before the pandemic. Now in the present situation, cash handling is considered unhygienic for all stakeholders.
KipleLive is currently working on face recognition ID for cashless canteens and collection of pre-packed food. Students can collect pre-ordered food using face ID or a student card to reduce queuing and waiting time. In the works is a face identification system that links the students to their parent’s app which in turn authorises the collection of the prepaid meals.
Beyond meals, the system supports other fee collection such as for the purchase of uniforms, school books and other items. The app provides balance reminders to the parents and helps users keep track of what they need to pay for and when.
This system enables school administrators to communicate directly with the parents and guardians throughout school terms.
The Covid-19 pandemic has become the prime accelerator of digital solutions to replace and revolutionise school operations.
And about time too.
-The Star