How this New Zealand university minimised COVID-19 risk and effectively returned students to campus

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If you’ve been keeping tabs on the seemingly infinite news stories of late, you’d know that New Zealand has been lauded for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

An almost immediate level-four lockdown back in April appeared to eradicate the spread — minor resurgence aside — leaving other countries scrambling to follow suit.

This prompt action was not exclusive to strict lockdowns and borders, though — New Zealand institutions began to fast-track systems that would ensure close monitoring and transmission prevention.

One such institution was the University of Waikato, that began working with Salesforce and Datacom to implement a contact tracing solution when New Zealanders were first instructed to stay home due to the virus.

“There is enormous pressure on tertiary institutions around the world to do this quickly and get it right,” Eion Hall, the CIO from the university explained. “That’s why within a couple of weeks of launching the Check-In program we had requests from all kinds of universities and colleges to provide advice or more background information — academic institutions in New Zealand are really at the forefront of this kind of response.”

The Check-In program relied on students and faculty members logging their location in order to effectively trace their movements and closely monitor potential transmission.

“For COVID-19 tracking, which was built on the Salesforce platform, almost 13,000 students, faculty members and visitors to the university’s two campuses are participating in the initiative, which uses their mobile phones and QR codes to log people’s on-campus movements,” Hall continued. “In 10 days, more than 5,000 check-in points were established at the entrance of every building, floor and residential hall on university sites.”

Impressively, the University of Waikato’s COVID-19 tracing system took just four weeks to establish and implement, including a 10-day delivery of the app, which is credited to the safe return of New Zealanders to its campuses.

However, that’s not to say the process didn’t come with its fair share of difficulties.

“The challenge with the university campus is that it is widely spread out with approximately 60 buildings and 5,000 spaces,” Hall said. “It was important that the solution provided granular tracing data in order to effectively report in the event of a probable case of COVID-19 on campus.

“The contact tracing solution was developed to accommodate our specific business requirements in order to be highly successful and to reassure our University community.”

As a small number of cases have recently been reported in parts of New Zealand, the University of Waikato doesn’t plan on easing their vigilant system any time soon.

“As the country operates within restrictions, the university will maintain the required contact tracing and increased cleaning initiatives on its campuses. Presently, New Zealand’s response to COVID-19 is currently in Alert Level 2.”

If you’re currently navigating a safe return to work, Salesforce’s new hub, work.com, has a full ‘How-To’ playbook on their site, as well as platforms to assist in the implementation of systems such as the Check-In program used by the University of Waikato.