Transformation of EUROCONTROL’s classroom courses into remote learning

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced the students, the teachers and all educational institutions to rapidly adapt to the online learning. The EUROCONTROL Institute of Air Navigation Services – EUROCONTROL’s training centre, which supplies more than 200 courses related to ATM/CNS, had to review its traditional training modules to ensure continuous delivery of the courses and in the desired quality. The theoretical courses were relatively easily transformed to virtual courses by using one of the major webinar platforms – Zoom. However, the courses with hands-on sessions were much more difficult to modify. Numerous challenges included cybersecurity of the test equipment to be connected to the internet, the quality of the connection, the adequate number of participants and, naturally, reasonable costs. This article describes the transformation of courses for the 3 EUROCONTROL’s surveillance products ARTAS, SASS-S and SDDS from face-to-face to virtual.