Start ‘Online’ school year for long-term sick children

The schools have started again and for most children that means they are taught together with their classmates in the classroom. Unfortunately, this is not the case for all children. There are more than a thousand children in the Netherlands who cannot go to school or who are absent for long periods due to their illness. KlasseContact and KPN Klasgenoot offer a solution for this situation.

This also applies to Lynn, for example. She had leukemia and cannot go to school at the moment. Lynn uses KPN Klasgenoot, an innovative ICT solution that ensures that she can keep up with her class. Lynn talks about this in detail in the Jeugdjournaal.

KPN Klasgenoot (Classmate)
For fifteen years, KlasseContact is the project that has been ensuring that sick children can make use of Klasgenoot. Ed Bontrop, KlasseContact’s program manager, explains how it works and why it is so important: “Whether at home or in hospital, the children use a laptop that is connected to an IT device in the classroom: the “KPN Klasgenoot”. In this way, they stay in contact with their classmates and they do not have to miss school. This is hugely important for sick schoolchildren. They feel connected with their classmates and do not fall too far behind with their schoolwork. And for teachers, after two years of online education due to corona, dealing with Klasgenoot is a piece of cake.”

Recently renewed
KPN has some 700 Klasgenoten that are used free of charge to connect children with a long-term illness with their class. Since the start of KlasseContact in 2007, more than 4,800 children have been able participate and stay in touch with their classmates, despite the illness that keeps them at home or in hospital. A new version of Klasgenoot has recently been launched. The revamped Klasgenoot weighs just 2.2 kilograms instead of 8.5 kg and has a built-in battery. This means it is easy to take from one classroom to another and, more importantly, to the canteen and other break rooms. That makes it extremely suitable for secondary school pupils.

KPN Mooiste Contact Fonds
KlasseContact is the first and longest-running project of the KPN Mooiste Contact Fonds, an initiative of KPN. The fund celebrates its 15th anniversary this year and supports initiatives by various social partners aimed at stimulating social contact among vulnerable groups in society for whom this contact is not self-evident. The KPN Mooiste Contact fund makes use of knowledge, ICT, resources, and people (KPN volunteers) to do something about this.