In March of last semester, we spoke to English professor Dr. Greg Luthi about having to transition from in person to online classes so quickly. This fall, faculty had much more time to prepare.
(Luthi) “It’s been a lot smoother and I want to say I want to compliment the college and the administration for making a decision fairly early on to go online this fall, primarily online. I think that was an excellent decision. I think they showed farsightedness and they showed some realism, realizing we were not going to be back on campus like so many colleges kind of wait until the last minute and didn’t know what to do.”
Media professor Susan Dawson-O’Brien had some very in-depth preparation this summer.
(Dawson-O’Brien) “iTeach is a course which was how to present in canvas and do it with best practices, standards for the college, that kind of thing. We – those of us who took the course and passed it – have kind of a new understanding. It was a much deeper dive into canvas and it was things that we hadn’t thought about. How about a welcome video so that when your students first day, you know, they’re normally in a classroom with you when they’re online, maybe they’d like to see you and get a feel for who is going to be teaching them as opposed to be putting on the spot the first day on Zoom and then being asked to talk. So, we learned all these tricks for those of us who were face to face for moving online. We learned a lot of tricks that were very useful, I think, in getting up and running in the in the fall semester.”
She also offered valuable perspective on both this semester and last.
(Dawson-O’Brien) “I think one thing that the switch, the immediate pivot to online did in the spring was remind us that where we don’t think we are, but we’re extremely flexible human beings. And we have had the opportunity this semester and the summer and now in the fall to evaluate what’s really meaningful and the interaction and the education and focusing on what we are doing as an educational community.”
For The Campus Ledger, I’m Landen Fields.