CHAPEL HILL – UNC System officials know many students weren’t happy with the makeshift courses they abruptly shifted to take online this spring due to the coronavirus pandemic.
So, not knowing when the state might face a second wave of the virus, they’re working to improve online offerings for if and when there’s a next time.
With $5 million of the $44 million recently approved by state legislators for the universities’ COVID-19 response,1 more than 60 faculty and instructional designers from across the UNC System are working to build a virtual “library” of shareable content for professors to use in online classes, the System’s Chief Academic Officer told a committee of the UNC Board of Governors last week.
The subjects will include introductory-level biology, chemistry, anatomy and physiology, economics, accounting, statistics and calculus, Chief Academic Officer Kimberly Van Noort told the Board’s Educational Planning Committee.
In addition, she said, UNC institutions will increase online tutorials and “student-success coaching” that officials have learned this spring is vital.
UNC campuses are working tirelessly, Van Noort said, to deal with a moving target next fall: When will be the best timing for classes? How much instruction can delivered face-to-face? How much online? How much in hybrid fashion?
With so many variables, “We have contingency plan after contingency plan,” Van Noort said. “There is a lot of great discussion going on.”
In remarks to the full Board of Governors, Interim UNC System President Bill Roper said that while he hopes students can return to campus in the fall, the digital enhancements are “a vivid example of our forward-thinking approach…. (that) reflects what we can accomplish when we collaborate as a System.”
At the committee meeting, board member Leo Daughtry asked Van Noort how much students liked their improvised online coursework this spring.
“What I hear is they don’t particularly like it,” Daughtry said.
Van Noort acknowledged that many students prefer in-person instruction – though at least some liked online delivery.
“I don’t think many of our traditional students want to go back to 100% online anytime soon,” she said.
UNC Faculty Assembly Chair David Green said some students didn’t have the best learning environments in their homes.
And Student Government Association President Isaiah Green of UNC Asheville added that between working or caring for younger siblings or grandparents in the midst of stay-at-home orders, academics didn’t always rank first for students this spring.
But board member Marty Kotis cautioned against passing judgment too soon on online instruction.
Simply “flipping it to a Zoom class,” as many professors did when they moved 50,000 courses online in a matter of days, is not the same as a well-developed online course, he said.
“I wouldn’t classify what we’re using right now as best-of-class in online learning,” Kotis said. Simply moving class to a Zoom meeting “is not nearly as good, but it’s not a developed online class.”
1https://www.ncleg.gov/Sessions/2019/Bills/House/PDF/H1043v7.pdf, p. 10; https://www.northcarolina.edu/apps/bog/doc.php?id=64000&code=bog, pp. 7-12.
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