By Andrew Mariotti
Dominican University has already started planning for Fall 2021 classes, and administrators say the mix of online and face-to-face instruction for September will stay close to what it is now.
Currently, Dominican’s course modalities for undergraduate and graduate students are a mix of face-to-face, hybrid, and online. For undergraduate students, 16% of their courses are face-to-face, 19% are hybrid, and 65% are online. For graduate students, 5% of their courses are face-to-face, 9% are hybrid, and 86% are online.
On February 11, I interviewed Jeffrey Carlson, provost and vice president for academic affairs, to hear Dominican’s plan for the Fall 2021 semester.
“Our current plan for Fall 2021 is to have a mix of online, face-to-face, and hybrid as we now have, but to try to move a little bit more towards face-to-face and hybrid,” Carlson said.
Carlson had been working with Student Success and Engagement (SSE) to figure out what would be in the best interest for students during the Fall 2021 semester because students who struggle generally do better with face-to-face instruction.
SSE has been analyzing student success rates considering courses students have dropped, withdrawn, or failed in the Fall 2020 semester. The SSE staff has also been analyzing academic alerts that faculty submit for students.
The planning was another factor that came into making the decision six months before the start of the Fall 2021 semester.
“We made a decision not to build the schedule as if things are going to be better. We made the decision to build the schedule as if things were going to be the same,” Carlson said.
However, Carlson believes that between the time the students register in April and the time the semester starts, the course modalities can change.
“We have to be flexible enough to keep our eye on things and change as we may need too,” he said.
All these findings and assumptions went into Carlson’s decision-making for the Fall.
According to a veteran teacher, a course that needs a face-to-face modality is Introduction to Computer Applications.
“It translates better in-person and I think it’s very difficult to teach a student some of the software when you can’t look at what they’re doing, and you can’t see their placement of their hands on a keyboard. It is a hard thing to pull apart when you are not together,” said Ellen Alamilla, a lecturer in Computer Science.
Alamilla teaches four Introduction to Computer Application courses. Three of the classes are hybrid while the other is fully online.
In her face-to-face hybrid courses, Alamilla provides help for her students by having them raise their hand. She will then stand behind them maintaining her distance and watch what they are doing to assist them with their problem.
For her online course, Alamilla is very explicit with her directions. She said she tries to keep a positive and encouraging attitude with her students.
Through both types of courses, Alamilla shares her screen so students can watch what she is doing. She has also increased her office hours and will meet with students on the weekend to allow them to talk through any problems or questions they may have.
Alamilla also prefers face-to-face classes because she enjoys getting to know her students and building a relationship with them. She had a conversation with one of her students from outside her office.
“You can see that even though they’re wearing a mask they’re genuinely happy to see you and you’re happy to see them. That’s everything for me,” Alamilla said.
Students also want to have that face-to-face communication with their instructors.
“It’s easier to get to know a professor face-to-face rather than online. It’s harder to make connections with professors online,” said Susan Garcia, a business major.
Garcia gauges the difficulty of a class before deciding what style to take. If a class is difficult, it should be face-to-face, but if a class is manageable, it can stay online.
“Last semester, it was really hard when it came to my accounting class,” Garcia said. “I felt that this class had to be face-to-face. I wanted to ask my professor for clarification, but when it’s online, they don’t really see you. Instead, they just proceed with the class.”
Garcia believes that Dominican is turning into “Zoom University” meaning that she is not receiving what she would get if she were in face-to-face classes.
Carlson said that no matter the style of delivery – or modality – the goal is the same. “We have to get every student to meet the learning outcomes that a course was supposed to deliver,” he said.
Along with the Fall 2021 schedule, the Spring 2022 schedule will also be posted.
For Spring 2022, Carlson encourages faculty to try to think what post-COVID would look like. Do we hop right back into our normal schedule or do we take what we learned from online and hybrid learning and keep that as we move forward?
The schedules for the Fall 2021 semester and the Spring 2022 semester will be posted March 1. Students can then start preparing their schedule and meeting with their advisors. Registration for graduates will be the week of April 5 and undergraduates will register the week of April 12.
amariotti@my.dom.edu
