Faculty Question #1 What was the most challenging thing for you as classes went entirely online?

Bill Machold, MM,
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF MUSIC, DIRECTOR OF BANDS
It is difficult to teach music online. So much of teaching music depends on demonstration and experience, performance and listening. The challenge was finding ways to recreate those experiences without being in a physical classroom or teaching studio.


Brian D. Royer,
MS, LMHC, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Learning the technology behind synchronous/asynchronous teaching (Videotaping lectures and uploading to Moodle and conducting live Zoom meetings)


Anna Shajirat, PhD,
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH
The most challenging aspect of moving online was supporting students as they made a difficult transition in extremely challenging conditions. The majority of students had significant anxiety about the transition and I felt very clear that my duty was to support, encourage, and comfort them. I was very glad to be a source of support for students, but that extra output of work and energy was draining.


Minerva Cruz,
PHD, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
OF HEALTH CARE ADMINISTRATION
The most challenging thing was not actually from my course itself, but from the different situations my students were dealing with during the COVID-19 pandemic. For instance, one of my students was an essential worker. In addition, I had students telling me they were overwhelmed because they were taking all their courses online. To mitigate the effects of these and other factors on the course during the Spring semester, I decided to contact all my students individually from time to time to ask about how they and their families were doing during the pandemic and to remind them to contact me if they cannot meet some deadlines in the course. I wanted my students to know that I was there to help them beyond the requirements of the course.


Kimberly Hale, PhD, CHAIR,
DIVISION OF SCIENCES AND
TECHNOLOGY; PROFESSOR
OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Being a science faculty the most challenging aspect of going completely online was labs! I had good time making videos of the various brain parts for neurobiology lab and also developing labeling sheets. However, for Introduction to Human Gross Anatomy I had to rely completely rely on videos posted by medical schools.


Eylsia Mahoney, MS,
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF SPORT MANAGEMENT
I have always taught a few classes online, so the concept itself wasn’t difficult. It was however challenging to keep in close contact with all students when we aren’t all on campus together. I have very close relationships with my students and have all their cell numbers, so I ended up calling everyone that didn’t log in for video meetings. It was important to me to check in on every student.