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On March 16, 2020 Wichita State University announced that faculty should prepare to shift all classes to remote learning for the remainder of the Spring 2020 term. To facilitate planning and preparation, the University extended spring break by one week so that it ran from March 23-April 6, giving instructors 21 days’ notice before the change and 14 full days of break-time to make the necessary changes.

Before the move to remote learning, Wichita State had a successful online presence defined by both online and hybrid classes and programs that were available to most students. Nevertheless, most classes were being offered in an in-person, face-to-face format. Moving to remote March 2020 meant moving thousands of classes and training hundreds of instructors in a few short weeks.

Adding to that, the Media Resources Center (MRC) and the Office on Online Learning (OOL) decided to invest in new technologies to support the decision. Zoom Pro and Respondus Lockdown Browser and Monitor were both deemed to be critical to remote delivery, and they needed to be acquired for the full University, and training needed to be developed and incorporated into the support program.

The bulk of the training and support necessary for all of this fell to the MRC which is the home Campus Media Services (CMS), the classroom support office, Instructional Design and Access (IDA), the online/hybrid and educational technology support office, and the Web Team, the campus web support office. The success of what came to be called the “Continuity of Instruction Program” was due to the efforts of these three teams in cooperation with MRC leadership, OOL as well as campus partners, especially those in the University Libraries and faculty from the Online Learning Faculty Fellows.

The overall “Continuity of Instruction” program was defined by:

  • Aggressive messaging through all available channels to instructors of any rank as well as on-campus student support personnel.
  • A focus on a “you can do this” tone
  • Comprehensive training that could enable instructors to maintain a feeling of ownership and freedom in their classes through the process of making choices about how to go forward
  • Coordinated training and support for both instructors and students

The “Remote Instructor” component of the Continuity of Instruction program was IDA’s first priority as any training development of the Remote Student component needed to correspond to the choices instructors were making in their classes.  IDA began working on the Remote Instructor pages in on March 16 and launched the program on March 22. The program consisted of:

  • A 10-step program designed to take an instructor from no knowledge about Blackboard, (the University’s LMS) Zoom, Panopto (the University’s video hosting platform), or online testing and help make them confident in their online course choices.
  • Each step of the program was delivered in two ways: one page with only written instructions, and one page with instructions with images. This choice was necessary because of the serious bandwidth problems many instructors had on their home networks.
  • Some program steps required video training, and these videos were created and incorporated into their relevant steps. The best example of these purpose-built videos is found in Step #2, Using Zoom, which had 10 support videos. This was necessary because Zoom Pro was largely a new tool at the University.
  • Two additional pages with troubleshooting tips and the names of active and alumni Online Faculty Fellows (faculty members with prior training and interest in online learning) who had agreed to mentor instructors.
  • The program also included sets of pages that lived outside the main 10-step program. The best example of these support pages are those IDA created to support Respondus Lockdown Browser, which was a new technology for the University. These pages were added in early April as they were not needed until the second phase of remote course development.
  • The program was also supported by supplemental training delivered in the University’s existing instruction-centered newsletter, Teaching Today. These supplements included:
    • March 8, 2020 issue, “Emergency Preparedness”
    • March 31, 2020 issue, “Maintain Community”
    • April 7, 2020 issue, “Computer Security”
    • April 18, 2020 issue, “Yes We Can”

After the Remote Instructor pages were completed, IDA shifted to the Remote Student component. After consulting with the Office of Online and Adult Learning, the Office of Student Success, Information Technology Services, which was providing Chromebooks and MiFi’s to students needing technologies, IDA decided on a 4-step program for students. This component of the program focused on:

  • Ensuring access to necessary technologies and technology training
  • Blackboard training
  • Supportive applications (eg: Zoom, Panopto, Blackboard Mobile) training
  • Advice on how to be successful as a remote student

And like the Remote Instructor component, the Remote Student training included supportive webpages and videos including:

  • 10 support videos covering how to use and master Zoom
  • An unboxing video to assist Chromebook training

Once the initial support for the move to remote learning was ensured through these two components of the Continuity of Instruction program, the team shifted to preparing to support a fully hybrid Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 terms.  The intent of this Hybrid Options component was to:

  • Increase instructors’ feeling of mastery and ownership of their classes, regardless of the delivery format
  • Assist instructors align hybrid delivery choices with course content demands by providing both examples and research-based advice
  • Provide the necessary training for instructors to implement their hybrid course choices
  • Ensure parity in quality and content between previous versions of courses and their hybrid equivalents

What resulted was a set of seven course delivery options a professor could choose for their Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 courses.  Options ranged from fully online to nearly fully in-person with synchronous and asynchronous choices. Each option received its own support pages that were aligned with previous training pages in the Continuity of Instruction program. This program was launched in May 2020 and is still in use on campus.

Metrics

The primary metrics we have available to us come from YouTube and Wichita State’s YouTube account.  The following statistics represent the dates 2/28/2020-8/31/2020, which were chosen to capture the time of the retreat to remote learning through the launch of the Fall semester:

  • Instructional Design and Access had 34,700+ views of support videos hosted in YouTube for a total of 1,200 hours of view time.
  • The Remote Instructor program main pages had over 10,000 page views on the University website.
  • The Hybrid Options program main pages had over 15,000 page views on the University website.
  • The additional webpages supporting both the Remote Instructor and Hybrid Options programs had over 45,000 page views on the University website
  • The Remote Student program had over 15,000 page views on the University website.
  • The additional webpages supporting the Remote Student program had over 20,000 page views on the University website.
  • Total page and video views for all programs across all platforms in this time period is in excess of 140,000.