Margaret Fitzgerald: I'm not sure if there's supposed to be a formal. Welcome to this session today, but let me take this opportunity to say thank you for sharing your NOON HOUR WITH ME.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And we'll go through some of the expectations related to high flex learning and coming back to campus in the fall. I'll make a few comments and then I'll open it up for questions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: These noon hour sessions are a response to questions we've been getting from campus in a variety of different areas and thought it would be a good opportunity to just, just to meet with people daily
Margaret Fitzgerald: On certain topics. People can attend if they'd like or or not attended. If not, and will continue to make these sessions available as we get closer to school starting. So can you see the PowerPoint slide that I put up on the screen.
Marc Wallman: Yes.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Thank you. Okay, I just put up a short of slide to guide my comments as we go through the materials. So the high flex course design model is
Margaret Fitzgerald: Based on components of hybrid learning and a flexible course structure that give students the option of attending sessions in the physical classroom or participating
Margaret Fitzgerald: In sessions online or the ability to do both. Depending on the day and of course that opportunity extends to our faculty as well. If, for example, they're vulnerable and don't want to be in the classroom. This this fall.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Usually when high flex models are described
Margaret Fitzgerald: Their accomplished through a combination of delivery methods that include face to face instruction or a traditional live in person classroom.
Margaret Fitzgerald: A synchronous or real time remote learning experience. So it would be a synchronous online course, for example, and also an asynchronous or
Margaret Fitzgerald: More independently timed course instruction that's taking place now you'll see I put asterisk by the face to face, and the synchronous learning
Margaret Fitzgerald: On my slide because those are the two areas that NDS you will focus on this fall, we heard repeatedly from our students.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Last spring and also through the summer that they really value the face to face experience. They want to be back on campus. They want to have real time interactions with faculty members and their fellow students and so
Margaret Fitzgerald: We want to make the face to face instruction available to them. And for those who are not able to be in the classroom. We also want to have the real time.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Synchronous option so they can be participating in that live classroom at that time. That's not to say faculty might not want to add an asynchronous online component to their courses, many faculty do that with their face to face courses already if they ever record lectures or
Margaret Fitzgerald: Provide problem sets to students that they can work on independently.
Margaret Fitzgerald: But we're not asking our faculty to do all three things for fall semester. So I think that's one area of confusion that faculty have run into. It's like, do I have to have face to face.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Synchronous online and asynchronous online this fall, and you really don't. What we want you to focus on is that live face to face experience with students.
Margaret Fitzgerald: High flex learning allows you to do lots of things with remote students that you can do live in the classroom. You can have small group exercises or activities you can have students collaborate on work that's going on in the classroom or in the remote site.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The, the important thing with the hybrid class is that you are tailoring the design of your course to those remote students as well as to those in the classroom. And so that's where the
Margaret Fitzgerald: The shift in our pedagogy happens if we're used to teaching face to face. We also have to think about. So how do I most effectively bring those remote students into the live classroom and and help them feel like they're a part of this system.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Hi flex is it's a conceptual framework. It's a design model. It's not a technology. So what we do is we use other resources that we have to support the high flex design so very commonly
Margaret Fitzgerald: People will do high flex using their institutions course management system for us that's Blackboard. So you might incorporate heavy use of Blackboard and to get that live stream component
Margaret Fitzgerald: You would use Blackboard Collaborate or you can use teams or zoom or other mechanisms to bring that real time experience.
Margaret Fitzgerald: As I understand the technology that's needed at the most basic level, and I will let mark and Christy chime in if if they want to.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Correct me or add more detail, but you need a camera video conferencing capabilities and then a way to interact with the students at a distance. And so, as part of the North Dakota cares act funding.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That is what our IDs division is putting into our classrooms on campus so that we will have the built in capacity to do high flex learning in our normal classroom environments.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And there are lots of options that you can do with with the technology. I just listed some
Margaret Fitzgerald: That I've seen some of our faculty using both last spring and preparing for summer.
Margaret Fitzgerald: You know, you can stream your lectures live, but you may choose to record them. So the students can play them back later. So that would be an asynchronous option for them. You're not required to do that. But that's, that's one thing that's fairly common that people do.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Some people also do asynchronous discussion boards or collaborative writing projects.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That takes place outside of the classroom. Again, not required to do that. This fall, but it, it provides some food for thought on how you might approach your class.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And the real goal behind a high flex class is to help make the remote students feel like an integral part of the class.
Margaret Fitzgerald: To try to pull them in and engage them just as you would with your face to face students in a normal classroom. And so it's that
Margaret Fitzgerald: As your teaching to be thinking about those people who are not in the classroom or sitting in front of you as you teach or if you're a teacher and remotely this fall. How are you going to engage with people that aren't in your immediate environment.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I say that as I'm desperately trying to watch for non verbal feedback amongst our participants today because as a as an instructor. That's what I'm used to. Following, you know, what are my students thinking, how are they reacting. What do I need to do differently and so on.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Ideally in a really well designed hi flex class, the technology, the course design the pedagogy and the engagement of the students all line up to have a really positive experience.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We hope you have those things in alignment in the fall, but teaching a high flicks courses like teaching any other course, whether it's a face to face course or an online course.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Usually the first time you teach it, you're still learning rolling things out trying things to get people's reactions. I've often heard it said that it takes about three course offerings to really get your class down
Margaret Fitzgerald: First time is is it's all new trial and error. Let's see how this goes by the second time you teach it. You're starting to kind of get into the groove and know how to make things work well.
Margaret Fitzgerald: By the third time you feel pretty comfortable. So that's probably going to happen this fall as well with if it's your first experience with high flex it's
Margaret Fitzgerald: You're going to be learning the students are going to be learning and you just have to be patient and kind of flexible as you as you're doing it.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Also in a in a high flex course ideally once it's all developed and working well. Students have multiple pathways to work through course content.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And it might be different for those who are alive or synchronous or asynchronous you maybe don't get to that or won't get to that point. This semester but it's it's a goal to be thinking about in the future, is how do you make the course as
Margaret Fitzgerald: Adaptable for students to be able to master the material in the way that they learn best. Like I said, you may not have that ready to go by fall, but it's something to keep in the back of your mind for the future. So, so that's my quick overview
Margaret Fitzgerald: But I'm happy to respond to your questions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Or discuss some of the things you're thinking about, if anybody wants to share some of their either the best practices that that you've learned about or that you're trying yourself. I would love to hear those be great to share some examples.
Marc Wallman: Margaret, you want a question from the chat. Sure. Okay. First one from Barclaycard is face to face mandated for faculty
Margaret Fitzgerald: Good question mark for most faculty. We would like there to be a face to face component of your class because our students have asked for that kind of interaction. They've been wanting that attention from their faculty
Margaret Fitzgerald: Last spring and over the summer. And so we're trying to do as much face to face or synchronous remote as we can. There may be some exceptions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Any class that it was typically scheduled to be asynchronous online is still scheduled to be a synchronous online or our campus has quite a few offerings that are exclusively
Margaret Fitzgerald: Taught that way or Todd in the fall that way.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Or if there is a special exemption for some reason a faculty member may be allowed to teach asynchronously.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Online, but those are evaluated on a case by case basis, the department had the dean and the provost talk about those situations. Does that cover up marker. Do you still have questions.
MMccourt: I've unmuted. Can you hear me.
MMccourt: Yep, yep. No, I'm just asking. Not for me.
MMccourt: I'm not teaching the fall. In any case, but
MMccourt: You know that I've heard from many people
MMccourt: You know, I'm a faculty senator and I keep in touch with my constituents, many of whom
MMccourt: Express some trepidation about
MMccourt: You know, wandering into to the
MMccourt: potentially dangerous.
MMccourt: Environments of many, many students
MMccourt: And and they're rightfully concerned.
MMccourt: About why, you know why they're being made to
MMccourt: Do this, when
MMccourt: It's
MMccourt: A very great risk to them.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Mark, they do have the ability to teach remotely.
MMccourt: Well, that's what I don't have to be. Yeah, they don't
MMccourt: Have to be face to face. Okay.
Margaret Fitzgerald: One film live in that classroom at the time the courses offered, but they don't have to be physically present one race. Yeah.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The answers my question. Okay. All right. Okay.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Next question.
Marc Wallman: We got one from another from the chat here if students from the other side of the world. We can't get the Fargo, but we'll begin their studies. How will they get courses, if not asynchronously.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And
Margaret Fitzgerald: That is a another good question and it, it's a little bit easier. Now, since some of the International restrictions have changed where students can start courses from abroad that are online, whether or not the university offers those courses online asynchronously as another question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Those students would also have the ability to participate remotely in the live synchronous classroom, but whether or not that works with the time differences.
Margaret Fitzgerald: You know, it might be that your courses offered in the middle of the night.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And so students would have to make that kind of choice, you know if if faculty are willing to adapt a course to provide an asynchronous option to accommodate a student who is abroad. I think that's very generous wouldn't stop you, but I also wouldn't tell you you have to do it either.
Shannon Ueker: I'm sorry, I just need to follow up. I'm sorry everyone if. How does, how do, how do my students go about finding out if the course will be offered asynchronously so that they don't have to get up with a 13 hour time change.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The courses that are scheduled now to be a synchronous are coded that way in the schedule. If you as a faculty member were opting to do that for a student who's abroad, I would say you can
Margaret Fitzgerald: work directly with them unless you're willing to do that for everyone who might want it that way, which is
Margaret Fitzgerald: Kind of, contrary to what we're trying to accomplish with the face to face experience on campus, but certainly understandable if an international grad student or undergrad student can't get into the US because of visa issues and whatnot.
Thank you. Yeah.
Carrie Anne Platt: Margaret. I have a question regarding procedures for faculty who may want to teach remotely in that live mode.
Carrie Anne Platt: Is there earlier you had mentioned that they would need to provide that information to their chair. So the information could be provided to students and there had also been
Carrie Anne Platt: Something about the remote work agreement. So I just want to make sure when I'm working with faculty, if they are in that position of not feeling safe going into the classroom, they're
Carrie Anne Platt: Definitely willing to teach live and answer students questions and do that engagement live, what steps should they specifically need to take. So everyone is on the same page, and we're able to keep things organized
And
Margaret Fitzgerald: Make sure I address all parts of that question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Slide. Excellent question. I just, I just want to make sure I get to all of it. So, earlier this summer.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Some of the academic advisors and faculty who advise students we're getting questions from students on
Margaret Fitzgerald: How will I know if my faculty is going to be in the classroom or teaching remotely and some of them had a preference, like I really want someone who's there in person. I learned best that way.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Can you tell me which classes to sign up for. And so I had asked the, the deans to submit information for their colleges on which of their faculty are planning to teach remotely this fall. So we'd be able to share that
Margaret Fitzgerald: That information with advisors, whether it's professional academic advisors or faculty who advise. It's not something that we plan to share with all students. It's something that if they want to know.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Is there Professor live or remote or how this is going to work, they can talk to their advisor about it.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We're learning a lot as we go through this pandemic and realize there wasn't a very easy way to merge the fall course schedule with the plans of our faculty and so
Margaret Fitzgerald: Mark Wolman and CC and his office have created this wonderful live integrated document where
Margaret Fitzgerald: You can, in real time, make updates for your department. So let's say somebody starts, face to face, but they have to quarantine and now they're going remote the department head can go in and and quickly change that spreadsheet to reflect that change.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And and Mark can add to this. If he wants.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We shared it with department heads at their meeting last week and showed them kind of what what it looked like. And what we needed to have them do at this point we had some missing information or some confusing information.
Margaret Fitzgerald: we piloted with a couple departments. I think communication was one of them to make sure it was working okay for for faculty and whatnot. And then
Margaret Fitzgerald: I believe Mark plans to circulate that document on August 7 this Friday that it'll be ready to share. So, that is how students can find out
Margaret Fitzgerald: If their faculty members teaching face to face remotely by going through an advisor to to acquire that information. What was another one of your questions.
Carrie Anne Platt: Karissa so I think, fundamentally, I'm asking what the procedure that someone who is planning to teach remotely should follow. So the first is to notify their department chair so that information is added to the right spreadsheet.
Carrie Anne Platt: The second question is, do they have to complete a remote work agreement through HR in order to do so.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Good question. I suggest you look at the remote work site.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Background material that's on the website, they really do a nice job of walking through who needs to submit that paperwork and who doesn't.
Margaret Fitzgerald: It is it is for faculty, staff, graduate students all employees of the university.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And what triggers the need for that work site remote document, as I understand it is that you are working remotely consecutively for 30 days. So normally
Margaret Fitzgerald: Faculty are pretty fluid in when they work on campus when they work at home when they work in other places because we all tend to gravitate to the space that we're most productive in
Margaret Fitzgerald: But when when it gets to be 30 consecutive days or more than you need to have that documentation on file with HR
Margaret Fitzgerald: And what I've seen with a lot of our faculty who are working remotely is
Margaret Fitzgerald: They may be working remotely from their office so they may be on campus, but they're just not wanting to go into the physical classroom.
Margaret Fitzgerald: In that regard, they would still be on campus, so they wouldn't have to fill out that kind of agreement we have several who are kind of going back and forth.
Margaret Fitzgerald: On campus off campus. They're coming in for some things, they're teaching remotely that would not trigger the 30 day
Margaret Fitzgerald: Consecutive timeline. But if you are planning to be like if somebody knows they're going to be teaching remotely and not coming to campus all semester should have that documentation on file.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Thank you, as I understand it, it's important for workers comp and other coverages at the university house that benefit the employer.
John Woolsey: Hey, Dr. Fitzgerald.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Good, yeah.
Margaret Fitzgerald: perfect person to respond.
John Woolsey: In really pat Hanson these approvals go through occur in your right and everything that you said, and next week, I believe, on Tuesday. We have one of these sessions where tats as well as Jennifer and myself will be talking about the telecommuting agreements and stuff like that.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Thank you.
kristi steinmann: Margaret.
kristi steinmann: We've got. I'm going to take over some of the chat moderation.
kristi steinmann: Marcus feed. So we've got a question about how do we document our Cures Act funding.
kristi steinmann: What do we need to do to a funding that was provided
Margaret Fitzgerald: Oh, great question. So the as part of the cares act funding we received a fairly significant amount of money to provide supports for salary stipends to adapt courses for high flex learning in the fall.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And so I am going to talk about a lot of different things related to those stipends because I've been getting a lot of questions lately.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Number one. People want to know when they're going to get paid. And that's an excellent question. The, the time period to start reporting work for most of our faculty
Margaret Fitzgerald: Is the August 1 to August 15th time period, which means the first payment would show up in your August 31 paycheck and
Margaret Fitzgerald: We have to do the payments over time. So they'll go from for most faculty, the end of August, till the end of December. So you'll get part of that stipend. The stipends are all $5,500 divided up through your pay checks.
Margaret Fitzgerald: There are some of our faculty who are paying them this additional war award gets a little more complicated, and particularly affects our faculty who have
Margaret Fitzgerald: 12 months salaries largely through grant funding. And so, Jody Dworkin in my office is going to be working individually with those departments and those faculty to figure out the best time to pay them.
Margaret Fitzgerald: You know, as far as we know right now they're still going to get their stipends, but we may have to stagger the timing to align with their effort reporting on their grant and whatnot so
Margaret Fitzgerald: Just be patient. This is a pretty heavy lift for God in our department to process all of those payments for people, but we anticipate that the first round of dollars will start coming into paychecks. On August 31 and if you're one of those folks who
Margaret Fitzgerald: Who were having a little more challenging figuring out how to pay you, you'll know what because we'll be trying to find out. Does your grant allow for overload. If you don't have overload. Is there a time period when you're
Margaret Fitzgerald: More available for payment and whatnot. So those are very unique situations.
Margaret Fitzgerald: There are there still cares money available for stipends, the vast majority of it has been used at this point.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We are trying to retain a little bit for new faculty who are starting on contract on August 16
Margaret Fitzgerald: We can't award them a stipend or pay them until they're on contract, but we know for many of them, they are going to be adapting their courses to high flex
Margaret Fitzgerald: And so, if possible, we'd like to extend this opportunity to them. And so I'll be asking. We have Dean's Council tomorrow I'll be asking the deans to tell me approximately how many faculty, they think
Margaret Fitzgerald: They'll have coming in and August who might be applying for the stipend. So we hopefully we'll be able to serve those new faculty as well there's well over 550 stipends, I'm not sure what the exact total is today. They've really
Margaret Fitzgerald: Stopped coming in as frequently, I think. Fourth of July weekend we had our peak of applications. And then it's gradually tapering off in terms of effort reporting I'm
Margaret Fitzgerald: Learning as I go. I thought that the final report due at the end of the semester would be adequate. So when I put out the applications. I asked for a one page or less summary of the work you've accomplished.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We have to be accountable for how we spend the cares money, it's very likely that we will be audited. So we are trying to be very, very careful.
Margaret Fitzgerald: With how we make those allocations and what the money is used for and have meticulous records that we can share with auditors when the time comes.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We also need to have a monthly effort report. So I've designed a very short call track survey. The instructions are far longer than the actual questions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That Melissa Lampl send out she'll do the first one in the middle of August around August 15 or so, where you just kind of tell me what you've done.
Margaret Fitzgerald: To adapt to high flex so far. So from the summer to the time you fill out the survey. What did you work on and it might be. I, I went to training.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Through it, so I sat in on Dr Beatty session about high flex pedagogy I revised my syllabus. So that's what you would report on that survey. That's the main question that I need to have the answer to is like how are you, accounting for
Margaret Fitzgerald: The award in that first block of time.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Some, some of our faculty maybe have gotten the whole course developed by now. And that's fine, but I'm anticipating most of our faculty will have a lot of things ready by the time classes start
Margaret Fitzgerald: And will continue to work on that classroom of semester because it seems like we're always tweaking improving revising
Margaret Fitzgerald: So that will go on. So you'll, you'll get that short little call truck survey once a month, again, the main question is kind of tell me what you've been working on.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I also put in a question about what's going well, or what are you most proud of, just because I want to hear.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Some of the creative ideas or the positive things that are coming out of this. I also have a question in there about what challenges or barriers are you running into
Margaret Fitzgerald: Because if you're having a problem that I can help with or get you the resources or support you need. I want to be able to do that too.
Margaret Fitzgerald: So they'll you'll have the sharp monthly reports. And then the final report again. It's just a one page or less.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I would suggest cutting and pasting from your monthly reports to the December report. And again, all of that tracking is for accountability on the part of the university that we used our money appropriately and accomplished great things with it.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That I had all your
Margaret Fitzgerald: Questions about the care statements.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That was the
kristi steinmann: Only one specifically related to that.
kristi steinmann: Okay, there are a lot of them here.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Is
kristi steinmann: Going back up to one quite a bit ago. And then I know marks been answering a few in the chat so
kristi steinmann: Don't get
kristi steinmann: Yours, either we might run out of time or marks trying to answer some of them if he can. This is when it doesn't look like was answered, what are the strategies to hold exams to maintain fairness.
Margaret Fitzgerald: There, there are a couple different ways you can approach, how you do examinations.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And I'll give you some very broad sweeping examples.
Margaret Fitzgerald: One thing that that faculty members sometimes do if they are not in face to face contact with all their students. Unable to proctor their exams, is to write an exam in a way that you know students
Margaret Fitzgerald: Are going to be looking at materials or resources and you give them permission to look up materials.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And then you write your questions in a way that the way they're able to answer that successful is they really know the material they might have some reference material that they pull in to help them do the questions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And I'll give you an example. When I was teaching online for the great plane interactive distance education Alliance, I had graduate students there.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Was some very fundamental knowledge that I wanted to make sure they knew before they finish that class.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And I know we don't often give multiple choice exams to our graduate students, but I would do short multiple choice exams.
Margaret Fitzgerald: For them with with the instructions that use your book, use your notes use whatever you resources you want. You just have to know this stuff. And so, you know, they would go through and do those, but then for their
Margaret Fitzgerald: Major evaluative assignments. I had them writing papers or doing projects or things that required this kind of integration of knowledge and resources.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That it would be very difficult to cheat on and again that's easier in a graduate class that's smaller than it would be in a very large undergraduate class.
Margaret Fitzgerald: But if you're teaching a large undergraduate class you, you can do that same approach of
Margaret Fitzgerald: Designing an instrument, where you know they're going to be able to check resources and and just make sure it taps into what you really want them to know we've had some discussion about getting the academic integrity software programs.
Margaret Fitzgerald: In Mark, I think, did you end up purchasing a license for one of them.
Marc Wallman: Know all our venues for money ran out. Oh.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Okay.
Marc Wallman: All right, good ask for additional
Marc Wallman: A supplement from cares funding because this some specific products came up with a request after we submitted our initial one
Marc Wallman: Additional supplement was denied. And we also tried to get it through the university system because he had some money for it. And that was also denied.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And I work on anything new at this point.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Okay. And I've heard mixed results on things like Exam Soft or some of the other programs about how effective they are. And if they're easy or difficult for students to
Margaret Fitzgerald: Use. I know a lot of you have expertise and how to test in the remote environment. If you would like to pitch in with your suggestions, maybe raise your hand and Christy can can call on you.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Anybody. Oh, Jill raised her hand kills Uber.
Jill Zuber: The one thing I found that useful is to
Jill Zuber: Once they access the assessment, the quiz test, they only have a certain amount of time to respond to all the questions and submit it.
Jill Zuber: If you can time it appropriately based on what has happened in a face to face classroom.
Jill Zuber: That's helpful that that will reduce the amount of time that they can just look through the textbook for information and have them rely on
Jill Zuber: More of what they actually know it may be like just referred to a few notes when responding also McGraw Hill. If you're using inclusive access this fall, they have already included in the inclusive access price for the student.
Jill Zuber: Some features for proc train like making sure there's only one screen used for
Jill Zuber: Looking at the questions and responding to them so that might be worth something.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Good suggestion. So thank you. Anybody else
koko: Think the the blackboard or Blackboard that in case you have this random blocks that we can create the Bank of questions.
koko: Hundred question and we asked that program to throw 10 question for each of students, students will have a different question. The mutation time cannot get back and forth between question to look at. So they have a time manner, and at the same time, they have a random question, it's not
koko: Copied to each individual students and this question, are all equal and can be equal to be fair and students will have randomly thing question could be good enough to
koko: Really test the basic knowledge or any as like I tested before it was great and students really focus on just responding to the question, not to search for answers.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Great, thank you.
Jeff Boyer: Barbara, I'm gonna make an addition to what's been shared already in that
Jeff Boyer: We often think of assessment as being equated with quizzes and tests, but that we have many other tools.
Jeff Boyer: That can also give us assessment information. And so I encourage faculty to consider assignments as their primary
Jeff Boyer: Assessment approach because assignments course tasks are often more aligned with the some of the activities that are that are a part of the discipline, so we we often think that we have to have exams. But that actually there's there's no law that we have
Jeff Boyer: Exams. There are there other ways that we can assess information and I would definitely encourage faculty to to do assignments. And in fact, I'm going to do a session at the
Jeff Boyer: Beginning of the year virtual conference on on good on good assignments and how they make for good assessment. So, so I definitely have adapted to talk with people about using assignments as an alternative to traditional exams.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Excellent. Thank you, Jeff.
Nancy Emerson: And the following up on what
Nancy Emerson: What Jeff said
Nancy Emerson: I think one of the things to keep in mind as students are just dealing with a lot of uncertainty and chaos right now is whether or, you know, do we really want to use a product during a live product during scenario through
Nancy Emerson: I think there are a couple of them out there. And I think you even has a life practicing and I've talked to a couple of students who are good students, but they're poor test takers. They have a lot of anxiety when they take tests.
Nancy Emerson: And when they sat at their computer and recognize that they were being watched, through the camera it heightened their anxiety.
Nancy Emerson: And it
Nancy Emerson: And they performed even poor on the exam. So I want a pony off of what Jeff said, just what are the other assessment options are there.
Nancy Emerson: And before we go to that, let's let's use the practicing and quote unquote have somebody watching our students for the versions of practicing that do that. Just think about maybe what the impact is on the student and all of our students.
Nancy Emerson: So that's my two cents.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Thank you. Now, it's very
william.wilson: Important. I have a question that will send I've asked this.
william.wilson: Every time I meet with somebody and there's no answer. So I want to teach synchronously, the size of my class exceeds the plan. We do size of the classroom.
william.wilson: So somebody has to be forced to take it online. You have any guidance on how I decide that or can I simply say, whoever shows up in the classroom first
Margaret Fitzgerald: And say you're saying
william.wilson: What it was this question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Yeah, you're going to have a face to face offering and then you're going to have a synchronous online offering at the same time.
Margaret Fitzgerald: There are a couple different ways to do it. You could
Margaret Fitzgerald: See who is self selects by finding out which of your students are planning to be face to face, which are planning to be remote
Margaret Fitzgerald: You could also
Margaret Fitzgerald: See if the registrar comes up with a bigger classroom for you by fall semester where you could get everyone in into a larger classroom and you wouldn't have to have as many students going
Margaret Fitzgerald: Remotely
Margaret Fitzgerald: But very Hall is challenging.
Margaret Fitzgerald: In that even if we find bigger rooms, they would probably be on the main campus and moving those students up to main campus throughout the day could be challenging. So you could also pull your students to see if they have a preference.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And see what you're looking at.
william.wilson: So let me give you the case that 100% say they want to be in the classroom.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Then we work really hard to try to find you enough space to accommodate that. And maybe you have two classrooms. Maybe you have you know 60 in one and 40 and the other. And one of those classrooms is real.
william.wilson: So in my case, I'm using a stylized lab, is it okay to just have a rotation.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Particularly in labs and studios. We're finding. We're going to have to do rotations okay because they can't all access the materials they need
william.wilson: I think giving guidance on that's
william.wilson: Useful because it's first time someone's answered the question.
william.wilson: Okay, I noticed, quite a few people have the same question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And and I think maybe the reason you're not getting or are others aren't getting clarity on that answer is because it's
Margaret Fitzgerald: A little bit challenging in that we've been planning for 75% capacity in our classrooms since last spring throughout the summer, North Dakota is still one
Margaret Fitzgerald: Level green, which allows 75% capacity or 65% and auditoriums and in that regard, we were able to find spaces for nearly all of our classes to accommodate
Margaret Fitzgerald: The social distancing in the space recently we've decided it's probably in our best interest to look at 50% capacity.
Margaret Fitzgerald: In case the pandemic worsens in our region. It's easier to figure it out. Now then, later. And that makes it a lot more challenging to use our existing classroom spaces and accommodate all our students. So we are
Margaret Fitzgerald: Adding additional classrooms faces. We're using several of the larger rooms in the Union, and some other interesting faces on campus.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That will be adapted with technology and allow us to to spread out as we need to. And then as we move, you know,
Margaret Fitzgerald: If we move Stevens all classes into festival concert hall, for example, that opens up a nice big space in in Stevens so OR gate city auditorium. So, so we're still working on those things.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The register is down to having spaces for everything except 106 courses which considering the number of courses we offer in the fall is is pretty darn impressive that we've gotten it down to those
Margaret Fitzgerald: That smaller number of bottlenecks and now we're figuring out what to do with those particular courses. And so if you get a wishy washy answer for me, it's because I don't really know yet. We're trying to figure it out and we're getting awfully close to being able to
Margaret Fitzgerald: release a new fall schedule we we didn't want to have to move days or times on courses because the vast majority of our students have already registered
Margaret Fitzgerald: And so to unregistered them and re register them to go later in the day or on different classes would be a nightmare. So we've been largely trying to accommodate our needs through space to try to keep them in their existing class schedule.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Moving forward.
kristi steinmann: Margaret, we've got a number of questions on sanitizing
kristi steinmann: Between classes in the classroom and common areas. I don't know if that's a question you want to take or if you want to defer that to another session.
Margaret Fitzgerald: But I think Mike ellingson is probably the best person to answer that. And his, his session might be tomorrow at noon.
kristi steinmann: Is is tomorrow and then Mike boars is on Friday night.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, they, they are more informed than I am, with regard to the sanitation and disinfecting and whatnot.
Margaret Fitzgerald: As I understand it, every classroom will not be cleaned in between every class. We simply don't have the
Margaret Fitzgerald: Capacity to do that, but there will be disinfectant and wife's available in all spaces and we will encourage people to disinfect their own space so that
Margaret Fitzgerald: Students can wipe down their deaths or their chairs are there allowed stations faculty can wipe down the instructor podium.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The one thing we know, though, is that if you are teaching in a room that has a Plexiglas screen.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Please don't use normal disinfectant on that plexiglass because it will damage the finish. So they're trying to find an alternative cleaner that you can use on the Plexiglas.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think Mark commented in the chat that we are trying to get individual microphones for every faculty member, so you'll have your own microphone, you won't have to share
Margaret Fitzgerald: It is is spent a lot of time over summer trying to figure out how to keep keyboards and mice sanitized everything from the ones that you waive over them to disinfect which we've learned, take a really long time to work to
Margaret Fitzgerald: Sleeves that we could put on lab or keyboards, it may come down to the fact that you may walk into your classroom and find a box of disposable gloves that you should put on before you use the keyboard or the mouse, because that is about the cheapest and most effective way.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That we were looking at
Margaret Fitzgerald: Phone haha
Marc Wallman: That's what we're looking at now because I don't think we can. We were denied this request for the keyboard sleeves.
Marc Wallman: So honestly, nothing, we're going to do is going to be washing your hands.
Marc Wallman: So,
Marc Wallman: Please do that too. And they are putting sanitizing stations around
Marc Wallman: All over the place so there should be a lot more access to a quick hand sanitizer.
Marc Wallman: And one of the things were a lot of mass questions in here and
Marc Wallman: Wait for
Marc Wallman: This Friday. You said Christie.
Marc Wallman: Yeah, probably. I don't know how much time we want to spend on that, but he can answer some of those questions.
Marc Wallman: And maybe from a student disciplinary perspective or astroland might be the person on that. I don't know how much time you want to take on it here.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Or not, Margaret.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Um, well, we'll see what other questions.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We have I can get into it if we need to. That seems to be what's on a lot of people's mind. The other thing I'm hearing a lot about
Margaret Fitzgerald: From faculty is air quality in our classrooms and labs and how safe is it and Mike ellingson is going to be able to talk about that with you during his session are the air, the air quality in our classrooms is surprisingly higher than are better than you might expect.
Margaret Fitzgerald: So I feel pretty good about that, but they've also got some plans to do some
Margaret Fitzgerald: Ionization to air quality. Yeah, let's, let's just look like talk about that.
kristi steinmann: Margaret. There were also a number of questions on if faculty will be notified if students test positive. Is that another one you want.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That is a better question for Laura. Oh, sir, all on to respond to and they're working on written materials to inform campus about that.
Margaret Fitzgerald: You know, so that's in process we you know that's it's a fine line between letting people know there's an active case in your classroom versus releasing personal healthcare information. So there, there will be a process in place for notification.
kristi steinmann: There's a question on assigned seating and if there are seating charts for the room. Do you need to document it. Yes.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We would like faculty to keep seating charts in their classrooms, so that if the state health department needs to do contact tracing we're able to assist them and letting know
Margaret Fitzgerald: Who has been in proximity to someone who has been diagnosed as positive
Margaret Fitzgerald: We have a
Margaret Fitzgerald: I'm laughing because I thought I would send this this email out two weeks ago and I still haven't sent it because so many questions keep coming up whenever we talk about seating charts. So
Margaret Fitzgerald: We do have floor plans that have all the seating laid out in our classrooms, as they're currently set up.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Facilities is going to be doing a lot of adaptation between now and the start of classes, though, to modify those environments so
Margaret Fitzgerald: In some classrooms. For example, the classrooms in the STEM building they've gone in and remove chairs and tables to get down to a 50% capacity with proper social distancing and
Margaret Fitzgerald: The university is ordered seat covers for the auditoriums that you know you you can't sit in a in a chair that has a covering.
Margaret Fitzgerald: So that's an example from one building with the labs in the STEM building, they're going to take chairs out but they're not going to approach it all the lab stations, but those faces will be social distance
Margaret Fitzgerald: In the ballroom for has another example. And yes, we are probably going to be using the ballroom in the Memorial Union as a classroom this fall.
Margaret Fitzgerald: In order to get the number of people into that ballroom and space them out, we're probably going to have to use the desks with arms gel. Know what I mean when I talk about the deaths with arms and
Margaret Fitzgerald: They will likely be placed far enough apart so that if the room was full, you might have proper social distancing
Margaret Fitzgerald: But if you have a smaller class, you might have to follow stickers with who sits where or it's actually easier. The smaller it is to space. Everybody else so so
Margaret Fitzgerald: That's another example of how classrooms will be dealt with. We have so many different sizes and configurations and seating options in our classroom.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That it doesn't work to say, Okay, we're going to put a sticker on every third chair or we're going to do this, that, or the other. It really depends on the classroom but facilities is putting a lot of time into figuring that out.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We hope to have those seating charts adapted for you by the beginning of the semester. So you can take attendance that way. But even if you have to take attendance on the
Margaret Fitzgerald: Full seating chart. I think you'll be able to do it. We just ask that your students set in the same place every class period so that we can contact race. Does that make any sense. You follow what I'm saying.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Okay.
Jill Lodde Greives: Can I just ask how many students. I said, the response, nevermind.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I'm sorry, what
Jill Lodde Greives: Mark Waldman is already answered my question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Okay, thank you.
david.hopkins: Excuse me manage my question, Dr. Fitzgerald regarding labs. I normally do field trips. I'm canceling them because I'm not going to get in the van with 15 kids and drive 40 miles one way to go look at wonderful soils.
david.hopkins: On the campus. Can I have kids drive their own cars here we're talking about a safety thing.
david.hopkins: You know,
david.hopkins: It's very serious. So I don't know if I'm allowed to ask students to drive to a part of the campus that's on the you know contiguous grounds UP BY THE AIRPORT AND 19th. Yeah.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think it would be good to work with the Safety Office on that. I do believe there are ways that students can drive their personal vehicles, but
Margaret Fitzgerald: I would want to make sure that it is done appropriately. So I would say, contact the Safety Office on how to do that.
david.hopkins: That's fine, and it would just be one trip, most likely, but it's a it's an experience that they would want and then we'll just get a microphone. A big microphone like a sports a sports coach with
Margaret Fitzgerald: sports coach, I'm
david.hopkins: A megaphone
Margaret Fitzgerald: Thank you. And I am going to put a plug in for for geosciences and David, I think they might be talking with you to about sale sciences, they can't do their, their normal field trip out to Western North Dakota to look at land formations. So they're
Margaret Fitzgerald: Purchasing A giga pants system that helps to photographs of rock formations and make them much more realistic to what they would look like in the normal environment so they
Margaret Fitzgerald: You know they're they're trying to find creative ways to accomplish that type of experience for the students by using technology. And I was actually over in
Margaret Fitzgerald: It was over in the soils lab with Frank Casey, the other day, and we're talking about with this work for soil science to so and i don't know cuz I don't know enough about it but they might be talking with you about that too. Thanks.
kristi steinmann: We had some questions about
kristi steinmann: lab courses that may not be able to be hi flex
kristi steinmann: Is their guidance on components of experiential learning where social distance is difficult to maintain and
kristi steinmann: Do we know like which classes will not be offered as high flex
Margaret Fitzgerald: The departments have control over how they offer those lab courses and whether they'll be available high flex or not and so
Margaret Fitzgerald: I would say that if you're in a department that offers lab classes and you're not really sure how they're going to be delivered you might want to visit with your department head and figure out what the plan is. And I know in in some departments.
Margaret Fitzgerald: It's still being figured out
Margaret Fitzgerald: I know biology has quite a few lab sessions to figure out yet chemistry would like to add additional lab sections to meet the demands for students in
Margaret Fitzgerald: A couple of their labs, but they need to find qualified instructors to do it. And so some of those things are still being worked out.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I and I, I'm sorry that I'm being so vague, but I'm not really sure.
Margaret Fitzgerald: What I can tell you about adapting a specific kind of lab, other than we will probably have to rotate students in our lab spaces because most of them aren't big enough to
Margaret Fitzgerald: Accommodate a full size class and most of them are set up in very unique spaces.
Margaret Fitzgerald: The stem building as you would imagine is probably the easiest building to get more students into safely because many of those rooms are just so very large
Margaret Fitzgerald: But in some of our other buildings there so very small
Carrie Anne Platt: One thing I would make a plug for in regard to these questions about experiential learning or labs, we're seeing them performing arts in our college is
Carrie Anne Platt: If you can set up forums or meetings with different departments that are facing this challenge. You can often get some good ideas from what others are
Carrie Anne Platt: Are doing so the training is really fantastic. And thank you to it for doing that.
Carrie Anne Platt: I'm just learning a lot from my fellow faculty when they say. So this is how I'm going to try and do that. So if you're like in college leadership and can set up something where people can exchange ideas. It could be really helpful right now.
Margaret Fitzgerald: That's a great idea. Carry on. You know, just exchanging ideas on best practices with your colleagues is very helpful.
Margaret Fitzgerald: And we can sure try to do things at the university level, but you can get it done much more quickly and much more effectively for all of you have virtual coffee with some of your colleagues from across campus.
kristi steinmann: In a question on if there are resources available for students who are working remote and have a poor or unreliable internet connection.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think I'm going to have to defer to it s on that one.
Marc Wallman: So the numbers. Fortunately, we believe are very small.
Marc Wallman: When everybody went home in March students access the Dean of Students Office kind of work to survey students, and it was
Marc Wallman: 90 over 98% had very had Internet connections that were adequate for doing remote work the place where we had the most problems worse North Central Minnesota. So if students
Marc Wallman: Are from there. There's not a whole lot we can do about it. If they're in a rural area because it's just a lack of providers.
Marc Wallman: If they're in the area here, they will at least have access to it. So I think the numbers are small. And I think that that's kind of the Dean of Students Office would work the same.
Marc Wallman: With the with the students. Same is true of devices if they don't have access to buy good device over 99% had access to a good device. So it's a smaller problem than I would have expected before this all happened.
Mark Harvey: My question here.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Yep. Hi, Mark.
Mark Harvey: Hi I'm several people have asked on the chat about the whole mass question.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Hey,
Mark Harvey: I know that you know you've said in the university and said that students will be required.
Mark Harvey: This is silver and so on and so on. However, it's going to be up to each of us individually that's instructors to enforce that.
Mark Harvey: So I don't even know if this is a question for you alone. It's really a question for everybody, but I would like to know how we're going to enforce this
Mark Harvey: And how we're expected to enforce it. So you know someone on the chat. Definitely library systems are going in the library that taking off the masks.
Mark Harvey: So, you know, it seems pretty obvious. We're going to have an enforcement issue problem challenge. And I'm wondering what people are thinking about this.
Margaret Fitzgerald: When it comes to classrooms and this is this is my personal take on it when it comes to classrooms, your students are expected to wear face coverings during the class.
Margaret Fitzgerald: We're trying to get messaging out to campus and to students before they return that that is the expectation on our campus and we
Margaret Fitzgerald: Hope that they will abide by it. But when it's your particular classroom on a given day, and you have to call the shots on what's going to happen.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I would encourage you to, you know, put it in your syllabus and remind your students that they should have a face covering on every day. Talk about why it's important to try to protect the community probably seen that protect the herd to campaign that we've launched recently.
Margaret Fitzgerald: But in terms of classroom management. If you have a belligerent student who's not going to settle down and who is refusing to wear their face coverings. I would ask that student to leave the premises, because they are being disruptive.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I suspect most of our students will be compliant and de su students tend to be fairly well behaved in general, and I would anticipate, they would leave the environment.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Someone asked me on another open forum if if they don't leave the environment. Can you just cancel the class and I would say yes, you have the prerogative to do that.
Margaret Fitzgerald: However, it makes me kind of sad to think that 99% of the students who comply get punished because one person doesn't cooperate so I would try other strategies first
Margaret Fitzgerald: Before i would i would dismiss the class. If you have repeat offenders. You are to contact the Dean of Students Casey Peterson and his office will assist if it's a faculty member who is not complying. You can contact their Dean. If it's a staff member, you can work with HR
Margaret Fitzgerald: I
Margaret Fitzgerald: I have a lot of faith in our community. And I think that when people come back and see that face coverings are very prevalent on campus. Everybody's wearing them if you see somebody who's not you should say hey you should get a face mask i i i think people will comply
Margaret Fitzgerald: I don't know, Mark. Does that help, or
Mark Harvey: It does. Thank you know
koko: Maybe general question. We work in indoor preparation. I don't know if anyone bring this question or this thoughts before to have some spots outdoor is spots.
koko: On campus so we can help our door pluses for small groups. It was all these kind of like outdoor is a good open environment and
koko: Or seminars talking classes for a small group. It could be a good opportunity if we designate a few spots around that beautiful canvas was the landscape to sit this as students will enjoy it. Actually, we did it in our architecture Downtown. Downtown is very limited.
koko: But after the big canvas have a lot of interesting lens if to sit up spots designated spots for us to help small classes. So I'm not sure if somebody bring this, but I would like to see your ideas.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think that would be a good topic to bring up with facilities, because they oversee those outdoor spaces. I could easily see taking a small class to the babbling brook
Margaret Fitzgerald: And meeting there, it would be a lovely environment.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think a lot of the music ensembles are practicing outside when it's nice. I believe I heard john Miller say concert Choir is probably going to be outside when it's nice and just because they can spread out and you know cuz was singing that's particularly
Margaret Fitzgerald: Challenging with Colvin
Margaret Fitzgerald: I remember in elementary school if we got to go side for a class that was like the highlight of the day.
Margaret Fitzgerald: College students might feel the same way.
koko: Absolutely. I believe the students like to get out from enclosed environment and get some kind of be please from fresh air and
koko: That's that's
koko: You know, an old building on the main campus like alien Hall. We used to have a behind that in a whole an open space. We used to have small classes to get out them set them this kind of spot.
koko: Between residents. It is big spots between the residence hall. It's a very nice landscape to be used for a small groups gathering or small classes, especially seminars. If you don't need blackboard or projectors, or any of these it's better to get outside. Now, that's my
greta.gramig: It's
Margaret Fitzgerald: Just one more comment thanks to Kimberly wall and I've started doing walk and talk meetings with Jeff Boyer and Mike Kessler, and the different people on campus that I work with.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Spend a lot of time over in the horticulture gardens actually having our meetings and it's a great way to get out, get some exercise, get some fresh air and see
Margaret Fitzgerald: Parts of campuses. So I highly encourage you to think about walk and talk meetings or visiting outside. I'm sorry, I interrupted somebody who had started talking
greta.gramig: Oh, I just wanted to ask a follow up to that because in my class. I'm thinking about doing walks outside, but I wouldn't have access to Wi Fi or the internet so I wouldn't be able to provide that experience synchronously.
greta.gramig: However, I could possibly record those sessions and have it available asynchronously. Is that acceptable.
Margaret Fitzgerald: I think we should talk to facilities about the extent to which we can start moving courses outside before I answer.
Margaret Fitzgerald: How we're going to do the pedagogy portion of it. I honestly don't know enough about the spaces on campus where we could be taking classes and and how we prevent like seven classes from showing up at the babbling brook at one o'clock on Wednesday. So it's a
Margaret Fitzgerald: Whole lot now on for a while.
Marc Wallman: That my book is the only place with official outdoor Wi Fi. There's a lot of bleed from buildings, but so like if you want to go outside and stream. So, apart from the facilities issue. If you want to stream a class from out there, depending on where you go, you may have some challenges.
Marc Wallman: And we're looking at this, I brought this up to my staff. We're going to see what we can do to get some other spaces because even if it's not going to use for classes.
Marc Wallman: We're probably going to have students that might prefer to study outside rather than indoors. So we're doing what we can on that.
koko: Mark, you're right, because most of the dorm is like to two students in a room is very combative to spend hours in that dorm rooms. So it's good to provide more
koko: Internet access to the outdoor spaces around the residential sparks that students can really get out and outside spending more hours outside the building is much more appreciated hearing this kind of fall semester, just very, very combative rooms and and spaces very tight.
koko: Because I'm a tech. So I'm a designer I understand outside is a space.
koko: But this kind of condition, we need to provide more outdoor opportunities for students to study or
koko: Enjoy.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Um, with that said, I have no eight minutes late for my one o'clock meeting. So if we could wrap this up for today. I appreciate your taking time to visit.
Margaret Fitzgerald: Very much like to know what questions and concerns that you have, so that we can
Margaret Fitzgerald: Address them and try to figure things out. I know the next couple weeks are going to go really really quickly, but I'm confident that we'll have lots of things in place by the time classes start
Margaret Fitzgerald: And you'll be getting more information through the next few weeks. So thanks everyone. Take care.