Reflections on Pivoting to Online Learning: Ariel Jagusztyn

“We always knew it was there, but somehow, working online has amplified it, crystalized it: no colleagues or students would be left behind.”

Online learning comes with a unique set of challenges, which are doubtless exacerbated when we live, work, and study during a time of global uncertainty. The realities become even more problematic when internet and data — both paramount for learning online — aren’t always stable. As a member of the academic leadership team at Davis College and Akilah, I have experienced these challenges first hand over the past year. However, I have also witnessed students and faculty coming together in a spirit of collaboration, innovation, and experimentation during this time, which has made us even stronger as a community of learners and educators.

In Rwanda, we saw a series of pandemic-related, country-wide lockdowns last year. Now in 2021, we find ourselves yet again in the middle of another lockdown which has brought face-to-face classroom instruction (having re-started in October 2020) back to the online world. This change happened overnight. This time, however, we were ready for it. Everything we had learned from the struggles we faced in 2020 to move online and support our students in that modality was put to use. Over the past year, our faculty have been trained in the design, development, and delivery of online courses, which were modified, restructured, and prepped for online learning. We now have a model and experience from our remote learning period to inform this new online wave.

Amid all of this tangible preparation, there were countless intangible benefits that also arose. Student agency — a must for online learning — has increased, and our faculty, students, and academic team have all evolved our mindsets to focus on growth, resilience and innovation. For instance, there was recently an issue with Canvas (our learning management system), which meant that students were unable to access their coursework. When this happened our faculty feverishly collaborated to identify possible causes and solutions, which led to the problem being swiftly solved by our IT team. The faculty’s persistence in trying to figure out what went wrong and their willingness to support one another was inspiring. We always knew it was there, but somehow, working online has amplified it, crystalized it: no colleagues or students would be left behind.

Throughout the pivot to online, I have been in awe of how our faculty have embraced the new ways of working and have remained curious so that their own professional growth can continue. Our upcoming Trimester 1 professional development is focused on making the most of live, virtual sessions with students and engaging them outside of the classroom. These two themes are areas in which we can continue to learn and grow. Our Director of Faculty Development and Quality Assurance is working with faculty to assess what is going on in their digital classrooms and what’s working or not, to inform the next phase of training and development.

It’s one thing to learn about and train on online learning best practices, but it’s another to adapt or modify those practices based on the needs and realities of our students. And that is exactly what we’re doing: working to customize, innovate, and build meaningful classroom practices for the short- and long-term. This will allow instructors to see what other faculty are doing, share their classroom space in an open environment, and consider how to apply those strategies across the college.

I am not going to sugarcoat it: having to move from face-to-face classes to online learning is not easy. But seeing the entire Davis College and Akilah academic team in action, from those who deliver and take courses to those who oversee academic operations, has shown me that we were not only ready for the move, but we are ready for whatever comes next.

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Our team of dedicated faculty are looking forward to welcoming the next classes of Davis College and Akilah students — apply now to join our July 2021 intake! https://www.daviscollege.com/apply