This advice in The Chronicle of Higher Education deserves a quick read by any instructor who has just moved seated classes to online classes.

"The Coronavirus Has Pushed Courses Online. Professors Are Trying Hard to Keep Up."

"Barrett-Fox issued a call to instructors everywhere: Ditch the fancy technology and intensive demands on students. Don’t rely on real-time-video classes or proctored exams. Don’t assume your students understand, or have access to, the latest technologies. And remember that students’ and professors’ increased responsibilities with work and family mean it’s not realistic to expect the remote-learning transition to be seamless, let alone pleasant.

"Keep it simple. Tell your students you care. Those two messages have been echoed and amplified across higher education in recent days, as professors, teaching-center directors, deans, technology specialists, and others have wrestled with what it takes to move millions of faculty members and students out of classrooms and onto the internet."

Read the full article here:
https://www.chronicle.com/article/The-Coronavirus-Has-Pushed/248299?key=4hnbV5pI8DX5eMPXF6nV_YLrQhkrcFn8VfVyP3pQGkPBYGx03EPJ2EWtCAVFv1AobDF3a3ZZNGIweHQzVEg5Qnplb2owQXVvaWZ3UnJrVWIzRzVxMnZkYWtKbw
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​#onlineeducation #pedagogy #coronavirus #highereducation

This is a link to a March 26 article in The Chronicle of Higher education with simple ideas to help students who are struggling to learn online. Having taught online since 2014, I still found this article helpful.

How to Help Struggling Students Succeed Online

https://www.chronicle.com/article/How-to-Help-Struggling/248325

#onlinelearning #pedagogy #strugglingstudents #highereducation #uncasheville #universityatbuffalo #daemencollege

This article about privacy issues with Zoom meetings is from Consumer Reports.​

Zoom Calls Aren't as Private as You May Think. Here's What You Should Know. 
Consumer Reports

"Videos and notes can be used by companies and hosts. Here are some tips to protect yourself."

Link to article - https://www.consumerreports.org/video-conferencing-services/zoom-teleconferencing-privacy-concerns/

"And most of the people on Zoom calls probably don’t realize how much information a host can gather. Depending on what tier of service—from a free option to advanced levels for big companies—a host can make a recording of the conference, have it transcribed automatically, and share the information later with people who aren't in the meeting."

If you teach online using Zoom, you should take a few minutes to read this article. These issues are especially important with respect to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). These are the privacy regulations with which teachers must comply.

Advice from Consumer Reports for Zoom meetings:

"CR's experts have some advice for enhancing your privacy while using Zoom. First, keep your camera and mic turned off unless you're actually speaking. If you feel that you need to have the camera turned on, Zoom lets you choose a photo as the background for your video. You can pick one from your hard drive or use one supplied by Zoom.
"That can be important because the books on the shelf, posters, or other items in your living space can reveal information that you might not want to share with some of your co-workers or clients. And those images of your bedroom may not disappear when the conference is over; they can be stored for months or even years, and shared with people you've never met."
#zoom #zoomprivacy #onlineclasse #onlinepedagogy #ferpa #studentprivacy

This article is from Ad Age, published on March 27, 2020.

Who watches the watchers?

Businesses and schools are relying on teleconferencing options like Zoom, and brands are releasing playful backgrounds so self-isolating workers can turn playrooms into sunny beaches. But questions are being raised about the tech company’s privacy protections—or lack thereof. Zoom reserves the right to store users’ personal data, including the recordings of video calls, instant messages and files sent through the program, according to research by Consumer Reports.

The Zoom app for iOS also sends personal data to Facebook, even if users don’t have Facebook accounts. “The Zoom app notifies Facebook when the user opens the app, details on the user's device such as the model, the time zone and city they are connecting from, which phone carrier they are using, and a unique advertiser identifier created by the user's device which companies can use to target a user with advertisements,” reports Motherboard.

The question is, will privacy concerns fall to the wayside as consumers become more concerned by their own health and safety?

Starting today - March 27,2020 - I will be posting about online learning in this blog section. I have taught online since 2014. This semester, I have been teaching a fully online Master's-level course for Daemen College all semester. Starting this week, I converted three undergraduate seated course to fully online for UNC Asheville, where I am a Visiting Lecturer of Strategy.

Come back frequently please. I will post what I think are useful articles related to online teaching pedagogy.

#onlinelearning #onlinepedagogy #teachingonline #daemencollege #uncashveille

The Vice Provost for Academic Affairs at the University at Buffalo (State University of New York) just announced the option for students to convert from A-F grades to Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory (S/U). The details for doing this went out in an email to students and faculty.

This is a verbatim excerpt from a longer and more detailed email, but covering the conversion to S/U for undergraduates (separate information for graduate students).

From SUNY University at Buffalo Email:

We have also made a number of changes to satisfactory/unsatisfactory (S/U) grading policy:  

• The deadline for students to elect this option is extended through the last day of the spring 2020 examinations.
• Spring 2020 courses graded S/U are excluded from the maximum 25 percent of S/U credits allowed towards a degree.

For undergraduate students:

Courses taken for S/U grades during spring 2020 will count towards UB Curriculum general education requirements, major requirements and electives.

• Some degree programs may require you to recover letter grades in major courses and pre-requisites in the future. To date these include Nursing, Accounting, Occupational Therapy and Physical Therapy. 

Undergraduate students may find information on how to Request an S/U Grade on the Office of the Registrar website at: https://registrar.buffalo.edu/forms/su-grade.php

#universityatbuffalo #suny #stateuniversityofnewyork #ub #grading #highereducation

My observation: The Wuhan Coronavirus and its Covid-19 illness are creating a watershed moment in how people meet, conduct business, and learn. I doubt we will return fully to prior behaviors after this settles.

Breaking News (from The Buffalo News)

"All state university campuses will shut down on March 19 to try to reduce density levels of students who could spread the novel coronavirus among people on and off college grounds.

"The remaining weeks of the spring semester for the 64-campus State University of New York will be offered through online course work, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo said Wednesday afternoon.

"'That will be a way to reduce density and that’s a good thing,' Cuomo said.

"The order will also affect the City University of New York system."

https://buffalonews.com/2020/03/11/all-suny-cuny-schools-shifting-to-online-learning-to-combat-coronavirus/

#covid-19 #coronavirus #education #businessmeetings #travel #socialchange #onlinelearning #elearning