New education design for universities using three years of pandemic experiences

Project introduction and background information

The 4TU are transforming programme and course designs geared towards flexible interdisciplinary educational ecosystems. 

Objective and expected outcomes

This project offers advice for that based on the research of all 4TU during three pandemic years. The results were gathered and discussed during the: "The Second webinar on the transition to online learning during the pandemic". The results of the previous project remain important. Here additional results are reported.

Results and learnings

The webinar provided quite some insight into the effects of Covid forced emergency remote teaching, the transition out of most limitations now, and how we should proceed in the future years. 

• Perry de Brok (WUR) started by reflecting on the results of the previous sessions as a basis for the research sessions:
• Uwe Mazat (TU/e) explained the use of Learning Analytics for examining changes in student learning due to the Corona transition and how learning analytics can be used in the future.
• Kazem Banihashem (WUR) presented the results of monitoring teachers and students in post-ERT times and explaining teachers' and students' preferences for Online/F2F education.
• Chris Rouwenhorst (TU Twente) showed their vision approach on how to move from ERT to optimizing the use of IT in education in the long term.
• Dereck Lomas (TU Delft) showed his multiple well-being check approaches, which indicated decreased well-being of students during ERT

Finally, Emiel van Puffelen (WUR) formulated the conclusions below using all the results, recent literature, and the paper: Covid-19 forced remote teaching and university education after it

Recommendations

During ERT

• Teachers experienced an increased workload but were motivated and felt able to teach online.
• The Well-being of students was low.
• Survey questions did not separate the general effects of the pandemic (like curfews, worries about health and relatives, and extreme online life) from the impact of online education. That should be taken into account when formulating conclusions.
• The ERT enabled education to go on, and that was appreciated. But students indicated a lack of connectedness and a strong desire for face-to-face education.

Education design for the years ahead (which is Post ERT, not Post Covid)

• Virus variants might cause new outbreaks; stay prepared for remote teaching. This requires focusing on well-being, a sense of connectedness of students and staff, and having online versions of courses available.
• Integrate the online courses made for ERT into the blended learning curriculum for less restricted times. Guidelines:
• Students differ in preferences towards online and Teaching and Learning Activities (TLA's) in general. A carefully designed mix of TLA's is needed to activate most students. It is not simply flipping one kind of TLA for another.
• The combination of synchronous and asynchronous TLA's need more design time than we had at the ERT beginning.
• Create (partial) online ERT alternatives for lab education, excursions and assessment.
• Continue in the direction of student-centered learning and flexible learning paths, but carefully! as this might cause a higher workload for teachers.
• Monitor change in learning; use the experience with learning analytics.
• Campus education remains essential and helps with a sense of connectedness.

Practical outcomes

In the discussion, the group concluded that we should study:

• Indications that after ERT, some students show up less at the university 
• Why do most lecturers advise not to go towards hybrid teaching