This is the first installment of a three-part series on how Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College has been able to pivot to the opportunities presented during the transitions of both learning and working in these pandemic times.
Part 1 – The Tech Team
By Karen Dyer, vice president for advancement and strategic initiatives
Moving to an all online learning platform for students of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College in response to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis meant transitioning overnight from hands-on learning in such areas as science and nursing labs, art studios, the music Conservatory and the horse barn.
“With a strong foundation in online learning and nearly 50 years of distance education experience, the College was able to pivot pretty seamlessly to an online-only platform with much intentionality and grace,” said Dottie King, Ph.D., President of the College.
The College moved all students to an online format on March 18, after canceling only two days of classes to prepare. With eight weeks of instruction left in the semester to complete fully online, the College’s IT team has put in long hours to make sure faculty have what they need to deliver courses and that student success is the top priority.
“We have successfully transitioned all of our classes 100% online with levels of robust support that are so much more than video chats and emails,” said Frankie Enochs ‘93, executive director of IT at the College. “Even classes and services that you would think, ‘how could you possibly do this online,’ we’re doing virtually.”
With a rich history of online delivery, Enochs said that the College already had a strong pedagogy on which to build, allowing the institution to re-platform nearly instantaneously.
Over the course of the last few weeks, faculty and staff have been able to focus on the human aspects of the transition and learning situations that required special attention and in some cases, exceptions, looking at specific student needs and determining solutions to best support them.
“We’ve looked at the unique requirements for compliancy and regulatory and how can we help, researching and adopting new technologies to address exceptions. We’re not just delivering 90% of everything online. We’re delivering all programs and in a manner that allows students to have an engaging, interactive, valuable and measurable experience,” said Enochs.
Junior elementary education major, Emma Taylor, from Greencastle says that she is handling the new learning format pretty well. “It was a rocky start due to getting used to things… transitioning to online and not seeing my friends. My professors have been very patient, understanding and supporting, allotting extra time for assignment completion. With a lot of understanding from both my parents and professors, I was able to transition easily,” Taylor reported.
King added, “Keeping our students, faculty and staff safe is our first priority. After that, providing continuity for our students to continue to learn and be supported in this challenging, emotional and difficult environment in the best way possible is paramount.”
What does support from IT look like when you have to move your entire College online overnight?
According to Enochs, it involves daily check-ins with faculty to help assess and meet their needs as well as researching new ways of doing things such as providing HIPPA compliant solutions for student clinical sessions for music and art therapy and other creative solutions that offer a high-touch element which is a hallmark of the traditional campus student experience.
As the College moved faculty and staff to remote workstations, Enoch’s team insured the daily business of the College would not be interrupted.
IT tested Microsoft Teams for use by departments for virtual meetings and document sharing and transitioned the entire campus over the course of a week to OneDrive so that files would be more easily accessible from the cloud. All faculty and staff were provided the tools they needed to work from home, including in some cases, hot spots for wireless connectivity for those with no broadband.
The Admissions team has had to be creative too, and this week utilized live stream equipment from athletics, typically employed to live-stream games, to host a live campus tour for prospective students who cannot visit campus. They have also planned a virtual registration event for the week of April 20-24, featuring components such as a virtual parent panel and online financial aid chat sessions for students planning to begin classes in the Fall of 2020.
The College was able to help the community recently as well, playing host to an educational debrief and information sharing session for the West Central Indiana healthcare industry.
“We are grateful to be able to do something to support the community by providing a technology platform to help share and disseminate vital information in our healthcare industry during the crisis,” added King.
At the end of the day, Enochs said that the College has invested wisely in technologies for both student data management and learning management systems, lifting and shifting faculty and students into the online environment that did not require the College to waste time reengineering processes, allowing learning to move forward without disruption. “We’re proud of our faculty, students and staff and the nimbleness with which they have adopted this new normal. They are eagerly adapting, assimilating and integrating new technologies into their learning and teaching environments at an unprecedented rate,” Enochs noted.
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