{"id":30,"date":"2020-03-18T06:29:04","date_gmt":"2020-03-18T13:29:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/?p=30"},"modified":"2020-07-03T06:05:26","modified_gmt":"2020-07-03T13:05:26","slug":"march-18-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/2020\/03\/18\/march-18-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"The Great Pivot"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>As our response to the COVID 19 situation evolves, we plan to send out regular email communications using the Arts distribution list.\u202fIn addition to communicating critical administrative decisions, and helping faculty stay apprised of the latest and most up-to-date information, we also want to use these communications as opportunities to share some of the stories, insights, solutions, and conundrums we have heard about from faculty as we have endeavored to support them in making the shift to online instructional modes. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we hope these communications will strengthen our collective sense of efficacy, capacity, and connection during this time of social distancing.&nbsp;<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Asynchronous Online Teaching:&nbsp;<\/strong>If you are feeling overwhelmed by learning new software or struggling with technical difficulties,&nbsp;Teaching and Learning has suggested that faculty in this situation do not need to use real-time video because it may not be the best option for students anyway. While the desire to see your students face-to-face via video is understandable, this may not be a pedagogical necessity. Asynchronous can be more flexible, which is what everyone needs right now. In this mode, you could post materials at set times, and have set follow-up times in which students submit responses and questions.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Big Blue Button  (BBB):\u202f<\/strong>\u202fOn Monday, we emailed a list of suggestions for using BBB.\u202f Since then, we\u2019ve received additional suggestions from individual faculty members that we would like to share.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Tracey Kinney (History) shared that BBB does not function well with&nbsp;Safari, but&nbsp;works smoothly with Chrome.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Tracy Sherlock (Journalism Communications) shared that BBB worked perfectly when she began by using a text chat (with all students on mute). She didn&#8217;t use the camera, only her voice. She uploaded her slides and let everyone ask questions via the text messaging function, and the exchange went smoothly with no technical issues.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Ellen Pond (Policy Studies) also shared&nbsp;several&nbsp;strategies: like Tracy Sherlock, Ellen made sure that everyone who was not speaking was on mute. She also placed a lot of &#8220;discussion&#8221; slides so that students could use the whiteboard or public chat questions and comments. Ellen generally advises to go slow and refer to students using emojis (\u201cthumbs up\u201d or \u201chappy\u201d) to see whether they are ready to move forward to the next topic.&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Microsoft Teams:<\/strong>\u202fA number of&nbsp;departments have been set-up on the Microsoft Teams platform. Others are in the process of doing so. We are encouraging departments to transition to this platform *<em>when they are ready and when they feel they need it<\/em>*. We recognize that too much tech up-take all at once is overwhelming and counter-productive. Moodle proficiency should take a higher priority if you are endeavoring to become proficient on a platform.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>The main page in Teams can be used like an old-style bulletin board with the advantage of being able to supply links and files.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Teams interfaces easily with SharePoint so that already existing resources can be easily accessed from Teams.&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Office of the Registrar (OREG):&nbsp;<\/strong>Last night, Zena Mitchell sent an update that KPU has extended the Voluntary Withdrawal deadline for the Spring term&nbsp;to April 9:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>This takes effect immediately. Banner has been updated so that students are able to withdraw online until April 9 for full-term sections, and until the last day of classes for the non-standard parts of term.&nbsp;<\/li><li>The&nbsp;Dates and Deadlines&nbsp;have been updated&nbsp;<\/li><li>The \u202f2019-20 Calendar&nbsp;has been updated&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li><li>OREG will be posting a notification in ONE.KPU&nbsp;<\/li><li>OREG will be emailing students on Wednesday to let them know&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Faculty Reviews:<\/strong>\u202f&nbsp;A number of&nbsp;probationary faculty (especially those who had scheduled classroom visits by faculty peer-reviewers and\/or Associate Deans) have been inquiring about the review process.\u202fGiven the shift to online delivery, previously scheduled in-person classroom visits are canceled.\u202fFaculty reviews are on hold for the moment, and we will have more information to share in the coming days.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Search:<\/strong>\u202fAll upcoming interviews are shifting to Skype for Business and Microsoft Teams (as a back-up) so they can be conducted remotely. The Associate Deans will be reaching out to all Search Committees during this process.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Arts General Meeting:<\/strong>\u202fThe Faculty of Arts general meeting had been tentatively scheduled to take place on May 6<sup>th<\/sup>.\u202f We are discussing alternative formats for this event, and we will be in touch in the coming weeks.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Finally, we would like to express how grateful we are to all of you for being so supportive with each other and KPU students.\u202f We appreciate how stressful it has been to transition to online delivery with very little notice, and we will continue to support all of Arts as we face the many challenges of these extraordinary circumstances.<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>With much appreciation,<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Diane, Wade, Greg, and Shelley<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p class=\"post-excerpt\">As our response to the COVID 19 situation evolves, we plan to send out regular email communications using the Arts&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":285,"featured_media":302,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[54,7,50,58,26,51,52,53,55,57],"class_list":["post-30","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-weekly-updates","tag-agm","tag-asynchronous-teaching","tag-bbb","tag-ellen-pond","tag-microsoft-teams","tag-oreg","tag-reviews","tag-search","tag-sharepoint","tag-tracy-sherlock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/285"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1875,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions\/1875"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/arts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}