Above, Biology Professor Ron Coleman discusses his approach to, and the challenges of, teaching in a virtual environment. (Sacramento State/Rob Neep)

By Cynthia Hubert and Dixie Reid 

Despite campus disruptions amid concerns about the coronavirus, Sacramento State students continue to pursue their degrees.

With the mid-March shutdown of face-to-face instruction, they are listening to lectures, participating in labs and completing assignments in creative new ways as faculty move their curricula to strictly online formats.

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“I’m sure students are facing a lot of anxiety and stress, so I’ve tried to pivot online in a way that maintains enough rigor, but adds some additional flexibility,” said Jesse Catlin, an associate professor of Marketing.

The campus provides access to a wide variety of software to support online course delivery, including Canvas, Zoom and Camtasia, he said.

Going online

Faculty members are using the resources in numerous ways. Many, including Catlin, are recording lectures of class material and making them available online. 

“I’m not going to be winning any Academy Awards for these videos, but I think they get the job done, given the limited time and circumstances,” Catlin said

Kimberly Mulligan, an assistant professor of Biology, and other Sac State faculty have mae significant adjustments in their teaching approach. (Sacramento State/Rob Neep)

Before the virus upended campus operations, Ron Coleman, a Biological Sciences professor, conducted his lectures on a whiteboard in real time.

“It makes the class into a conversation,” he said of the traditional approach. “I try to gauge understanding by asking questions of students and responding to their questions and input.”

Now he delivers his lectures to a classroom – empty except for the students he visualizes as an attentive audience – and videotapes them.

“Sometimes I even pretend that students respond to my questions,” Coleman said. He then transfers the videos to a website where students can access them.

Doing it live 

Some professors are using Zoom software to talk to students in real time.

Anna Patterson, an assistant professor of Geography, has tutored fellow faculty members on how best to use Zoom and other technology to teach. 

“We’ve worked on covering student feedback” such as hand raising during online lectures, and on ways students can share screens with their professors to get help and feedback.

Patterson held a practice Zoom session with her students during class before courses moved online, she said. 

“The students seem to be adjusting well,” she said. “I’ve tried to be very transparent and have them involved in the process of restructuring the syllabus and gauging their anxiety.

“I think the students seeing that I have numerous backup plans in place in case any combination of technologies goes down is also helping alleviate their anxiety.”

Backup technologies include Discord, Twitch, Slack, YouTube Live, and Facebook Live, she said.

Dispensing advice 

Traditional office hours and advising sessions also have changed. Some faculty members have individual telephone or FaceTime calls with students for up to 30 minutes at a time. Others schedule group Zoom advising sessions. 

“I wanted to hear their voices, but some of our students are not set up for Zoom, so I decided to do it by phone,” said Cheryl Osborne, professor and Department of Gerontology chair. “It’s more personal when it’s not a group. It’s just me and the student.”

Kimberly Mulligan, an assistant professor of Biology, said far fewer students seem to be seeking advising help now that her regular office is closed. 

Of 64 students in her undergraduate class, only a handful have visited her online during her “office hours” on Zoom this week, she said.

“Usually I have anywhere from six to 12 students visit during an office hour, so this is a significant decrease,” she said. “Because of my lack of interaction, I don’t feel like I have a sense of how my undergrads are adapting. I do know that some students are really struggling with a sense of loss and miss their Sac State community.”

Graduate student Chloe Welch said that switching to virtual studies “has gone pretty smooth for me,” despite minor hiccups. Lecture components have been an easier transition than labs, which typically demand mastering techniques and hands-on work, Welch said. 

Overall, “I feel that despite everything and under these concerning, confusing, and rapidly evolving circumstances, I am still getting the most out of my classes because my professors have really gone above and beyond to adapt,” she said.  

Virtual testing

Tests have gone fully virtual, and some professors have employed innovative techniques to administer them. 

For an anatomy test, Paolo Taboga, assistant professor of Kinesiology and director of the Biomechanics Laboratory, took photos from multiple angles of plastic models and linked each set with their relative test question. “We will see how the test goes this week,” he said.

More challenges

Labs, internships and “service learning” in the community have proven to be more difficult to duplicate online.

Mulligan had to shut down her research lab, which uses fruit flies in the study of the origins of brain diseases including autism. Gerontology students who previously worked with elderly patients on projects designed to improve their daily lives now are improvising with videos that they then share with care homes and assisted-living centers, Osborne said.

In other cases, including in the Department of Geography, faculty members are simplifying their labs, considering how to teach certain concepts using online tools such as Google Earth and ArcGIS, Patterson said.

“It’s all a matter of ‘adapt and overcome’ this semester,” Patterson said. 

Ethnic Studies Professor Timothy Fong said he has had mixed reactions from students about the transition to virtual education and online interactions.

“The most common theme is wanting to get into some sort of routine,” Fong said. 

In the meantime, faculty members are trying to help students cope with the new order.

“Nothing can take the place of in-person interaction, but we are doing the best we can and trying to be resilient in the face of challenge,” Mulligan said. “That’s all you can do, right?”

Undergraduate Nivene Hojeij, like Welch, one of Mulligan's students, said she was concerned at first about the transition. 

“I was overcome with stress,” she said.  “As someone who loves face-to-face interactions and bugging my professors during class and office hours, I was afraid of losing those connections and the motivation to learn.”

She is trying to maintain as much normalcy as possible, engaging in many of the same habits and routines she had while she was on campus. The approach seems to be succeeding, Hojeij said, crediting her professors for keeping students engaged and motivated. 

“I wake up at 8:30 a.m. and prepare to watch Cell and Molecular Biology lectures that I typically would have been on campus for at 9 a.m.,” she said. “I attend my online classes until 6 p.m., as I normally would on campus.” She writes down daily tasks to accomplish, and dedicates the same amount of time to studying and assignments as she did before campus closures. 

“Attending classes in my pajamas and wrapped up in a blanket hasn’t been as bad as I predicted,” Hojeij said.