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Second verse, same as the first: little bit louder, little bit worse. Or maybe it's just me—even though we've opened up a bit, teaching in the time of Covid, Year 2, is wearying. And it's definitely wearying for our students as well.
I was surprised to realize, as my students participated in their introductory discussion posts this semester, that many of them have never set foot on any of SCCC's campuses. What strange times we are teaching in, and what strange times our students are learning in.
Our enrollment numbers underscore that as well. I was hired at Suffolk in fall 2005, and I can remember our enrollment numbers climbing from about 18,000 to over 28,000 in the wake of the 2008 recession. Finding classrooms for all the students at the Grant campus was challenging, and we began to offer 6:30 a.m. classes, among other strategies, to accommodate all our learners.
This year, we have the opposite problem. We have dropped from the 25,000 students denoted in the 2020-22 College Catalog to about 16,000 students this semester. More than ever, each student is important, both in terms of our individual classes and in terms of the college as a whole.
As online instructors, what can we do to encourage student persistence (what the student does to continue their studies) and student retention (what the institution does to move students closer to graduation)? One of the most important things we as faculty can do is to ensure that each student feels part of a learning community. We set the tone in our classes, whether on campus or online, and there are several techniques we can incorporate—even now, in the middle of the semester—to make students feel like our courses are a community of learners rather than just individual studies.
One of the best articles on creating community in an online class is Melissa Wehler's Faculty Focus piece "Five Ways to Build Community in Online Classrooms." In it, Wehler lists five methods of creating community, any of which would be easy to incorporate into an online class at any point in the course. Take a look at these methods, which I’ve parsed below with commentary about how these methods have worked in my own courses, and evaluate which ones will work for you.
- Make yourself available.
In essence, this means making yourself a person to your students, someone who has a face and a life outside of the strictures of the course. Post a picture of yourself on Blackboard. Introduce yourself on the opening discussion board. Post your office hours and make a weekly announcement of opportunities to engage with you. Let students know when you'll be marking their work—and if that changes, as it often does, let them know.
Instead of text announcements, make video announcements. And add something interesting about yourself in those announcements. For instance, every week I provide a video overview to the next module, explaining what students need to accomplish in detail and in that video I reveal something about myself—such as the novel I'm reading or the show I'm watching, and invite my students to write what the're reading or watching on their class preparation for nominal extra credit. The more students feel connected to you as their instructor, the more accessible you seem, and the greater the likelihood of persistence for students.
- Create a communication plan.
How will you use the announcement board in your course? Planning regular weekly updates leads to predictability for your students. Be consistent with the days you regularly post. And when will you send individual emails (through Blackboard) to your students? When they're slacking off? To encourage them? To offer extra assistance right before major assignments? Look at your syllabus and decide at the outset how and when you will regularly communicate. Of course, you may need to have communications outside of this as well if something unpredictable emerges. Consistency leads to familiarity and ease for students.
- Encourage interaction.
Plan for students to engage with each other. This can be (but doesn’t have to be) a graded group project. Many of us use traditional discussion boards. I often point out via announcements when a student discussion has gone especially well and offer nominal extra credit for outstanding discussion threads. In one of my classes, I've helped students form a study group, at the students' request. That's gone well and next semester I plan to offer that from the outset.
Some courses lend themselves to group notes via a wiki or a sharable Google Docs. And while difficult to implement on the fly, student presentations using video like Vimeo or Flipgrid can generate a lot of interaction. One technique that combines instructor presence and student interaction in offering themed office hours via Zoom. This themed office hour can be in advance of a major assignment or as a way of addressing common problems students are having. Advertise it and give nominal extra credit for attending, and students will come.
- Build outside-of-class spaces.
Wehler makes the case that much community building in an on-campus course happens as students are coming into the classroom and as they leave. There is nothing quite like that in our online course websites, but we can build non-classroom related discussion boards, so that students can engage with us and with each other about things other than the course material.
My sense is that students might be reluctant to start conversation there and that, for the first few weeks, the instructor might create a discussion thread and encourage students to engage. A dedicated social media page—say, an Instagram account where students could post memes related to the course or post pictures related to class content—can also serve the same sort of function.
- Bring the outside in.
By this, Wehler means to remind students that they, and we, are part of a larger community. Regularly post announcements about the larger campus and college. Invite students to attend campus and college events that are helpful to them: transfer fairs, scholarship meetings, theater performances. Perhaps make these sorts of regular announcements part of your communication plan.
If there is news material pertinent to your course, post it to connect your course content to the larger world. For instance, for my History of Religion Course, I regularly post Religion News Service’s weekly updates, about news of religions from around the world. Don't just blindly post, however; personalize each of these types of announcements so that your students understand how they're connected to the class.
Can you and I solve the student persistence and the student retention crisis that SCCC—and really most of higher education—faces two years into Covid? No, not by ourselves. But you and I can work to make our students feel more connected to us and to the courses we teach. And in doing so, we are making a difference.
I want to know: What has worked for YOU in terms of creating a community online? Email me at murphk@fascc.org. |
