Across faculties, professors are approaching the new term in different ways to accommodate their teaching styles and course content as some students say they are fine with entirely in-person classes.
Engineering has warned students “not to expect recorded lectures to be made available,” but other faculties are allowing profs to decide how they deliver course content.
“In speaking with a lot of our first- and second-year instructors, they plan to use a lot of the recordings that they’ve made over the past,” said Dr. Paul Kennedy, the online education faculty mentor from the School of Kinesiology.
“The message we try to share with our students is, if you’re not well, don’t come to class. There will be materials available so that you don’t feel left behind,” he said. The faculty is encouraging in-person engagement, and the recordings will be a supplement in the face of sickness, not an alternative for students to join online, Kennedy added.
Dr. Jonathan Graves from UBC’s Vancouver School of Economics is extending access to lecture recordings to all his students.
“I’ve heard clearly from students that being able to go back and review, slow it down or replay is extremely valuable. And that’s really how I made that decision,” he said.
He said he continues to encourage his students to attend class in person and sees the lecture recordings as a supplemental resource for consolidating information.
In his opinion, it all comes down to the pedagogical context of the course and what activities are involved. He said that if he was teaching more discussion-oriented courses with sensitive topics — he predominantly teaches courses that involve statistics and mathematics — he would have made a different decision.
One professor with a discussion-based class is Dr. Kim Snowden from the Institute of Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice (GRSJ).
“My classes are all in-person with some online/hybrid activities and days built in to give multiple ways to engage and participate,” she wrote in an email statement to The Ubyssey. She explained that most GRSJ classes place a focus on discussion and in-class activities, content that doesn’t translate well to live-streaming or multi-access formats.
With the exception of Distance Education courses, Snowden explained that all GRSJ classes will be in person, without offering any multi-access courses with optional attendance.
Despite the variations in course delivery, students The Ubyssey spoke to said they were content with only having an in-person option.
Daiwik Shah, a second-year at Sauder and a representative from the Campus Ambassador Program, said he has found that Sauder classes are moving away from hybrid learning and lecture recording.
“Personally, not having recorded lectures makes me more focused in the class and prompts me to take notes,” he said.
Katrijn Bjornson, a fourth year in geological engineering, said she understood the engineering department’s decision to not have lecture recordings available.
She described her program as “the type of degree that requires more physical engagement than the average.”
In speaking with fellow engineering students, she has yet to hear any major frustrations about the disappearance of recordings. Similarly to Shah, she sees value in lecture recordings for study purposes. Still, she feels that engineering students much prefer to be in person.
“It’s good that people are happy to be back in person with the understanding of what expectations are of an engineering degree.”
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