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1. Where’s My Whiteboard? The Challenge of Moving Active-learning Mathematics Classes Online

   Nelson, Jill K. ; Rosenberg, Jessica ; Fernandez, Kathryn ; Shank, Julie ( July 2021 , 2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference)

   null (Ed.)

   This research paper studies the challenges that mathematics faculty and graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) faced when moving active and collaborative calculus courses from in-person to virtual instruction. As part of a larger pedagogical change project (described below), the math department at a public Research-1 university began transitioning pre-calculus and calculus courses to an active and collaborative learning (ACL) format in Fall 2019. The change began with the introduction of collaborative worksheets in recitations which were led by GTAs and supported by undergraduate learning assistants (LAs). Students recitation periods collaboratively solving the worksheet problems on whiteboards. When COVID-19 forced the rapid transition to online teaching, these ACL efforts faced an array of challenges. Faculty and GTA reflections on the changes to teaching and learning provide insight into how instructional staff can be supported in implementing ACL across various modes of instruction. The calculus teaching change efforts discussed in this paper are part of an NSF-supported project that aims to make ACL the default method of instruction in highly enrolled gateway STEM courses across the institution. The theoretical framework for the project builds on existing work on grassroots change in higher education (Kezar and Lester, 2011) to study the effect of communities of practice on changing teaching culture. The project uses course-based communities of practice (Wenger, 1999) that include instructors, GTAs, and LAs working together to design and enact teaching change in the targeted courses alongside ongoing professional development for GTAs and LAs. Six faculty and five GTAs involved in the teaching change effort in mathematics were interviewed after the Spring 2020 semester ended. Interview questions focused on faculty and GTA experiences implementing active learning after the rapid transition to online teaching. A grounded coding scheme was used to identify common themes in the challenges faced by instructors and GTAs as they moved online and in the impacts of technology, LA support, and the department community of practice on the move to online teaching. Technology, including both access and capabilities, emerged as a common barrier to student engagement. A particular barrier was students’ reluctance to share video or participate orally in sessions that were being recorded, making group work more difficult than it had been in a physical classroom. In addition, most students lacked access to a tablet for freehand writing, presenting a significant hurdle for sharing mathematical notation when physical whiteboards were no longer an option. These challenges point to the importance of incorporating flexibility in active learning implementation and in the professional development that supports teaching changes toward active learning, since what is conceived for a collaborative physical classroom may be implemented in a much different environment. The full paper will present a detailed analysis of the data to better understand how faculty and GTA experiences in the transition to online delivery can inform planning and professional development as the larger institutional change effort moves forward both in mathematics and in other STEM fields. 

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2. Work in Progress: Faculty Perceptions of STEM Student and Faculty Experiences during the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Fall 2020 Qualitative study.

   Lamssali, Mehdi ; Ferguson, Alesia ; Nicholas, Olivia ; Ofori-Boadu, Andrea ; White, Angela ( August 2022 , ASEE annual conference exposition)

   Miller, Eva (Ed.)

   COVID-19 is a continuing global pandemic causing significant changes and modifications in the ways we teach and learn here in the U.S as well as around the world. Most universities, faculty members, and students modified their learning system by incorporating significant online or mixed learning methods/modes to reduce in person contact time and to reduce the spread of the virus. Universities, faculty and students were challenged as they adapted to new learning modules, strategies and approaches. This adaption started in the Spring of 2020 and has continued to date through the Spring of 2022. The main objective of this project was to investigate faculty perception of STEM student experiences and behavior during the Fall 2020 semester as compared to the Spring 2020 semester as COVID-19 impacts were prolonged. Through a qualitative methodology of zoom interviews administered to 32 STEM faculty members across six U.S. Universities nationwide and a theming scheme, the opinion and narratives of these faculty members were garnered in a round one and round two sets of interviews, in Summer 2020 and then in Spring 2021 (following the semesters of interest). Some of the main new themes that were detected in faculty interviews during the Fall 2020 semester and which reflect faculty perceptions are represented as follow: COVID-19 impact on student and faculty motivation, COVID-19 impacts on labs and experiential learning, COVID-19 impact on mental health, COVID-19 impact on STEM students' involvement in STEM experiential learning opportunities and research. Other previous themes detected and which are revisited to analyze major differences with those themes obtained during the Spring 2020 are presented and not limited to: extra efforts from professors, student cheating behavior, cheating factors and prevention, student behavioral and performance changes, student struggles and challenges, University response and efforts to the COVID-19 pandemic. We explored the differences in these themes between the semesters to look at noticed adaptations and modifications. Presented will also be recommendations to improve student and faculty motivation along with strategies to enhance the student learning experience during the COVID-19 pandemic. We report on common findings and suggest future strategies. 

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3. The concerns and perceived challenges students faced when traditional in-person engineering courses suddenly transitioned to remote learning

   Yu, Fan ; Milord, Johanna ; Orton, Sarah L. ; Flores, Lisa. Y. ; & Marra, Rose. M. ( June 2022 , 2022 ASEE Annual Conference)

   This research evaluates the impact of switching college engineering courses from in-person instruction to emergency remote learning among engineering students at a university in the Midwest. The study aimed to answer the question: What were the concerns and perceived challenges students faced when traditional in-person engineering courses suddenly transitioned to remote learning? The goal of this study is to uncover the challenges students were facing in engineering online courses and to understand students’ concerns. Our findings can help improve teaching instruction to provide students with previously unavailable educational assistance for online engineering courses. We collected online survey responses during weeks 8 and 9 of the academic semester, shortly after the COVID-19 shutdown and emergency transition to remote learning in Spring 2020. The survey included two open-ended questions which inquired about students’ feedback about moving the class online, and one two-item scale which assessed students’ confidence in online engineering learning. Data analysis for the open-ended questions was guided by the theoretical framework - Social Cognitive Career Theory [1] that explores how context, person factors and social cognitions contribute to career goals, interests and actions. A phenomenological approach [2] was conducted to understand the experience of these students. Open coding and axial coding [2] methods were used to create initial categories then themes related to students' concerns and challenges. Data from the two-item scale was evaluated using descriptive statistics: means, standard deviations, and ranges. Four main themes with separate sub-categories emerged from the student responses: 1) Instructor’s ability to teach course online (Instructional limitations, Seeking help, Increased Workload), 2) Student’s ability to learn online (Time Management, Lower engagement and motivation, Harder to absorb material, Hard to focus, Worry about performance), 3) Difficulties outside of class (Technology issues), and 4) No concerns. Students seemed more concerned about their ability to learn the material (48% of responses) than the instructor’s ability to teach the material (36% of responses). The instructional limitations or lack of instructional support (22% of responses) and time management (12% of responses) were among the major concerns in the sub-categories. The results from two-item scale indicated participants' s confidence in their ability to master their classroom knowledge was at an intermediate level via online instruction (6/10), and participants' confidence in the instructor's ability to teach knowledge in online classes is moderate to high (7/10). The results align with the open-ended question response in which students were somewhat more concerned about their ability to learn than the instructor’s ability to teach. The themes and analysis will be a valuable tool to help institutions and instructors improve student learning experiences. 

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4. Strategies to Address Changes in Social Supports during the COVID-19 Pandemic

   Johnston, A. C. ; Douglas, K. A. ; Martin, J. P. ; Short, T. ( June 2021 , American Society for Engineering Education 2021 Annual Conference and Exposition)

   The pandemic of COVID-19 is disrupting engineering education globally, at all levels of education.While distance education is nothing new, the pandemic of COVID-19 forced instructors to rapidly move their courses online whether or not they had ever received prior training in online education. In particular, there is very little literature to guide instructors in supporting students in online engineering design or project-based courses. The purpose of this research is to examine engineering students’ report of social support in their project and design-based courses at a large research university during the move to online instruction due to COVID-19in the Spring 2020 semester and to provide recommendations for instructors teaching these types of courses online in the future.Our study is framed by social constructivism and social capital theory.We surveyed undergraduate engineering and engineering technology students(n=235) across undergraduate levels during the final week of the Spring 2019 semester.Survey questions included open-ended prompts about social supports and overall experience with the transition to online learning as well as name and resource generator questions focused on specific people and types of interactions that changed during the pandemic. We used qualitative content analysis of the open-ended responses along with comparisons of the name and resource generator to develop recommendations for instructors.Recommendations to increase students’ social supports include:facilitating informal conversations between students and between students and the instructional team, grouping students located in the same time zones in teams, facilitating co-working sessions for students, establishing weekly structure, and utilizing some synchronous components (e.g., virtual office hours). 

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5. Online and on-campus transfer students experienced different impacts from the pandemic

   https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2023.1067380  

   Ardissone, Alexandria N. ; Galindo, Sebastian ; Triplett, Eric W. ; Drew, Jennifer C. ( February 2023 , Frontiers in Education)

   The COVID-19 pandemic caused extensive disruption to higher education, highlighting the negative impacts of emergency shift to online instruction. As a result, advantages of intentionally designed, online programs in higher education were overshadowed during the pandemic. Furthermore, socioeconomic disparities were exacerbated during the pandemic which extended to STEM undergraduate transfer students, who are more likely to be low-income, from historically underrepresented groups, older, and first generation in their family to attend college. To better understand the impact of the pandemic on STEM undergraduates, including those in an intentionally designed online program, ordinal regression analysis of 352 student survey respondents enrolled in a life sciences major at a large, R1 institution in the United States spring 2020 through fall 2021 was performed. Three student types are compared: on-campus, first-time in college (FTIC); on-campus transfer (OC-TR); and online transfer (ONL-TR) students. The latter group receives all course delivery online, whereas on-campus student groups received predominately in-person course delivery prior to the pandemic. ONL-TR students were over six times less likely to report negative educational impact compared to on-campus students, FTIC and OC-TR, while controlling for parent education, income, gender, race/ethnicity, and GPA. Additional survey items further explored this result and were validated with academic records and thematic analysis of students’ text responses. A pre−/post-pandemic comparison revealed that students maintained a similar course load and GPA, despite increased perceptions of a lower GPA during the pandemic. OC-TR students were over two times more likely to express increased concern related to delayed graduation and higher frequency of feeling stress compared to FTIC and ONL-TR students. Meanwhile, low-income students were more likely to report stressors due to the pandemic’s impact on daily life, independent of student type. Taken together, students in this intentionally designed online program were more resilient to the educational and emotional impacts of the pandemic compared to on-campus students. The differences between student groups warn against generalization of student impacts and suggest further research into the positive role of online learning, not just for delivery of educational content and expanding access, but for academic and emotional stability for different student populations. 

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