Return to university

[SouthCoastShell]

I've just watched all of Boris's announcement and he doesn't mention when students can return to university. Does anyone know when students are allowed to return?

What is the answer they want to hear????

@Nettleskeins

What is the answer they want to hear????

I can only speak for my university but we are keen to get back to normal as soon as possible.

It's concerning that so much online is affecting the education they are getting. Online with people you don't know affects the ability to discuss. debate, share ideas which is all part of a university education.

Also the lack of practical skills in this cohort. I know science students being taught lab skills by video, med student learning dissection by video, art students who have no access to all the resources in the school of art.
These students really need in person teaching in their universities next year to consolidate their skills otherwise they will not have the level of education previous years have had.

I asked my DD - 2nd year doing a social science- what she felt about how she has been learning this year and whether she felt she had lost out in any respect. She said she preferred the online lectures as she could side and rewind if she didn’t quite follow something or to look something up to aid her understanding. Her course has had some face to face seminars this year but for the online ones her tutors have encouraged cameras in and they have been well attended so she feels she has seen other faces and communicated with them in a nearly normal way. And as she pointed out all the reading for essays and projects is a solo activity anyway - yes she might have gone to the library instead of her room, and that may have created some social interaction but she doesn’t feel it’s been that much different. Her main extra curricular activity has been “meeting” and rehearsing online and hope to be able to perform in late May in the campus theatre.

So all in all it hasn’t been that different and generally a positive experience

Dd went back in March for face to face teaching, art course.

I’m a lecturer and we’ve asked our students which they prefer and the majority have overwhelming said they prefer online to face to face.

I wonder whether the response from students is / would be different, depending on the level of 'commuter' students? Don't Scottish universities generally have a higher proportion of students remaining at home whilst studying anyway? So for those students, going to university is a sort of 'one stage process'. For those who have moved, sometimes a considerable distance, for university, the only reason that they are (would be) in the geographical location is to attend university, so one might expect them to be rather less keen on the idea of prolonging a system which then retricts access to the physical entity they have moved to attend.

Mine has been back a few weeks but he's on a practical course, they've been given priority at the moment. Hardly seems worth the others going back for a couple of months.

@MarchingFrogs but it’s the being away from home aspect which is one of the main positives - certainly amongst the 2nd years I know of who had the opportunity to have at least half a normal freshers year and so are now living with people they know and like. That’s why so many have returned to their rented houses even though learning is online - they can still get the house share fun experience, a bit of independence etc which will only improve as things start to open up in the next few months

@BackforGood

I wonder why unis have said social distancing in sept when BJ had said June 21 for it to be over?

Well, I don't know about you, but I'd trust the scientists in our Universities judgement over any politician when it comes to forecasting possible / probable trajectory or how a virus might behave.
100x more with Boris Johnson's track record on not listening to scientific advisors over the time he has been Prime Minister,

Ha! I don’t trust BJ at all. But the road map is happening based on many peoples input.

Do I trust all uni decisions? Sadly not. They are heavily unionised and many individuals prefer working at home. One very high profile sage advisor for a start much prefers his media work to teaching. I think senior management teams are more focused on staff than students.

It also depends on the cache of the uni. Oxbridge aren’t rushing back because who will complain? They will get students whatever they do. Our local uni is by contrast doing an amazing job of making f2f happen as they always have to work hard to get their share of students.

@CovidCorvid

Dd went back in March for face to face teaching, art course.

I’m a lecturer and we’ve asked our students which they prefer and the majority have overwhelming said they prefer online to face to face.

For lectures?

But surely not for labs, drama, music, tutorials, project work etc?

@CovidCorvid

Dd went back in March for face to face teaching, art course.

I’m a lecturer and we’ve asked our students which they prefer and the majority have overwhelming said they prefer online to face to face.

Really? I find that so depressing. How do they interact with each other properly? How do they get to know people?

@cowbells. No idea, I was surprised at their preference. I do break out activities online, etc. I much prefer face to face.

Is this like Glasgow mentioned up thread? If asked in Jan/Feb the students may give a dif reason now?

My dd would be happy with online lectures as long as she gets f2f seminars, practicals, and work placements. The problem is when people read "lectures" to mean "all university teaching" instead of "sessions where the academic does all the talking and which only form a small part of the course".

As regards "going back" - huge gap between the guidance and the law. The guidance appears to have been written by people who think that all universities operate like Cambridge in the 1980s.

The law at Christmas said all students could go to another residence and return to uni, once during a specified period. Nothing about some being allowed and some not. Hence the law now says they're all allowed to go back. They've always been allowed.

What we've been told at my uni is that - if you're on a course that's been allowed to go back - come back, if not - stay at home. Exams are already only going to be online - that was decided long ago, and we only have a couple of teaching weeks left before the timetable stops anyway (normally it stops at Easter but it's how it's fallen this year) so basically - don't come back is the gist of it.

Nothing officially said on next year yet - but what I've been told informally is that the staff's timetable requests are in - large scale lectures still aren't happening and the uni is planning on running at 1m+ social distancing arrangements again - so allegedly small scale seminars will be face to face - but having seen what happened this year - I'm doubting it, and considering taking the year off. Online saved me a bloody fortune but it was just soul destroying and the technology failed so many bloody times. We've had three campus sessions all year - and we were a course that was allowed to continue running during lockdown.

@VanCleefArpels, I absolutely agree - our DD is a second year at Birmingham (over 160 miles from the family home) and now refers to her rented house in Selly Oak as 'home'. I just wondered whether there was a difference in view between those universities where having moved out of the family home to be there - or where there is a higher percentage of older students who already live locally in their own right, so to speak - is the norm, compared with those with a 'different' student body. If your social life (such as it can be atm) is little different in termtime vs holidays anyway, because most of your existing friends are still local as well, even if also at university, then there is less incentive to go onto campus for anything other than the purely academic bits and therefore less of a disadvantage in not being able to?

Weird if it's students on courses with a high studio / lab content who are voting for 'contactless' teaching, though.

Dd would definitely like blended learning to continue. I think most DC doing courses with lab and f2f tutorials would say the same about lectures being online. She's had on average 10 to 12 lectures a week so having to physically go to all these lectures would mean she is wasting quite a lot of study time and would probably end up watching the lectures online again anyhow. The f2f tutorials in term1 have meant she's met and bonded with 8 of the students on her course. The labs in the first term allowed her to meet a few others. Shes found the online workshops difficult so these would be better f2f.

So I think it depends on your course, the number of lectures and whether there is other form of f2f contact.

@wooliewoo

It's concerning that so much online is affecting the education they are getting. Online with people you don't know affects the ability to discuss. debate, share ideas which is all part of a university education.

Also the lack of practical skills in this cohort. I know science students being taught lab skills by video, med student learning dissection by video, art students who have no access to all the resources in the school of art.
These students really need in person teaching in their universities next year to consolidate their skills otherwise they will not have the level of education previous years have had.

All students need "in person" teaching, not just those on practical courses. Uni's can't charge the same fees for students who are getting little or no F2F than they charge those on practical/lab courses. A "distance learning" course needs to be a lot cheaper to account for all the facilities that students aren't getting. Uni's aren't going to get away with "blended" learning or no F2F at all if they think they can charge the same. My son has only had 3 tutorials this academic year - that's it, and they weren't even attended by lecturers, they were held by PHD students - none of his lecturers are even on campus and havn't been all year. Not even last October when the uni promised "blended learning" but didn't deliver it, before the November lockdown.

Students are putting up with everything being online because of the lockdowns, but when lockdowns are eased, there really is no excuse for unis to do a lot more "face to face" and actually get their lecturers back on campus, even if they're not doing large lectures.

Weird if it's students on courses with a high studio / lab content who are voting for 'contactless' teaching, though.

I doubt they are voting for totally contactless. Based on my experience, the students that know what 'normal' is are saying that they prefer having the lectures online.

The bit upthread about lectures being a place to chat to people on the course is perhaps misleading. I suspect it might be an idealised presumption of what happens at lectures made by a first year student who hasn't actually attended any face to face lectures yet. The reality is that after the first couple of lectures, only about 25% will actually turn up. Fewer if the lecture is at 9 am or 6pm. Fewer still if it is 9am on a Thursday morning. In the past, those that didn't attend relied on lecture recordings of variable clarity. Now they have lectures tailored specifically for online viewing. For the majority, it is better for them and they want to stick with it.

@CovidCorvid

Dd went back in March for face to face teaching, art course.

I’m a lecturer and we’ve asked our students which they prefer and the majority have overwhelming said they prefer online to face to face.

Depends on how the questions were worded I assume?

What question was asked?

My son has problems with screens due to an eye thing so hs to have breaks etc. He will find things a lot easier if his course is face to face lectures in September but we don't know yet. He is currently at home and been recording an oral exam over the last few days and has to keep having a break to help his eyes. Being at screens all the time is not great for a lot of people.

Also what students want and what should be forced on them for their own good are different things. What many students want most is no work ever and lots of drink. That does not mean we give it to them.

@user1497207191 it wasn’t an official survey as such just a number of conversations during seminars.

I’ve had a number of students emailing me even before being asked about it saying they’d rather carry on with online stuff as it’s easier for them from a point of not travelling in, saving money on parking and fuel, not having to get up as early, the mature students can do the school run, not wasting money on coffee/lunch.

They like the fact the online stuff is recorded so they can watch it again if they want. If someone does have a hospital appt, etc they haven’t missed it, they can watch it whenever.

I do think we need to do a more structured survey and make sure it’s not a vocal minority....we have an even mix of mature students and 18yos and I’d have assumed the 18uyos would prefer face to face but the ones who have spoken up have said they like online. 🤷‍♀️

I suspect we’ll adopt a blended approach, some stuff online, some face to face.

@hellcatspangle

Mine has been back a few weeks but he's on a practical course, they've been given priority at the moment. Hardly seems worth the others going back for a couple of months.

Mine would disagree with you. She has been at home since early December, we are having to pay for her accommodation until August, whether she is there or not, and it's her final year.

She will take her exams online, but once they are over she wants the chance to relax and have have fun with her friends before they all go their separate ways in the autumn.

As far as lectures and tutorials are concerned, everything this academic year has been online. She has been happy with online lectures - she usually used to go in person but they were always recorded so she used to sit and listen first time round and then rewatch them later and make notes. She is dyslexic and finds it hard to listen and take notes at the same time.

She hasn't liked smaller groups like seminars and tutorials online though as she said most people had their cameras off and many didn't contribute. That meant that she always felt under much more pressure to do so herself.

@changi my eldest DD says about 80% of people go to every lecture normally and most days they started at 9am. They are medical students so no idea if that makes a difference. Her law friend says similar amount. All lectures were always recorded to watch back even when live. And they'd chat over a coffee after the lecture not during it 😊.
It's about social contact now. These young people need it so so much.

I asked my dd about whether she would return to f2f lectures, or watch them online when given the opportunity. She was adamant about returning to f2f despite the convenience of watching them online at 1.5x speed