Higher education institutions have shuttered doors and shifted to remote learning for the remainder of the spring semester. Although students and parents will give most institutions a pass for this semester’s technological struggles, discontent will become increasingly vocalized as new, fully online sessions begin. Meanwhile, instructors that are struggling to effectively migrate their content to a usable online format likely will not have time to focus on pedagogy, leading to dissatisfied students and instructors, resulting in attrition among both, and ultimately impacting an institution’s livelihood.

The success or struggle of many academic institutions in the wake of COVID-19 may depend upon their ability to quickly relieve their instructors of time-consuming technical tasks.

Fortunately, there is a solution to this urgent problem: provide the right technical support to your faculty and enable them to think creatively about online instruction, which will create positive online experiences for instructors and students.

In the midst of this need for innovative online instruction, M&S Consulting is ready to assist instructors with the work of transforming an existing course into an online format. Our professional staff will migrate existing course content into the online course shells provided by your university and configure course materials. Course design, layout, and functions will be directed by the course instructor in order to meet pedagogical goals using the online tools and configurations available in your learning management system.

M&S Consulting staff will:

• Create modules, structured by either topical content or time-based (e.g., weekly) units, that include learning materials and instructions;
• Transfer existing course materials into appropriate online formats;
• Schedule assignments and assessments to match the syllabus and assignment schedule that have been provided;
• Develop course assessments in the learning management system and configure restrictions, settings, and timing;
• Use previously recorded audio or video recordings while transitioning content to courses; and for faculty who would like to provide lecture content via recordings, capture and video conferencing tools can be provided to instructors as needed.

Instructors can provide course materials upfront, or M&S staff can work directly with instructors to prepare materials for each module and release them to the class sequentially. Sequential releases can assist instructors who are including audio or video lectures, making the process easier for them since they would not need to provide content in advance for the entire semester.

Let’s partner to provide the right technical support to your faculty so that you’re able to provide a positive online experience for your instructors and students. Contact us to learn more, and visit our Higher Education page to discover the many ways we can help your institution.