How have other Optometry Schools transitioned to online learning?

[jennagin]

At MCP I feel that admin and certain professors have definitely made things harder on us as students. Most professors have opted to a "voice-over" powerpoint presentation, while a select few are doing online live lectures. While we did end up having a week of no school, many professors are posting up to 6 hours of material for a week where they would normally only have 3. This has made keeping up with material extremely difficult. They have also changed testing formats so that we have more limited time, randomized questions, and they have taken away our ability to return to previous questions. Being at home and dealing with constant distractions have made testing in this environment, with these conditions very difficult on me on my classmates (and that doesn't even include the added stresses of the pandemic). What are other optometry schools doing in this time? How have things changed for you? Do you feel like things are harder now than they were before?

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[Optgal96]

I feel happy with how Salus has transitioned, especially after reading what you are going through. It's been difficult for everyone, but I do feel like Salus integrates student input with a LOT of the decisions they make.

For example: before exams started, we asked for open-note exams. Our dean warned us that the risk of that was more difficult exam questions in a much lesser allotted time than usual (45 minutes as opposed to 2 hours!). Our class voted to keep it closed notes, thankfully. Additionally, our class can vote to move exams around. Right now we are currently in the process of trying to move one of our most difficult exams to May 8! (Even though our semester technically ends May 1).

With lectures, we are to watch the recorded ones posted online. There are powerpoints associated with them. Some of them are 1-2 years old. Others are brand new recordings. This is nothing new to me, as someone who rarely goes to class unless they are mandatory. I do fairly well by just watching the recorded version at home at my own pace. But I know a lot of students (the ones who go to every class) are not in favor of this. They want live Zoom sessions or something.

In regards to exams, we were originally supposed to have 11 exams starting May 1 and ending May 1. And about 3 quizzes. I thought this was impossible, but I've adapted and am getting by in lieu of the current situation. Luckily, our class voted to move another tough exam to May 4. This gives us ample time to study for that subject, which I believe is the second hardest course for us. All our exams are online with Lockdown Browser and we are recorded through webcam and microphone. Some exams have been way tougher than others, and we are not sure if that is because the material is getting harder or simply because the professors chose to make it that way.

My only issue that my class has brought up to our dean is that some professors are not as active as others. They don't post a supplemental review, don't provide extra resources, or even respond back to our emails sometimes. Our dean talked to our professors and all but 1 have reached out and offered extra help.

We have a weekly video session with our dean where we share any concerns or ask questions we may have. And she provides us with updates on our curriculum. Just today we had one and she told us about our summer session schedules being finalized and she took down suggestions students had (like providing live lectures).

Now, I don't know how many people share my view, but I am very happy with how Salus has transitioned. Our dean works so hard along with many other faculty members around the clock. I am only a first-year, so technically we are the least priority (as the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th years are being more directly impacted with clinical and boards), but somehow the dean still manages to listen to us and help us out.

I have many friends who are upset with how Salus is handling everything. They should probably read your post and be made aware of how other programs are tackling all this with their students. But I am happy with how things are proceeding, even though I am not doing my best at home with this pandemic looming over us all. But I am just trying to take all this one day at a time and accept a C here and there. But also try and understand that at the end of the day, all this hard work is necessary unless you want your graduation delayed. We can't sacrifice the quality of our education to help ease our way through this. We need to find a way to get through all this and know that we'll come out stronger!

 

[DocereTruth]

SCO's transition to online classes has been smooth in many ways for all the students and faculty; before we were already using this program called Panopto where instructors would upload their recorded lectures on right after we attended in person lecture. At first we were doing livestream lectures when this pandemic hit, but then our instructional advancement director (who is also our Optics professor) came up with the idea alongside our class officers to move all lectures to Microsoft Teams. This has been great as we still have our lectures at we would regular times, but they are livestreamed from wherever the professor is. We are also able to voice chat and regular chat with the instructors while they lecture as well.

For midterm and final exams, they have always been taken on the computer already so the only change is that we take the exams remote instead of on campus.

There's a couple of things I'm sure our school is working out (especially with clinic assignments at this time), but I'd say I'm quite happy with how everything has been handled. Wishing you luck on wrapping up your semester and that everyone is able to continue their optometric education without the limitations and uncertainties of COVID19!