The COVID-19 pandemic provoked a need for rapid adaptation of teaching strategies and learning environments. Thus novel approaches, predominantly based on online/virtual platforms are needed to minimize the negative effects of the pandemic on teaching (and learning). Herein we describe our recent web-based symposium series on environmental…

In a matter of weeks--and in some cases, days--teachers were asked to move the remainder of their semester-long, in-person courses to the online environment, restructuring assignments and methods of content delivery along the way. Now, we live in-between, as people have navigated hybrid, stops and re-starts. What helped us then can help us in the…

Education is a perpetually evolving field, especially with the rapid advancement of technology and the upsurge of the globalization phenomenon (Crawford and Kirby 2008). Students need to become familiar with social interactions that they will eventually encounter in the future. However, in order for students to effectively participate in…

Teacher preparation programs need quality training courses that offer flexible, interactive alternatives to isolating online courses and classroom-based programs that limit students to a specific place and time. The HyFlex course design provides a solution by combining internet video instruction (such as Zoom), regular online learning, and…

This article presents two similar design cases and a discussion of how like values resulted in dissimilar design moves. Both cases were gamified learning activities for graduate students in instructional design. Both interventions employed rapid prototyping and were delivered synchronously in an at-a-distance setting. This article compares the two…

Online learning is convenient for many learners; it gives them the possibility of learning without being restricted by attending a particular classroom at a specific time. While this exciting opportunity can let its users manage their life in a better way, many students may suffer from feeling isolated or disconnected from the community that…

Faculty learning communities (FLCs), established prepandemic to disseminate and discuss evidence-based teaching practices as part of an NSF-funded project, Investigating Student Success Using Evidence-Based Strategies-eXpanded (ISSUES-X), proved effective at facilitating learning during a pandemic. As our university made the decision to operate…

The combination of the COVID-19 pandemic and social unrest turned education on its head this quarter. To keep students engaged, a plethora of techniques were employed, ranging from synchronous lectures and activities via the Zoom platform to the asynchronous online discussion board Piazza. Consideration of students' nonacademic struggles also…

Blended learning has a muddled history but is still evolving. Technological innovations and the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 led higher education to create a new blend to blended learning, one that did not follow the generally accepted and most numerous definitions or previous examples of blended learning. This new blend of blended learning lacks the…

The authors have been teaching mathematics and economics for more than 15 years at two nonresidential colleges in New York City: Metropolitan College of New York and Bronx Community College, which is part of the City University of New York (CUNY). Until the first week of March 2020, the authors were teaching all their classes in-person. With the…

"Social Europe Days" is a collaborative four-day international seminar held yearly near Brussels, Belgium, by a network of ten European universities from eight different countries. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the seminar had to be offered virtually and redesigned. The final design included synchronous and asynchronous activities,…

According to the Community of Inquiry (CoI) model (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2000), an enriching educational experience online in a collaborative learning environment requires three interdependent elements: social presence, teaching presence, and cognitive presence. Social presence provides interaction in the online environment that allows…

The online environment challenges social work educators in their approach to developing students' cultural awareness and culturally competent skills. To develop student competencies, it is important for accredited social work programs to consider both their explicit and implicit curricula. Although research has focused on the influence of…

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to an unprecedented shift in how health science education is delivered (Sandars et al., 2020). With face-to-face learning, such as lab and classroom interactions, largely unavailable during the pandemic, institutions have been required to quickly shift the learning environment to a fully virtual format. While…

The first five articles of this series on technologies that enable collaboration, highlighted ways to foster shared learning experiences among students. For this, the final installment, focus is shifted to teachers. States, districts, and groups of teachers are enhancing their collaboration opportunities through synchronous online meetings and…