Crowded Classrooms and COVID

[Caracal]

The Covid thread in general discussion got me thinking... I really, really hope we are back to in person classes in the Fall. But, when I think about many of the classrooms I teach in, they seem incredibly inappropriate for a world where, hopefully, we don't have rampant spread of the virus, but it is still appropriate for everyone to be taking reasonable precautions.

I've had fantasies for years of placing an anonymous call to the fire Marshall about one of my classrooms, which has been packed with so many desks that I have to make sure I hold my bag close to my elbow so I don't bash student's heads as I walk to the front of the room, like I'm walking down the aisle of a plane. Last year a student who was trying to hand his completed exam to me tripped and fell completely over a desk. I really wonder how it meets the fire code.

Is that going to be ok in the Fall? If you're a student sitting in the middle of that room, you probably have 5 people breathing within six feet of you. That just seems like a significant public health risk if we are in a situation where things are better but there's a need to avoid new waves of cases

[mamselle]

If we're back by fall.

M.

[Caracal]

If we're back by fall.

M.

I wonder if it might have to be partial. Maybe you could give faculty the option to choose online classes if they feel like they are in a high risk group and push of the larger classes to stay online. That might allow you to use some of the bigger rooms for other classes and let people spread out. I don't know, I really hope we will be back in the fall. In the same way that it isn't sustainable to have these stringent restrictions in other aspects of our lives forever, I can't see how it would really work for college education.

[Parasaurolophus]

Our classrooms are tiny and packed (classes are usually capped at 35, but most rooms struggle to accommodate so many). Final exams--even when proctored--take place in those classrooms, too. There's one "large" auditorium on campus capable of holding ~80 students. Everyone in there is always packed cheek by jowl.

There's no money to increase classroom space or cut class sizes, though. So if we're back in the fall (which I think is likely here), I expect no changes whatsoever on that front.

We're dependent on international enrollment, however, and new international cohorts usually show up in the winter. I expect that enrollment will tank hard, but the result won't be emptier classes in the winter. Instead, the admin will cut sections, and non-regularized faculty (like me!) will have to find other work.

EDIT: I suppose there's some small chance the Dean will want to trial some online offerings. Ugh.

[bopper]

off topic, but what about Airplanes? Disease incubators.

[polly_mer]

It's possible that enrollment will be down enough in the fall that crowded classrooms are a good problem to have to solve.

[Ruralguy]

Yes, Polly, honestly, we hope to God we have that problem, and then we'll solve it. More likely, low enrollment, healthy students, unhealthy college. Argh.

[Caracal]

It's possible that enrollment will be down enough in the fall that crowded classrooms are a good problem to have to solve.

Who knows, but I don't really see that happening at the regional state school I teach at. If anything, a bad economy is likely to result in more people going to college.

[the_geneticist]

We are online for Summer term here.  I think it's a 50/50 chance that we will have in-person classes in Fall 2020.  We're a large enough school that I don't think we will be short on students.  In fact, we are worried already that students will withdraw from Spring classes if the they are worried about their grades (no penalty until after Week 8 of a 10 week quarter!) and have an increase in demand in Fall.  Personally, I'm guessing we will get a garbled mess of some classes in-person and some online, but no clear guidance for which type to offer.

[Caracal]

We are online for Summer term here.  I think it's a 50/50 chance that we will have in-person classes in Fall 2020.  We're a large enough school that I don't think we will be short on students.  In fact, we are worried already that students will withdraw from Spring classes if the they are worried about their grades (no penalty until after Week 8 of a 10 week quarter!) and have an increase in demand in Fall.  Personally, I'm guessing we will get a garbled mess of some classes in-person and some online, but no clear guidance for which type to offer.

This whole thing has been a month. September if 5 months away. This isn't a "no big deal, things will blow over" kind of argument. I don't think everything will be back to normal by then, but I do think it is likely campuses will be back open in some form. I think this because I think most things will be back to being open in some form; they will have to be. I can't see how schools are really any different. You can move everything online for for half a semester and everyone can sort of agree to pretend it is working, but it is "working" because we are just agreeing that its good enough for the last two months of the semester. Trying to teach an entire semester online across entire schools would bring up huge problems with instruction, content and student performance. It also would be pretty disastrous for schools, and not just ones in trouble. Can you really have residential colleges where incoming students just don't come to campus in the fall semester?

Of course none of this means that it isn't possible schools won't reopen in the Fall. Who knows where this is going to go, lots of things are possible. I just think if you're trying to handicap this, I'd bet pretty heavily on the chances of reopening in some form for the Fall semester in the same way that I imagine that by mid June in most parts of the country having a few friends over for dinner will be allowed.

[marshwiggle]

Can you really have residential colleges where incoming students just don't come to campus in the fall semester?

The good thing about this situation is that it forces everyone to rethink all kinds of basic and heretofore unquestioned assumptions. In this case,

"Why is the institution residential? Is that primarily for the students (pedagogically and/or socially) or is it for the institution (economically and/or administratively)?"

and more importantly

Whatever the answer to that question would have been when the place was created, is it still valid with the changes to society in general and the local community ?


I had a great car which I really enjoyed, but after 250000km, it had some big issues that would have cost more then the car was worth to fix. It made sense to get something new instead that would be better for the next 250000km or whatever.

[downer]

I don't generally plan my classes until I am sure they are going to run -- a potential waste of my energy otherwise. But supposing that they do run, I will probably basically plan all my classes to basically be online classes, and if there is classroom component, that will be largely optional and will be an inverted classroom. Maybe I will do small tutorial groups with plenty of distance between people.

[polly_mer]

Again, Caracal, I have to wonder what you're reading in the higher ed discussion circles, because what you write is so far out of step with the data and the discussions by people who have the information.

Go read IHE and CHE, think about what those articles state, and then decide if what you think ought to be true is really going to happen.

* People who are looking to go back to school are mostly investigating online programs.  The fear is that good online programs will take the good students with little left for in-person institutions that aren't elite.

* Surveys of high school students indicate prospective college students increasingly intending to postpone a year (or more for those hit hardest financially), go online with the good online programs, or continue the trend of going to a cheaper, local CC first.

* Surveys indicate many people not having the money to go to college, especially those who have already run out their lifetime financial aid and are reluctant to take out loans for anything except a quick-turnaround certificate.

* Surveys of presidents indicate such a tight year through a combination of enrollment drops, low endowment returns, and lower state revenue that many are anticipating furloughs and layoffs of faculty.

* The entirely foreseeable lack of first-year students due to the birth rate 18 years ago continues to be a factor and is exacerbated by the continued questioning of the value of a college degree in majors that don't directly prepare one for a profession.

Your institution may be open in the fall, but overcrowded classrooms is not what most people are foreseeing as one of the top 5 problems.

[Caracal]

Again, Caracal, I have to wonder what you're reading in the higher ed discussion circles, because what you write is so far out of step with the data and the discussions by people who have the information.

Go read IHE and CHE, think about what those articles state, and then decide if what you think ought to be true is really going to happen.

* People who are looking to go back to school are mostly investigating online programs.  The fear is that good online programs will take the good students with little left for in-person institutions that aren't elite.

* Surveys of high school students indicate prospective college students increasingly intending to postpone a year (or more for those hit hardest financially), go online with the good online programs, or continue the trend of going to a cheaper, local CC first.

* Surveys indicate many people not having the money to go to college, especially those who have already run out their lifetime financial aid and are reluctant to take out loans for anything except a quick-turnaround certificate.

* Surveys of presidents indicate such a tight year through a combination of enrollment drops, low endowment returns, and lower state revenue that many are anticipating furloughs and layoffs of faculty.

* The entirely foreseeable lack of first-year students due to the birth rate 18 years ago continues to be a factor and is exacerbated by the continued questioning of the value of a college degree in majors that don't directly prepare one for a profession.

Your institution may be open in the fall, but overcrowded classrooms is not what most people are foreseeing as one of the top 5 problems.

Can we drop the weird hostility? You always seem to be responding to things I never said. I was simply just thinking about one problem, not making a claim that it is the most vital.  I teach in some rooms that have 50 desks, but they are so packed together that people don't have much space if you only have 30 students in there. So a marginal drop in enrollment might not make much difference in that respect. I also never said that everything would be back to normal in the fall or whatever you seem to believe I wrote.

I'm also rather skeptical about any predictions at this point in terms of the ultimate impact. Obviously if you're an administrator, your job is to try to consider various scenarios and think about contingency plans, but we are basically one month into something totally unprecedented. The actual impact on higher ed is heavily dependent on the course of the epidemic, the success of efforts to mitigate it, and the governmental response to the economic impact. Anybody who claims to know exactly how this is all going to work out is full of it.

[att_mtt]

At my university they are discussing online classes only for the fall already - might be that crowded classrooms will be a problem postponed to the next spring.
I am wondering about lab research though - in most labs it's difficult to keep 6 feet distance as the lab is not big enough - however I do expect R1 institutions to get back to research sometime soon. Does any other college discuss online classes only? And what about research labs?