In contrast to last year, our expectation is that most instruction will take place face-to-face. But we will attempt to remain in hybrid mode to accommodate anyone with visa or Covid-related obstacles to attendance. Please note that attendance online is not a matter of convenience for those able to attend in person. (Sleeping late is not sufficient grounds to attend online!) Eligible students may access course sessions via this Zoom link.
As a matter of courtesy and a sign of engagement, please keep your video on at least half of the time. It is generally wise to mute your audio, but you can preemptively unmute in anticipation of speaking. You can also indicate your readiness to intervene by using the "Chat" function.
When the instructor or student presenter is sharing slides, Zoom generally takes over the entire screen. Click on "View Options" at the top of the screen and choose "Exit Full Screen." You can then adjust the window to suit your purposes.
Holding a seminar online via Zoom presents special challenges to our collective participation and individual attention spans. If you are online, please stay "in the room" during the class. No scanning social media on the side!
This seems sufficient for our purposes, but if you would like more explicit guidelines, let us copy below the ones developed by our Political Science Department.
For students participating in online sessions, please refer to the following guidelines to ensure a successful learning environment:
1. Be polite and kind, respect yourself, respect others and respect the online environment.
2. Remember that we are still learning and interacting with cultures around the world. Dress appropriately, as you would in a university classroom.
3. Sit in a well-lit space and be mindful of what things in your home may be in view of the camera.
4. Students should only have applications and resources open as directed by the course instructor.
5. Please use non-verbal communication functions with a special emphasis of the icon to raise your hand to speak, at the same time recognize that your instructor may not immediately see the chat while leading the class. If the debate is unstructured, make sure nobody raised their hands before you speak up and jump ahead of them, make sure you pause before you respond to make sure your classmate or instructor has finished talking. Please don't monopolize discussion. Be to the point.
6. Being in an online conference is like being in class. Contribute to the learning environment, and don’t make distracting noises or movements.
7. Please keep your video on in order to enable better communication with course instructors and classmates. If you are unable to, for whatever reason, please let your instructor or TA know and turn off the video.
8. Feel free to experiment with backgrounds or blurs if you worry about your privacy, but understand these features require additional computing resources.
9. Mute yourself when you aren’t speaking.
10. Please make sure your name is correctly displayed as what you want to be called by your colleagues and teaching team.