| Update from Dean Johnson and the Owen COVID-19 Taskforce |
| As we learn to operate in this new remote environment, we aim to move our announcement and community communications back to “What’s Happening”. You will hear from us in this format for a few more evenings, but “What’s Happening” will resume next week. There are virtual events, resources, deadlines, and connections that we want the community to know about. Submit your information for What’s Happening through OwenCentral (link for Faculty & Staff; link for Students). |
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| Faculty and Staff Information |
We will host a faculty and staff town hall meeting via Zoom on Friday, March 18 at 10:00 a.m. An Outlook meeting request will be sent from the Office of the Dean. Please submit your questions by 6:00 p.m. Thursday, March 19, and we will do our best to answer them. Questions can be submitted here.
The following was sent to our faculty this evening:
Mod 4 Teaching Colleagues,
Thank you for all the hard work over the past week to move our courses on-line. I have visited many of your classes and seen all your efforts to ensure a great remote experience. Phase 1 of our plan has been a great success. Thank you! As we deliver day 3 of remote learning today, we are hard at work rolling out Phase 2. In Phase 2, we anticipate that the remaining live sessions held in our classrooms will need to move home. It is a university decision when to close buildings, so I want us to be ready.
In Phase 2, each class will be assigned a staff assistant. Their role is to be another set of eyes on the course including: - Accessing Brightspace and testing any asynchronous content you post (e.g., prerecorded videos). They will simply be another set of eyes – not developing or posting content.
- Attending live zoom class sessions as a participant to help you monitor chat and troubleshoot problems.
If the staff assistant sees a problem during a live session, they will help you try to troubleshoot. If troubleshooting is not working, they will have the cell numbers of IT/Zoom/Brightspace support people that can join the class within a few minutes (kind of like having them call/run down the hall to find support). IT has identified specific individuals who will be available to support Owen classes during each class period, each day. Of course, all of this will be done remotely – no one will be coming to your home or office. Staff assistants should not be asked to help with grading or other traditional roles of an Owen TA.
So far, 24 of our staff from all over Owen have volunteered for the role of assistant. Many of them have been part of the Remote Teaching Taskforce. They are assuming these duties on top of their regular jobs. We held two training sessions for them today, led by Nancy Hyer, Morgan Leeson, Kathryn-Claire Barlas, Blake Gore, and Emily Anderson.
We are currently assigning staff to classes. Your staff assistant team will be reaching out to you when the assignments are finalized later this week.
Thank you for your extraordinary efforts during this very unusual time.
-Eric
Staff
On Thursday, March 19, we ask that only staff who are needed to support in-classroom delivery come to the building. At the end of last week, we distributed a spreadsheet indicating staff who were needed in the office this week. That spreadsheet is no longer valid. Our responsibly to the greater community is clear, we need to have as few people in the building as possible.
Staff, if you are using PTO for illness, vacation, or a mental health day, it is important that you set your out-of-office in Outlook and reflect your status by blocking your calendar. This step will help us know who is not available for work any given day. Please note this is in addition to communicating with your manager and recording your time in Oracle.
A word about the use of Skype for Business. As we manage our remote work, it is understood that many people may have to adjust availability during the day. Please let your Owen co-workers know you are available by updating your calendar and/or indicating your availability in Skype for Business. Helpful hint: the use of the instant messaging tool in Skype for Business can greatly decrease your email traffic.
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| Daytime Student Information (Community-Wide Update) |
| As announced last night, the Owen community has the university license for Zoom. Your classroom experience will be better if you sign-in using your VU single-sign on credential before connecting into your course. https://vanderbilt.zoom.us |
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| Vanderbilt University Updates (Community-Wide Update) |
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