The 123rd Installment
“Virtual campus” created to fight infectious diseases

by Yoshihide Chubachi,
Professor

In academic year 2020, due to the spread of COVID-19, face-to-face classes cannot be held at many universities around the world, and online classes are being offered. With the emergence of special circumstances such as infectious disease countermeasures, new forms of behavior of required of both students and faculty members.

In this article, I would like to look back on the previous semester and reflect on the course I taught under infectious disease countermeasures.

The course I taught in 1Q was “Information Architecture Theory 3”. The content was on the acquisition of knowledge about object-oriented modeling using UML and the acquisition of techniques for modeling.

Originally, this course was a blended type in which teaching was conducted alternately through watching on-demand classroom videos and face-to-face interactive class instruction. Consequently, it was decided to conduct the classes that were previously held face-to-face remotely this academic year. In the classes that were conducted in person, I reviewed the video content, explained how to use the tools to create models, did exercises and had Q&A for assignments, and reviewed submitted assignments.

Since this class was originally blended and half of it used on-demand videos, it proceeded as planned with few problems, even though it was taught remotely. One of the advantages of conducting it remotely this time was that the process of downloading assignments submitted by the students, opening UML models using the tool, reviewing models, and providing various explanations seemed to be smoother than in person. It may have been good to be able to concentrate on explanations without taking my eyes off the computer screen.

On the other hand, “Advanced lecture on collaborative development” was held in 2Q. This course, as the name suggests, is where team members experience the collaborative joint development of software. Normally, we will form groups, perform exercises in Git/GitHub, a tool for software development, and then continue application development in groups again. During development, work is visualized using whiteboards, sticky notes, and the like, and development exercises are conducted through informal brainstorming sessions. There was no easy answer as to how to implement this remotely.

One idea was to set up opportunities to talk with various classmates in icebreakers during classtime. This was because I assumed that many of my students would never meet their classmates face-to-face. The first four classes were used to randomly assign groups and discuss infectious disease countermeasures and software development. By randomly changing the members each time, I believe many students became acquainted (?) with each other. The discussions were also exciting, and each presentation was engaging.

The subsequent development exercises were carried out by each team with a friendly atmosphere, so I think this strategy was a success. Surprisingly, the quality of the results was not only comparable to the previous academic year, but some were even better. My initial concerns proved groundless. Also, regardless of the fact that the class started at 6:30 pm, fewer students were late than in previous years, which seemed to be the effect of the ability to participate remotely.

At first, I must admit that it was unsettling as a teacher to teach a class to a single computer in an empty classroom. However, this experience showed me that by understanding and effectively utilizing the unique features of remote learning, I can make my classes as good as or better than traditional ones. The common notion that classes must be held in classrooms has been overturned, and it is precisely on the internet that virtual campuses were formed.

When the COVID-19 pandemic has subsided and classes can be held in person as usual, there will come a time when we will have to consider whether we should return to 100% face-to-face classes, has 100% remote classes, or a combination of the two. Basically, I think it is better to do what can be done remotely and come together in a classroom when necessary, but I currently feel that there is quite a lot that can be done remotely. Rather than simply going back to a face-to-face environment, we must continue to devise ways to provide better learning environments for students by understanding and effectively utilizing the characteristics of the virtual campuses that have been formed.