Fortunately, SLCC’s School of Applied Technology & Technical Specialties kept most of its classes going, despite traditionally relying on face-to-face labs for areas like welding, aviation maintenance, electronics and emergency medical technician.
“Our faculty members have worked hard to create videos and use other technologies to provide students with course materials using remote delivery,” says Gary Cox, the school’s interim dean. “Anecdotally, I would say that students are having more contact with their teachers than before the transition to remote teaching.” Students, he added, will eventually get back to the labs and then need to demonstrate what they’ve learned from their homes during the pandemic once it is over.
Dennis O’Reilly is used to getting his, and his students’, hands dirty in his Automotive Automatic Transmissions lab in a big garage-like setting on SLCC’s Miller Campus, using actual cars and engines, with actual grease and grime. O’Reilly still goes to campus, but without students, to record live streamed class sessions and then copy links to those recorded sessions to Canvas for later review by students.
“My biggest challenge was due to the emergency nature of the situation,” Dennis says. “I was not able to practice at the delivery method prior to being expected to deliver quality instruction in the online/remote platform.
In the automotive industry, a totally online instructional method is unorthodox and not known as the preferred method of delivery. The practices being conducted currently are expected to be temporary until the “live work” component can be commenced. One silver lining, Dennis says, is that he’s strengthened relationships with industry partner contacts and has had support from the Automatic Transmission Rebuilders Association, which is providing his SLCC students with valuable industry certifications at no additional cost to his department.