The Return

Georgetown is returning to in-person class meetings next Monday, after about two and half weeks of remote learning to start spring semester, 2022. At this writing, the unprecedented surge of COVID positive counts associated with the Omicron variant is subsiding in Washington DC and other east coast US cities. Our aspiration is that the resumption of in-person classes can take place with manageable levels of isolation and quarantining of students, staff, and faculty.

In talking to students and faculty, the dominant sentiment seems to be, “We can’t wait!”

The long term effects of using internet-based audio and video communication in higher education are well-documented. Most of the findings are not positive. Current undergraduates have had interrupted academic and social lives since March 2020. Current graduate students have experienced a variety of job displacements before their entrance to their Georgetown programs; last year some completed Master’s programs without much of any face-to-face contact with fellow students or faculty.

Cognitive science has taught us that our brains and bodies are sensitive to their environments, actively (often subconsciously) consuming stimuli that they deem relevant to interpreting the situation at hand. The stripping out of some stimuli unavoidable with internet-mediated communication makes all involved work harder to achieve the level of shared understanding so critical to learning. Hence, the common complaint about “Zoom fatigue” that we have all identified.

A set of student surveys over the past few semesters have asked sampled students to rate their own engagement in classes they are taking. An early finding during the semesters of remote learning was that engagement levels declined over the course of the semester. Since such surveys had not been routinely conducted pre-pandemic, when classes were dominantly in-person, the question obviously arose, “Is declining engagement over the course of a semester another feature of online learning?”

Repeating the surveys last semester, fall 2021, allowed us to collect data relevant to that question. The findings are complicated, but the general pattern is that the reported levels of engagement in the in-person fall 2021 are higher than those in remote-learning fall 2020. This is consistent with the increased breadth of channels of communication possible with in-person instruction. In short, richer communication produces higher engagement.

Next, the analysis examined the trend over the semester in fall 2021 compared to that of fall 2020. The same decline in self-reported engagement occurred in both semesters — less engagement as the semester proceeded both in remote and in-person semesters. While the in-person engagement remains higher than the remote-learning engagement over all, the in-person semester had a similar decline over time. Certainly, stress and fatigue quite naturally increase because key features of courses are loaded toward the end of the semester. We all get tired. The value of the in-person mode appears to be a higher overall average engagement.

Students and faculty whom I encounter repeatedly call for our return to in-person learning. The surveys suggest their desires are related to enhanced performance when the two groups are together in the classroom.

It is heartwarming to see that we are coming back together. While our lives are still affected by a global pandemic and this virus has repeatedly surprised us, I hope we take advantage of this return. We do our best work together.