Decentering Authority in Hybrid Learning Environments: Collaborative Course Design with Students as Co-creators

Description

"This class proved to me the capacity for human connection through a digital platform and that gives me hope for an unpredictable future." This is a quote from a student reflecting on their experience in the "Senior Design Challenge," a two-term senior capstone course at Dartmouth College. When COVID-19 forced the second half of this project-based course to move to a remote format, the students and instructor were forced to improvise their strategy and approach to the balance of our timeline. Ensuring successful completion of project deliverables for our partner organizations and maintaining a supportive community in our class were two equally important goals. Admitting a lack of expertise in online teaching and a general uncertainty about how to proceed, the instructor recruited the students in co-creating the structure of the rest of the course. This presentation will describe some structural elements of the course that were thus co-created, and share some reflections on the unique advantages of this approach.

Takeaway

Participants will walk away with examples of techniques that can be used to engage students as collaborators in designing online/hybrid learning experiences.

Abstract

This 20-week course had four multidisciplinary student teams who worked on projects in the domains of healthcare, education, and sustainability—all in partnership with off-campus client organizations. The first half of our timeline involved field research, in-person stakeholder interviews, and physically co-located student collaborations—all of which instantly became impossible with the shift to an online format of instruction.

Our first step to co-creating the remainder of our experience took the form of several all-hands Zoom calls over spring break (the halfway point), during which the students and instructor brainstormed together about what the spring term might look like. Students were given agency to pivot their project topics as necessary, with the collaboration and approval of partner organization. The students and instructor then co-created the schedule of deliverables that scaffolded the students' work for the remainder of the course. Students were responsible for setting and adhering to deadlines (which varied from team to team), teaching each other new techniques and tools, and shaping the agenda of several class sessions. The final presentation was an successful Zoom production, in which the students—besides creating presentations of their work—collaborated with each other and the instructor to create various digital collateral to celebrate their work and engage the audience.

This conference session will go into some illustrative detail about all of these, and more, elements of the course.