Spring semester begins online
Early this morning, Tsinghua's spring semester began. Setting up their mobile phones or computers and taking out their notebooks, Tsinghua students from all over the world were well prepared for their first class of the new semester. Tsinghua University will offer online courses beginning this Monday, in line with prepared curriculum plans.
This approach has been adopted to ensure the health and safety of Tsinghua students, faculty and staff, as part of a wide range of novel coronavirus prevention and control measures.
Online courses offer students the opportunity to make good use of their time away from campus while reducing their exposure to the virus.
Tsinghua University President Qiu Yong and Chairperson of the University Council Chen Xu visited the operations center for online education this morning. Tsinghua University Provost and Vice President Yang Bin and Vice President Peng Gang were also present to make sure of the smooth operation of the online teaching.
For spring semester 2020, Tsinghua plans to offer 4,254 course sessions in total, delivered by 2,681 faculty members to 25,091 students. Of these, 3,923 sessions are available online.
On the first period of Monday morning, 155 sessions were delivered online, involving 31 schools and departments, which marked the beginning of the new semester.
During the winter break, Tsinghua has set up three expert teams and one special work team to prepare for online teaching and learning, drawing on the latest information technology.
Meanwhile, students who are experiencing financial distress because of the epidemic will receive allowances from the university as all-out efforts are made to ensure access to online education for all students.
"I think the system worked better than I had expected. This remote teaching may lead to more student participation since some of them may be less shy speaking on line than in the classroom. The classroom is better for discussion and debate,” said William Rosoff, a Professor from the School of Law.
"Overall, it was a very good experience. There were students from all over the world and we could all communicate clearly. Considering the very challenging times we are passing through, this seems to be a very good solution,” said Ana Paula Perrone Kasznar, a first-year graduate student from the Global Environmental Leadership Program. After using different online class tools, she also put forward targeted suggestions from the perspective of user experience to help make the technical support serve the online teaching and learning better.
"Online class is a new experience and challenge to me,” said Guo Yida, an undergraduate student from the Department of Physics. “As soon as I enter the live room, the Tsinghua School song played by the teacher makes me feel inspired and confident. I believe that online teaching will get better and better, and I will gradually adjust my pace to adapt better to the online teaching.”
Writer: Li Han Editor: John Paul Grima