The extent to which the College of Education had to react and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 was as vast as it was fast … as comprehensive as it was conscientious.
From facilitating a switch to online learning, to purchasing personal protective equipment, to being certain that students were meeting graduation requirements, to offering a virtual helping hand to the Pennsylvania Department of Education, the college quickly had to come together even though its personnel were forced by the pandemic to be apart.
“This is funny now, but the first email I sent was informing people to be ready to work remotely for the next two weeks,” said Julian Morales, director of operations for the college. “Luckily, people all had laptops and not desktop computers, so going remote wasn’t as big of a lift as it was in some other colleges.
“The second part was in conjunction with (Dean Kim Lawless) and … just keeping up with the information because everything was evolving so quickly.”
That merely scratched the surface. The college’s leadership team, along with program chairs and others, participated in countless meetings and calls on Zoom and Teams for more than a year in a coordinated effort to achieve — as much as possible — a new normal.
That included, but was not limited to, coordinating all necessary technology through the Carrera Education Technology Center as well as securing the talents of instructional designers from Penn State World Campus; ensuring that student teachers could meet graduation requirements if they were unable to continue teaching at their respective school districts; enabling Rehabilitation and Human Services students to complete or receive credit for clinicals; coordinating the college’s portion of a virtual commencement ceremony for graduating seniors; and communicating information about all of this to members of the college community.
As coronavirus cases subsided slightly and some in-residence classes were planned for the fall semester, barriers to overcome included figuring out building size and classroom size to meet standards set by Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf; distributing massive amounts of personal protection equipment (PPE); and working in conjunction with University Health Services to administer COVID-19 tests to College of Education students who were entering area school districts as student teachers.
The college also hosted one of the first hybrid courses taught at the University, as Karen Eppley, assistant professor of education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, taught a pilot class in Chambers Building over the summer.
Greg Kelly, senior associate dean for research, produced a website with resources for remote K-12 learning. Just a few of the available links included tips for supporting students socially and emotionally during distance learning; resources for families to help children understand COVID-19; distance learning for special education; and teaching tolerance materials that supplement the curriculum to inform their practices and to create civil and inclusive school communities where children are respected, valued and welcome participants.
Rayne Sperling, associate dean for graduate and undergraduate studies, and Alicia McDyre, director of curriculum and instruction field experience, navigated the constantly evolving challenges of placing student teachers and pre-student teachers in school districts statewide during a pandemic.
“One of the biggest challenges faced by teacher education faculty and supervisors when we made the pivot from in-person to remote instruction was how to engage student teachers in meaningful field experiences,” said Carla Zembal-Saul, professor of education (science education) and head of the Department of Curriculum and Instruction.
“Professor McDyre and her staff moved mountains to negotiate and renegotiate with school-based partners to create opportunities to support Penn State student teachers in completing their requirements for graduation and certification,” said Zembal-Saul.
When it became clear in March 2020 that face-to-face classes would be moving online, assistant professor Will Diehl and World Campus instructional designer Rebecca Heiser, with feedback from Diehl’s colleagues among the Lifelong Learning and Adult Education faculty, created an online course template to ensure that students would have a consistent experience in their classes.
“We shared this template with College of Education faculty, conducted informational webinars, and it was adopted and adapted by some faculty across the college,” said Diehl, director of The American Center for the Study of Distance Education and coordinator of online graduate programs in the Department of Learning and Performance Systems.
Diehl also teamed up with Peggy Schooling, professor of practice in educational leadership in the Department of Education Policy Studies and executive director of the Pennsylvania School Study Council, and they offered their assistance to the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) to assist PDE in developing its vision around distance education because it was putting supports in place for school districts statewide.
Schooling and Diehl also formed an association with PBS, which is beneficial because PBS is launching a datacasting initiative from which its television signal can be used to distribute additional content to students who are learning from home and might not have internet access.
Not being in the classroom was an immediate problem for student teachers last spring, and those issues continued into the 2020-21 academic year. While some school districts approved having in-person student teachers, others opted to have student teachers engage remotely. That had its own set of challenges, such as some College of Education students not having adequate internet access or not having secluded locations to perform remote student teaching duties properly.
Morales said the college accommodated some students’ needs by converting areas in the Krause Studio into student teaching pods. Some of those students were grateful for the opportunity the college arranged for them to have their private spaces to conduct their virtual in-class lessons.
Alex Karras, a middle level math education major from Chalfont, Pennsylvania, considered himself fortunate to have been in Krause while directing his eighth-grade class at Mount Nittany Middle School in Boalsburg.
“I could not imagine teaching from my apartment. I do not think I could physically teach there because I have roommates, and I would feel bad taking up all the room. Being able to teach in this small, glass-enclosed room has been great, believe it or not,” Karras said.
“It is like my mini office, and it helps me focus and get my work done.”
Kaitlyn McCoach is another student who calls Krause her classroom. From Reading, Pennsylvania, McCoach is a middle level math education major instructing fourth- and fifth-grade students at Pleasant Gap Elementary School in the Bellefonte Area School District.