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When we suddenly made the transition online, I wanted to try to maintain as much normalcy for my students (and myself) as possible. I teach a small, honors section of our introductory Religions of the World course. There are only 11 students enrolled this semester—a real luxury. I thought we might be able to continue synchronously, if they all were able. So, I asked: Did they have the technology to make it happen? Did they have the availability? Did they have the space? Did they have the desire? They did.  After our first synchronous class session, the Monday after an extended Spring Break, I asked my class, anonymously, how it worked using Zoom for our class that day, in a PollEverywhere poll (which they were used to doing face-to-face). This is the kind of check in, a form of formative assessment, that I love. If I want to know what students think or how a class activity is going for them, I ask. Among their replies: “I really liked how we could all see each other” and “It will be a good way to keep the community feel.”  We made it to the end of the first week, during which time I led whole-group discussions among all students, offered mini lectures, used Zoom’s breakout rooms to set up pair and group work, asked them to do quick writes and type their thoughts in the chat box, showed videos, and even had them share drawings on the computer screens. In their weekly reflections, which I’ve written about elsewhere, I asked them to respond to one additional question: “How did it go having our class online this first week?” As expected, students were struggling with motivation and time management, known challenges in any online learning environment. But they also shared: “This is the only class I use Zoom for and it also feels the most normal because of the level of interaction;” “I think having class online this week went well, especially since we are using Zoom, which I think helps preserve the community feel of our class;” I like the fact that we are able to break out into smaller groups and still have discussions with each other;” “I am really happy we are able to maintain the personal contact and the feeling that our class is a community.” What my students have reminded me, in this moment of social distancing, working remotely, and self-imposed isolation, is just how much they crave connection, how much they benefit from learning in place and among people. I work hard, in a variety of ways, to create this community in my face-to-face classes—and I have worked hard to maintain that communal feeling, even though we are now all separated, flung across the corners of the United States, with our cats crawling across the video feed and our classroom attire now consisting of grungy sweatshirts and bed covers. What this COVID-19 crisis has underscored for me is just how much students knowingly appreciate and crave those connections too.  There are lots of ways to stay engaged and connected with your classroom community without all meeting at the regular class time as I’m doing. I recognize that what I’m doing may not be possible, or even advisable, for all religion instructors, given class sizes, content, personal comfort with technology, instructor and student availability, and so forth. Perhaps it’s as simple as creating an announcement on your LMS just to ask students how they’re doing—not academically, but as people. Perhaps it’s creating a Google Voice Number so that you can give students a way to text you, without giving out your private contact information. Perhaps it’s holding online office hours, through Zoom, WebEx, or Google Hangouts, so students can see you if they’re in need of a friendly face. Perhaps it’s calling all of your advisees, as one of my colleagues did, or reaching out to former students with a mass email. Perhaps it’s creating opportunities for pair or group work, for instance, through an online discussion board. Perhaps it’s simply sharing with students that you’re feeling anxious or stressed or worried or discombobulated too. On our campus, we are hearing from students (and sometimes from their concerned parents) just how disconnected, discouraged, and dissatisfied they are now that the human dimension of learning has largely been taken from them. Students do not simply want to read a textbook and submit a short essay in response. They want to talk to their peers; they want to hear from a real, live instructor; they want to sit in the same space; they want to learn in the context of others. A student once asked me, a few semesters back, if I thought learning always takes place among others. I said yes. Another student disagreed. By way of evidence, he said that he taught himself how to play guitar. I asked how he did that. He said he watched YouTube videos. Okay, I said, but who created those videos? There was a long pause. Learning is communal. Never has there been, paradoxically, a moment when this has been more clear—to me and to my students.

Indignant. That word sums up how I felt at a recent departmental Zoom meeting when our chair mentioned that the Dean wanted to know about–and highlight–faculty who made the transition from face-to-face to online learning well. Who, we were asked, had gone above and beyond? My indignation focused on two assumptions behind this request. The first is the failure to see that everyone who is continuing to work with students in this time is going above and beyond, and the second is that the remote options most faculty around the country were asked to throw together in less than a week are not the same thing as online learning. Let me start with the first. The remarkable capacity of my colleagues in my program and around this country to adapt quickly and effectively should be lauded. When life changed suddenly, and while struggling to figure out living situations with partners and children and parents and friends, getting access to needed equipment and bandwidth, figuring out the challenges of groceries and prescriptions, making masks, and coping with the stress, faculty mounted classes and supported students who have often been displaced, are frequently frightened, and sometimes are sick or are struggling with others who have taken ill. Even more, we kept holding virtual committee meetings to determine whether or not students should have options with regard to grades this term, to do the routine but necessary work of our departments and programs, and to consider ways to mark graduations that would be missed. No, we are not the frontline healthcare professionals, first responders, or even the “necessary” workers in our grocery stores and pharmacies, but we are keeping the educational mission of our schools alive. And at many institutions, leaders forgot to say “thank you” to the faculty for doing what was demanded and doing it in the best way folks could manage from the places where they were. Many faculty also simultaneously found out that what works well in the face-to-face environment in terms of preparation and activity is not often what works best online. I have been teaching fully online courses in a primarily face-to-face department for more than 15 years and so my classes this term were set. But what I saw at my institution and in online forums when helping others get ready to go remote was faculty quickly recognizing that the tricks of our trade in the traditional classroom do not transfer readily to the digital world. Indeed, even when faculty want to do some of the “simple” best practices, like making useful short video lessons, it is not as easy as it seems. Then, for those “live” sessions, there are the joys of losing connections or having things freeze up or drop at key moments. And lots of faculty now know that our supposedly digitally savvy students are less so than we might think. That is before you even get to structuring and pacing sound learning activities and assignments that evaluate student progress toward learning goals or planning for meaningful student interaction or group work. In pondering these pedagogical learning curves, it becomes clear that if this pandemic keeps us physically distanced from one another into the next academic year, many faculty will need more help thinking about how to mount classes that make the best use of the platforms and materials that are available to do a fully online course. And more help to feel less swamped. In addition, we are also now also seeing that the policies of many of our institutions are not geared appropriately to this effort. How we think about seat time and contact hours, faculty workload, office hours, evaluation, or even the academic calendar itself, are for a world we are not living in right now. Indeed, they are for a world that has been disappearing for a long time. These concerns prompt even more about other areas of our work life. What about the health and well-being of the journals and publication houses? What about the conferences where we interact with our colleagues and learn? What about our granting agencies? How will changes in these areas impact tenure and promotion considerations? Will this economic environment sound the final death knell for tenure? Will we have students? Will we have support from our states?  We do not know. Many of us remember all too well the struggles of education post-2008. Now we must also wonder for ourselves: Will new contracts even come? What will the post-pandemic economy hold?  We cannot control much of what happens. But many of these issues are about academic governance. And while we have all been working hard while worrying not just about our immediate health, we also must think ahead. If that future is not to be dictated solely down the administrative chain, faculty are going to have to be ready to lead, and perhaps must do this work in the near term--likely over the summer. Now is the time to realize that faculty who adapted quickly and capably in the classroom can also offer some powerful insight into how to plan for the next phase. And so indignant is my word. Indeed, I could not help but think that many of our leaders should be less worried about calling out who we should give a gold star to for the best transition, and more concerned with marshaling the expertise at their fingertips to start planning for the future. Don’t give us pats on the head. Use our knowledge, listen to our voices, and practice sharing governance. Now is the time to call us together to work toward a future in higher education. There is much to be done.

Caught In-Between Questions “I always figured my music came from somewhere between,” said singer-songwriter John Prine in an old interview.[1] I’ve been listening to his music as part of praying for health, and now mourning his death to this pandemic. We are in an in-between time, caught in-between mourning and making music, moving through the day and being stopped in our tracks at the sheer weight of the pandemic. Some things are falling apart. Some things are holding steady. Where does the seminary curriculum fall in this spectrum and why does it matter?  Discussing teaching and learning pastoral care amid pandemic, one student asked about the purpose of specialized training in theological education. In this moment of human solidarity does professional training serve to unite and/or separate?  Another student revealed a nagging feeling that seminary wasn’t built for them and that the curriculum isn’t as inclusive as it professes. Now that finishing a semester of disruption is taking so much energy, the student wonders if it’s worth it. Is it? I share such vocational questions: what is the purpose of professional training? To what extent are our institutions exclusive or inaccessible and can this disruption lead to expansive and deep change? What is crumbling? What is holding firm? What does all of this mean for my vocation? To what extent do I believe my courses and teaching and learning practices could resource this moment? Attending Seminary in Pandemic Crisis is an unbidden test. The COVID-19 pandemic tasks the curriculum–assessing all we have learned and taught, drawing sustenance from deep wells of knowledge and wisdom, exposing as shallow what we may have thought was deep. How could theological education resource this crisis moment? Sacred texts and philosophies speak to people across times and spaces, in good times and hard times, and mostly in-between. Text and tradition can both expose and salve wounds, make and undo worlds for whole peoples. Academic practices of digging, studying, connecting, unmasking, lingering with words are staples of theological education across the curriculum that could help give energy and direction on as we move through pandemic. How does my discipline of pastoral care resource this moment? Moving In-Between We are in-between what was and what will be. Human interaction with the novel coronavirus has begun, but not yet ended. More pointedly than most days, in pandemic we linger between life and death, searching for what will give and sustain life while minimizing and transforming, vaccinating against what kills. This is a time of in-betweens. We abide in the middle. School is not what it was and is not yet what it will be next year or in five years. We move through the in-between. Medical care, economies, policies, birthday parties, clothing ourselves for the day, visiting the sick and imprisoned while advocating for health and release, embracing at weddings, births, deaths, and other momentous life occasions–our institutions, civic practices, and religious practices and so much more are not what they were just weeks ago and are not yet where they will be. We abide in the middle. Pastoral care is a discipline that pays careful attention to the in-between that could resource the in-between-nesses of our lives in this moment of crisis and disruption. Pastoral Care Can Resource the In-Between pastoral care in-between selves and communities. It is important to honor the dignity and uniqueness of each human person while also studying the places, spaces, and communities in which individuals live. Pastoral care recognizes individual vulnerabilities and limits. Pastoral care also affirms compassionate connection. Practices of faith and religious experiences abide in-between personal piety and social justice. Practices of self-reflection, communal reflection, and conversation between selves and communities can resource lingering in this in-between. In crisis, we link “how you are, really?” to “what in the world is happening?” pastoral care in-between identity and interculturality. Not only are selves and communities constantly interacting, but identities and cultures constantly interact and affect each other. An intercultural posture recognizes that there is no such thing as an identity or a culture that is exactly one unchanging thing for all times. Practices of bordering and border crossing affect belonging. Much pastoral attention is focused on the borders of identities and the deep interactions of living cultures. Practices of storytelling, translating, learning and listening across cultures, and paying attention to borders and border crossing can resource this in-between. In crisis we link “who am I?” with “how does my story reflect and contribute to a world of difference?” pastoral care in-between roles of different levels of training, authority, and power. Pastoral care practices pay close attention to the character of relationships between parents and children, between teachers and students, between faith leaders and faith community members, between therapists and clients. People with more role-based authority have more responsibility for creating and maintaining good boundaries. We also know that role-reversals can happen where the student becomes the teacher (momentarily or in more sustained way). In many families, children become care takers of aging parents. Practices of collaborating across roles with good boundaries help attend well to in-between that characterizes much of our relational lives. In crisis that crosses borders, we ask what wisdom children bring while carefully reexamining and recommitting to boundaries that guard against abuse of power. pastoral care in-between theories and practices, in-between actions and reflections. Knowing and doing, learning and acting are deeply interconnected. Inseparable. The way we know and what counts as a source of knowledge (epistemology) is affected by and affects who we are and how we engage life practices. Likewise, practices of moving through the world help us understand and evaluate theories, often interpreting or creating new ways of thinking about what it is we do and why. Practices of integrating what we do and what we think about what we do can help to resource the in-between. In this crisis, we link questions about how to lead and teach while staying home with questions about why it matters, and in what ways it is challenging. pastoral care in-between what is and what ought to be. Practices of pastoral care are transformational, not transactional. Chaplains and other faith leaders participate in pastoral care because we believe it does something in the world, something like healing, something like liberating, something like instilling courage into the heart of fear. Crisis times can bring up all the old patterns, coping mechanisms that got us through hard times before, but may not help us be well. Systems thinking helps us recognize both life-giving and stubborn harmful patterns. Crisis times can also make new collaborations possible, help structures of injustice fall away, and fuel energies for deeper transformations. Practicing noticing patterns, remaining non-anxious, and dreaming dreams of possible futures can resource this in-between. This is a time of in-between and it makes sense to be asking questions about what matters, what is worth giving up, what must be grieved, what endures. Is theological education important in-between? To me, it’s not a question of whether, but how theological education can help resource this moment of crisis–not solve it, but help move through it. I am thankful for the ways pastoral care locates study and practices in the in-between. We’re going to need all the resources each other brings as we navigate this in-between. How is your discipline resourcing the moment?  [1] https://youtu.be/x-SKCWXoryU

When your course unexpectedly pivots to an online format, students will likely feel a lot of uncertainty, and it’s hard to know how best to approach such an abrupt transition with them. Whether conducted synchronously or asynchronously, the first remote meeting is a chance for you to help students process these changes while maintaining transparency and empathy. Consider incorporating some of the following ideas:  Communicate and acknowledge the difficulty of the situation.  By the time your course meets, students will likely have experienced upheaval, distress, and disappointment over the past couple weeks. Additionally, you may have been scrambling to adjust to teaching remotely, and your personal life may now be intersecting with your professional life in complex and challenging ways. Acknowledge to students that this is a time when anxiety is running high for a number of reasons, understandably so, as these circumstances are not normal. Recognize that, yes, the transition to a remotely taught course will be bumpy, but you and the students will be navigating it together. Emphasize that this process will require empathy and patience with one another, and it can be a true partnership.   Conduct a mindfulness exercise.   Given the circumstances, it may be hard for students to make an immediate mental shift and be able to focus on your course. Give students a few minutes to become present in the moment. A short interval of stillness, a breathing exercise, or a moment for students to “empty their minds” are all ways to ground students and prepare them for the work of learning. For more guidance, see this resource on Mindfulness in the Classroom.  Clearly communicate any new expectations.  If you have already made decisions about adjustments to the syllabus, such as revised learning objectives, assessments, schedule, or course policies, explain them and provide them in writing.  Explain how students can expect the course to be run on a day-to-day basis. It can also be helpful to establish netiquette expectations around appropriate self-presentation, guidelines for engagement, sharing airtime, etc. If you plan to involve students in making any of these decisions, communicate that as well, and make time for that process.  Give students a chance to reconnect with you and one another.  Though it might be more difficult, it is possible to maintain social connection in a remote learning environment, and that social connection is especially critical in a time such as this. You might ask:  How are you feeling right now about the course/semester/this transition online?  What do you think you will need to have a successful rest of the semester?   What do you remember struggling with the most where we left off?   If you intend to hold your course synchronously over Zoom, you could have students respond over the chat, using the whiteboard tool, or in pairs/small groups using breakout sessions. If you are conducting your course mostly asynchronously, students could share their thoughts using the discussion board in the LMS.  Try conducting a small portion of class as you plan to conduct it day-to-day.  Particularly if you plan to hold synchronous sessions, you could allot some time to try a bit of “normal” instruction, including testing some of the technology you plan to use to ensure that everyone is comfortable with it. Since you and the students may be using certain tools for the first time, the first meeting can be a good time to do a trial run and iron out any issues that immediately arise.  Have students complete a pre-rest-of-semester survey.  Because this may be a major transition, it can be valuable to check in with each student about their individual needs or concerns. Have students complete a survey, which can be set up in the LMS. Questions might include:  Are there barriers or challenges to your participation in synchronous (in real time) meetings that you would like me to know about?    How proficient do you feel with the online learning environment/educational technology tools we’ll be using? Please provide your input/opinion on revising [insert course policy/assessment/course expectation here].  Where do you feel you need support at this juncture, academically or otherwise?  Is there anything else you want me to know?   Remember that this is an extraordinary situation.  You are not developing online courses, which involves a careful and deliberate process of choosing pedagogies and appropriate tools—rather, you are keeping the trains running. 

The current pandemic has caused faculties to scramble to move classroom courses online. For many instructors, these will be their first fully online course. Having taught online for over 22 years, it's been interesting to observe the steep learning curve many are experiencing. Here are the eight most common errors I see in the current scramble to go online. Trying to "translate" a classroom course to the online environment. While I'd argue that there's no such thing as "online pedagogy" (there's only good pedagogy and poor pedagogy), classroom and online are different experiences that require attention to the conditions of learning distinct to each. Attempts to re-create the classroom learning experience, methods, and modes to the online environment is a basic error. Teaching online requires a "start over" in your course design, though not necessarily a change in student learning outcomes. Applying wrong metrics to the online experience. For example, many professors are wondering how to take attendance, or figuring out what counts for attendance. Attendance is a rather archaic and almost meaningless metric left over from the industrial age model of schooling. A better metric is student engagement. Becoming a talking head. It's bad enough students have to put up with a lot of poor classroom lectures. Now they have to suffer through countless hours of talking heads as professors videotape themselves "lecturing." I've been teaching online for 22 years. I've never once used Zoom in an online course or posted taped lectures. Forcing students to watch a taped disembodied talking head almost guarantees student disengagement, especially if we fail to appreciate the liability of transactional distance in the online environment. If the content of your lecture is that important, give your students a manuscript or your lecture notes to study. Posting video lectures over seven minutes long. The lecture method takes on a different function in the online environment. When instructors ask me how they can video tape and post their lectures online I ask, "Why would you want to duplicate the most maligned and least effective teaching method and pretend the online environment is a ‘classroom’ when it offers so much greater opportunity for student engagement?" The question to ask is, "What is the pedagogical function of this video?" The most effective functions are: a short introduction, an explication, or a demonstration. Assessing the wrong thing. I see some schools wanting to assess whether students "like" the online experience. What students "like" is beside the point of the educational. A common student comment on course evaluation for online courses is, "I would have preferred to have taken this course in the classroom." The response is, "How do you know?" Ask those students if they learned what the course was intended to provide, and they'll likely say, "Yes!" Assess the right thing: evidence of student learning and achievement of the course student learning outcomes. One can also evaluate the effectiveness of the course design: structure, scope, flow, alignment with program goals, etc. Ignoring aesthetics and design when creating an online course. Figuring out your course should not be an assignment. Your course should be designed so intuitively and aesthetically pleasing so the student perceives, intuits, and understands immediately what they are seeing and what is expected of them. Your students don't read a user manual or instructions when playing complex video games—they can immediately perceive what the game is about and what they are supposed to do. A well-designed website does not provide an orientation to new visitors. Your course should be clean, intuitive, and logical in design (and that includes not adding anything that does not directly support the learning outcomes). Attempting to go for coverage rather than depth. Many classroom instructors fail to appreciate that because online learning requires a higher level of student engagement, they need to reduce the amount of coverage they usually attempt in a classroom course—-which usually is way too much as it is. A good rule of thumb: cut the content coverage by half and focus on student engagement that (1) helps students achieve a learning outcomes and (2) provides evidence of learning. Failing to ask for help. Most faculty members are used to the silo-oriented isolated nature of academia. Traditionally, they develop their courses alone. At most they may share their course syllabi with colleagues on their faculties or departments, though more often than not they are seen mostly by the dean, registrar, and library services. Teaching online, especially for first time instructors, is a great opportunity to be more collaborative in our approach to teaching. Ask for help. Experienced online instructors, your school's instructional designers, and numerous online teaching support groups are ready and happy to help you make your online course the best it can be.

When we engage our teaching world online, let me encourage you to start where you are.  It is not about the tech, gear and gadgets.  It is about vision, imagination and design. In this vlog I show you my setup, my online classroom and how I think about this space. This is not a “how to video” but rather it is a glimpse into my inner world.  I want to invite you to dream about your space, your vision for online teaching and how this might look for you.  My goal is to inspire you to think deliberately about your presence and vision for your online classroom. [su_vimeo url="https://vimeo.com/403354389" title="My Online Classroom"]

We live in a world that tries to manage risk, to assess whether this decision or that decision is more or less risky, better or worse for the long term good of the institution, more or less likely to lead to student complaints, and more. And we make plans to mitigate risks based on knowledge and experience. Then, the crisis we are not prepared for appears. And if the crisis occurs in the midst of a semester, teachers rightly find themselves asking, what does it look like to teach in the midst of a crisis? There is no "one size fits all" response in the midst of a crisis. Each school is different. Teachers are different. Students respond in their own ways. Some classes are small, some large, some medium. Some students and teachers have lots of experience online and others none. In addition, there are a variety of emotions that may be present such as fear, anxiety, lethargy, depression, panic, and worry to name a few. It is important for teachers to recognize that both the teacher and the student/s may be experiencing challenging emotions that they have to navigate while functioning in an upended life situation. Our awareness of these situations can help us as we think about teaching strategies during a crisis situation. These strategies are familiar. First, invite the whole self to be present in the classroom. When my institution moved to the fully online environment, I set up a forum for each class and invited students to “check-in” with both myself and fellow students. They were invited to share how they were doing, how they were feeling, and how they had been impacted by the coronavirus crisis. I gave a little credit for completing the forum to show students that I really wanted to hear from them. I also shared some of my own concerns with them so they could see that I was also impacted by this crisis. I plan to continue this “check-in” strategy over the weeks ahead since the impacts of the crisis will be felt for months to come. There is no use denying the presence of such a crisis. Second, communicate clearly. In the first week that we were online, I sent out several announcements sharing information as it was made known to me. For example, I let the class know it had shifted from face-to-face to online and indicated when I would send out more information. Two days later I emailed them with the class outline for the week and clear instructions about how to access and complete that week’s class. On our normal class meeting day, I reminded them that my TA and I would be available via Zoom for an optional session where they could chat or ask questions. Third, change assignments to fit the crisis. For example, in a class on the book of Acts I asked students to analyze the speeches in the book of Acts in small zoom groups and then talk about the message the scattered disciples took with them as they left Jerusalem. I then asked them to think about what message they wanted to take with them as they had been scattered from the seminary to their homes. And, I asked them to think about how they would communicate this message in the time of social distancing. In a different class, I changed a requirement for service hours to an opportunity to write on the early church’s response to plague and connect that writing with our own situation. Finally, aim for an encouraging, empathetic tone. Creating a tone that encourages both students and teachers, reminding us of both frailty and hope, and calling us to our best selves will strengthen the community of the course. Allowing many to reach out and uphold each other in the midst of challenging times means the burden is not on just one person (usually the teacher). In this way, teachers can model for the future leaders we are teaching how to be people who name their emotions/vulnerabilities, recognize the variety of responses people have to crisis, communicate clearly, work to connect the current crisis with current learning, and reach out to support one another. Which strategies are you using to teach during the time of coronavirus?

When we first move into online classroom spaces, we often miss the dynamic energy of gathered bodies in a familiar location. We lose the immediate gratification of watching in real time as new knowledge “clicks” for students in discussions and class activities. Online classrooms may initially feel sterile, artificial, and indistinguishable from one another in our learning management system. With time and experience in teaching in online classrooms, we may begin to reconsider how a traditional residential classroom is also an artificial space. Residential education occurs on the educational institution’s “turf,” asking students to put their relational connections, participation in the economy, and other vocational expressions on hold to enter into these four walls to be formed and informed. Traditional schooling is an attempt to engage life wisdom from across generations and cultures in a simulated environment that speeds knowledge acquisition and re-organizes it more efficiently from how we might naturally encounter it in life. There is nothing “natural” about a classroom with 12-200 students in it all trying to learn the same things at the same time, regardless of their existing experience or knowledge. What feels “traditional” about this education is actually a factory model of education largely adopted during the industrial revolution for the sake of increasing access to and efficiency of education for the masses. To be certain, online classrooms have many of the same constructed elements. However, they are also more porous than synchronous residential learning experiences. You may experience this in the plethora of Zoom meetings that are happening right now in the midst of staying-at-home as a part of Covid 19 mitigation. Suddenly, you see your students in their home contexts, sometimes with roommates, children, spouses, or pets wandering into the picture. The students’ home contexts become a part of the teaching and learning milieu in more pressing ways when they stay embedded in them. While they are still engaging with a community seeking knowledge, they are also embedded in other relationships and contexts where that knowledge can be tested and integrated on a daily basis. Another of the unique features of online spaces is the capacity for immediate linkage to communities and resources far beyond those of the “walled-in” residential classroom. Opportunities to have students video-conference with scholars or practitioners around the world, curate their own examples or applications of course content drawn from internet resources and their local context, or interact with external media or images related to the course are easy to arrange in online classrooms. This allows course content and the contexts in which knowledge is situated to expand in ways sometimes even beyond faculty expectations and expertise. By asking students to take the insights they are gaining into other settings or to make connections with external resources, faculty may find ways to make online interactions more analytical, more relevant to students’ final vocational destinations, and more engaging for both students and faculty. Additionally, porosity means that students can share learnings from the course through online forums from Twitter feeds to YouTube videos by linking to these in the online classroom. This practice serves as a way to test out ideas in other publics and to help students understand that ultimately this knowledge is not for regurgitation in a classroom setting for their instructor to judge but rather for integration and application in other settings. The longer I have taught online, the more I have become reluctant to serve as the primary audience for student written work. While I always read student work and provide the best feedback my own expertise and experiences with the material can provide, I find that they are better and more committed scholars when they know that what they are creating will find its way into a group who can benefit from what they are creating, whether their class colleagues or some other part of their community. Student papers are remarkably stronger when they know they will share them with their classroom colleagues or other external audiences in comparison to the ones that they will just dash off at the last minute to submit to me in order to complete an assignment. This strategy improves student formation by positioning them more regularly as persons whose knowledge impacts not only their experience but serves other communities as well.  The space for collaborative exchange between students is so much easier to engage in porous online settings where students can share resources and insights easily through links and public postings. There are times when the porosity of online classrooms can be concerning. It is helpful to protect some spaces where mistakes can be made and opinions shared that are within relationships of mutual accountability rather than in the general public. And in theological education where I teach, students are often accountable to ordination boards and hiring committees who may not yet need to witness their growth and development as they encounter new ideas. Some of those boundaries can be maintained in online classrooms to the extent that they can in the public space of a residential classroom. But the possibility of regularly opening up the classroom to the world outside the four walls is an engaging gift of online education.

Death is all around us. The palpable feeling of impending loss, grief, dread, doom, and despair has gripped our families, our nation and the world. With each passing day, there are increased numbers of positive diagnoses, hospitalizations, and loss. It feels as if we have been snatched up into the sci-fi novels of Octavia Butler.  We are on the inside of an apocalyptic narrative. We, the global community, in this pandemic moment, are walking through the valley of the shadow of death.  Mental health professionals are part of the teams of experts who are working tirelessly during this pandemic. Societal shuddering and quarantine have meant an increase in domestic violence, self-harm, and child abuse. There has been an uptick in all the forms of mental illness. Sustained periods of terror, trauma, and isolation shred our imaginations. The pressure of this moment will drive some people mad. The corporate value of rugged individualism is not serving us well in this moment. The myths of the lone ranger, the solitary winner, the underdog triumphing against all odds, are box office favorites. In the past, we have preferred the lone achiever, we have favored the one winner, and have envied the one, most prized, beauty. In this moment of pandemic, the ideologies which promote “I, me, mine” are failing us. Slowly we are awakening to, and becoming desperate for, “we, y’all, us, everybody.” The pandemic will be interrupted by a vaccine and/or by a cocktail of medications which will more rapidly quell symptoms. In the meantime, let us steady our fear, anxiety, hopelessness and despair by revitalizing our notion of community. We know all life affects all other life. Martin L. King, scholar and activist, said it this way, “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” The poignancy of this truth was made vivid for me and my students when we traveled to West Africa. Many communities in West Africa welcomed me and my students many times over many years. While learning in the homes and schools of othered persons, my students and I were immersed in the life saving and unfamiliar practices of ubuntu. Ubuntu is a communal value of connectedness, radical care, hospitality and inclusion. Ubuntu means simply – “all-of-we-are-one.”  It means, “I cannot know myself apart from you. And you cannot know yourself apart from me.” I means, “If we are not, I am not.” When Ghanaians greet a friend in the market place the question is not “How are you?” This question, in the practice of ubuntu, has no merit or meaning. The question about the welfare of a single person apart from kith and kin seems absorb in the ubuntu philosophy. The greeting, “How are you?” infers that you could be some way that your people are not. Or that the circumstances of your people are not your circumstances. In the practice of ubuntu, the report and disclosure of your wellbeing is a report of the wellbeing of your people.  So, the greeting in the marketplace is “How is it?” The response is - “We are well.” The response is in the plural. In ubuntu, if your mother is well - you are well.  If you brother or sister are on hard times – then you are on hard times.  If your aunt or uncle had a victory, then you had a victory. How you are is how they are – because “all-of-we-is-one.” Ubuntu is bubbling up all around the USA. People all over the country are finding ways, while honoring physical distancing and quarantine, to build community, find community, be community, support community, live as if we are one community. Neighborhoods are having cocktail parties while each neighbor stays on their own porch. Synchronous on-line experiences like concerts, card games, birthday parties, yoga, cooking lessons, and writing sessions are easing the feelings of loneliness and the strain of being alone. Streamed and recorded worship experiences are connecting disconnected souls.  Experiencing community, being part of something bigger than oneself, knowing that you are connected to neighbor, fictive kin, family and co-workers helps all of us cope and survive in these death dealing times. In ubuntu, individualism is replaced with empathy, forgiveness, mutuality, and a feeling of deep connection with all that is. The Wabash Center, in our nimbleness and responsiveness, has reached out to our participants asking, “How is it?” We have heard from our colleagues the many ways they are sustaining and building community. We have also listened to laments from persons in the academic community who feel neglected, overlooked, and lonely.  We have heard colleagues say, with relief in their voices, – thank you for checking on me, because no one in my school has reached out to me.  Friends, the life of the mind cannot be a life of isolation unto death.  Check on your colleagues – just say, “How is it?”  And – as important - do not be afraid to reach back when you receive a call. Participating in activities of community will beat back the fear, the anguish and the trepidation. The devastation of the pandemic will be felt for years. Together (and not apart) we will survive. In the words of Toni Morrison -- "This is precisely the time when artists go to work.  There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language.  That is how civilizations heal."  Let community building be our artistic message. Let the composers among us write songs celebrating the marvel of community. Open the old cookbooks for cocktail formulas and recipes to reconnect with the ancestors. Make quilts in virtual sewing bees for the babies born at this peculiar time; knit shawls for those who are now widowed. Relieve a parent who is home schooling by writing poetry with their children on Facetime. Map the vegetable garden you will soon plant and ask your neighbor which veggies would they like planted.  Find a way to create something for someone else knowing this gesture of care and thoughtfulness will radiate out to everybody. And when the blues come (as they will) – write the words of lament, despair and hopelessness, express the uncertainty and rage, make vivid your messiness and unbalance and sorrow. Then share it with someone else – a neighbor or friend - to help them release their pain. And so – the question, I suppose, is “how is it with me?” I am both overjoyed and overwhelmed.  I am so grateful to the Wabash Center staff for their maximum flexibility in a time when we could have gone dormant.  We transitioned to working remotely while at the same time scrambled to create needed resources for our participants.  We created a dedicated web-page for online teaching resources, tripled the number of podcasts, hosted digital check-in conversations for more than 20 workshop groups, created a Facebook page and started live webinars. We are creating a page for artistic expression and dedicated blog column for online teaching. I am overjoyed about my staff’s dedication and hard work.  We have gotten feedback that our efforts are helpful in this moment of disenfranchisement. My overwhelmed-ness is that I started the job of directing the Wabash Center just three months ago; I am still disoriented.  Then, last week, I was informed that in my circle, three friends are diagnosed with COVID-19; the wife of a friend died on Wednesday, and the brother of another friend died of cancer on Sunday.  Both families are in grief and in upheaval because the funerals will be livestreamed. In the spirit of ubuntu – we are overjoyed, we are new to our job and overwhelmed, we are grieving the loss of loved ones and incensed because a livestreamed funeral is inadequate to hold our sorrow. Even as I write this, I have a keen sense of my community gather around me - calling daily, checking-in regularly – finding ways to be together through this chaos.

One of the major advantages of the online learning environment is the capacity to help students develop critical thinking in more effective and efficient ways than the classroom environment allows. Emphasizing student engagement through online discussion forums is a powerful way to cultivate critical thinking. By having students engage more intentionally with texts and media, and respond to well-crafted prompts and questions, instructors can immediately assess the level of a student's understanding and concepts acquisition. Reading student responses to well-crafted prompts and questions is akin to a form of mind reading. The instructor gains immediate feedback on what the student thinks, how a student is thinking, the level of understanding achieved, and can identify misunderstandings. Assessing online student responses allows the teacher to provide correctives, follow up with clarifying questions, challenge fuzzy thinking, and push for specificity. In this way the teacher can cultivate critical thinking and assess evidence about how well students achieve it throughout the course. Critical thinking is one of the universally desired goals in teaching. The current ATS M.Div. program goals includes “. . . development of capacities—intellectual and affective . . . ” as one of its ministerial formation outcomes (Degree Program Standards A.3.1.3.). The online discussion experience is one of the most useful methods for developing and assessing critical thinking. What is Critical Thinking? Critical thinking is a particular cognitive activity evidenced by specific components. Attached is a handout, "Assessing and Cultivating Critical Thinking Online" with nine of those components. Other components of critical thinking not included are credibility, sufficiency, reliability, and practicality. You can use the handout to assess student responses for critical thinking. Sharing the chart with your students, or, converting it into an assessment rubric for online academic discussion can help your students cultivate critical thinking and help you assess how well they achieve it.