Ingrid Greenberg: OK. Well, welcome. Hi, everyone. To those who will be watching this recording, the topic for today is HyFlex for student access and success-- recommendations for pedagogy, hardware, and software. My name is Dr. Ingrid Greenberg, I am the Online Faculty Mentor/Coordinator for the San Diego College of Continuing Education. Jessica, would you like to say hello?

Jessica Varnado-swall: Hi, I'm Jessica Varnado-Swall. I am a Lead Online Faculty Mentor, Academic Senate Secretary, and I also serve as the co-chair of our Distance Education Committee here at the San Diego College of Continuing Education. And Jia--

Jia Sun: Hi, everyone. My name is Jia Sun, I am the ESL Digital Literacy Coordinator for San Diego college of Continuing Education.

Ingrid Greenberg: Great. Thank you. So I always like to show a slide about how we collaborate at the San Diego College of Continuing Education. We do have a belief that we are better together as we serve our students, and this is a collage of images and screen captures from all the hard work and commitment to our pilot for HyFlex instruction, and there's images here from Zoom professional development trainings with our faculty and staff, and there's a couple images of us on campus.

As we leave the fully online Zoom classes, we're now venturing onto the campus. We're going to the brick and mortar classroom and we are starting to teach from the sites on-campus. So you can see in a couple of images the instructor and instructional aide sitting in the front of the class, that one's in the lower right-hand corner.

Also in the top right-hand corner, you see an image of a Canvas screen capture. Canvas is our learning management system that we use to connect with our learners, to help them learn material from our classes, and that is used for students who are connecting with our class asynchronously at a distance, at a different time than our synchronous classes. So we are-- we've been collaborating since spring 2021, and we're really excited to be sharing some of our lessons learned, and our best practices and recommendations to you.

So today's agenda will be our enrollment, and one of the reasons why we decided to embrace this brand new teaching modality called HyFlex. And we'll be doing a quick overview of a literature review for our HyFlex research, and then we'll explore some opportunities, challenges, best practices, and lessons learned from our HyFlex pilot, and then finally we will be making our recommendations.

So we'd like to cite Dr. Beatty. He's a professor at San Francisco-- Cal State San Francisco in California, and he has published an e-textbook about HyFlex instruction and methodology. So he asked two key questions, and the first one is, under which conditions is implementing a student-directed approach like HyFlex worth the cost, or worth the investment?

And we will be describing the many ways we've used CARES Act funding and HEERF funding to support this pilot, both for staffing and technology purchases. The second question Dr. Beatty proposes is, do we have those conditions at our institution, college, department, or in our courses? And in the next couple of slides, we'll be talking about one reason we decided to return to campus in a HyFlex modality.

So student enrollment was our main reason for returning to campus. Many of our adult education students are getting new jobs or they're getting more hours in their current jobs. So as our students return to work, they have less time to study fully online, so we wanted to find a new way to reach our learners.

Now during the pandemic, some of our students, they did not adapt readily to online education. Because of the digital divide, did not have access to the internet or computer technology, for them to use Zoom web conferencing or Canvas learning management system. So we really wanted to use HyFlex instruction, which offers kind of the best of both worlds, on-campus instruction with Zoom and fully online instruction.

Also our adult education students have very fluid lifestyles, they are caregivers, they work, their schedules frequently change due to work. And so we wanted to give them more flexibility in how they participate in our classes and our belief is that the HyFlex approach will do so.

And then one more enrollment topic and technology topic, our accreditation route. One of our goals as a college institution is to grow the enrollment and student access and student success, and while doing so, we maintain and secure technology to support instruction and student services.

So it's important at this time to talk about definitions because HyFlex is a relatively new approach to teaching, especially in adult education, and it's a combination of two words, "hybrid" and "flexible." So hybrid combines both online and face-to-face teaching and learning activities, and flexible means that our students can choose whether or not to attend face-to-face on-campus or on Zoom, with no learning deficit between the two modalities.

Now Dr. Beatty also reported that when students have a choice like this, we want to make sure that whether we're teaching to the Zoom audience or on-campus audience, that there are equivalent learning experiences in both online and on-campus. So one way we do that is when we're using Zoom, we use a breakout room for conversation pair practice or group communication with our students. Now if you're on-campus, instead of using Zoom breakout rooms, what we use as a instructor, we ask our students to meet in pairs or groups and to have a conversation or dialogue around a topic.

Also, Dr. Beatty recommends that we identify equivalent learning outcomes that in both scenarios, whether students are learning in a Zoom breakout room or on-campus in pairs, they will demonstrate similar communication skills. So that's something that we're always looking for that Dr. Beatty recommended through his research. Equivalent learning experiences and equivalent learning outcomes.

So I really like this participation path illustration. And what it shows us, there's three or four column-- three columns, starting on the left is week 1, then week 2, and week 3. So in week 1 the student can choose. They either start OL, meaning online learning, or they start FTF, which is face-to-face, meaning on-ground, on-campus, in the classroom.

So a student can start fully online, and then they can choose in week 2 to again go fully online, and then in week 3, again, to go fully online. So this student is fully online all three weeks. Now conversely, another student may say, hey, wait a minute. I want to start face-to-face on-campus. I'm not that strong with computer technology, I'm going to go to campus.

So they might start face-to-face on-campus, and then their second week they may continue on-campus, but in week three, maybe someone in their family loans them a laptop and they decide to go fully online. So that would be a different participation path. And so in the HyFlex modality students have choice. They can choose any one of these participation paths.

So here's another way to look at it, for those of us who enjoy math and looking at things like in a statement. After three weeks, there can be up to eight different participation paths available, 2 to the power of 3. And if we extend this participation path into a 12-week class, we can see more than 4,000 possible paths for our students, where they can choose between fully online or on-campus face-to-face. So that would be 4,096. So those are the different participation paths that HyFlex students can choose when we're offering HyFlex instruction. Let's see, Jessica or Jia, did you want to talk about our milestones?

Jessica Varnado-swall: Yes. And I also just wanted to let everybody know that apparently there is a tech glitch, a lot of our colleagues are currently waiting to be let in and were not able to make it for some technical reason. And I see a few more people have joined us, thank you so much. Did you have technical difficulties as well?

Audience: The link was taking us to a different session that happened at 1 o'clock this afternoon. So I logged in to a different 3 o'clock session. And she gave me a private link to go in the back way to your session here.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Oh, OK.

Carl: I'll share the back link that they gave, because if you guys know anyone who's interested in joining us, this is the link. I'm going to share it with everyone. This is the one that they gave you.

Speaker 1: Yes, Carl, thank you so much. And in fact, I think I was the one that shared that with you. And I've also updated the back end of vFairs with the right link. So apologies. And I'm going to push out a notification through the platform to invite anyone who was interested. So they should see that notification here in about 60 seconds.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Fabulous. Thank you so much for doing that. So--

Speaker 1: Absolutely.

Jessica Varnado-swall: --I wasn't sure if we wanted to reintroduce ourselves or keep going. What do you think, Ingrid?

Ingrid Greenberg: Sure. Do you want me to go back to the first slide? Or we'll introduce ourselves from here?

Jessica Varnado-swall: I think from here is OK.

Ingrid Greenberg: Yeah.

Jessica Varnado-swall: What do you think, Jia?

Jia Sun: Mm-hmm.

Ingrid Greenberg: All right. Hi, everyone. I'm Ingrid Greenberg. I'm with San Diego College of Continuing Education. And I am the online faculty mentor coordinator. So happy you're here today. Thank you for being patient. Jessica.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Hi, I'm Jessica Varnado-Swall. And I am an ESL instructor as well as a online faculty mentor. I serve as co-chair of our Distance Ed Committee here at College of Continuing Education. And I also am on Academic Senate as Secretary. And my colleague Jia.

Jia Sun: Hi, everyone. My name is Jia Sun. And I am the ESL digital literacy coordinator for San Diego College of Continuing Education.

Ingrid Greenberg: All right, thank you so much. Jessica, do you want to review the milestones of our HyFlex pilot?

Jessica Varnado-swall: Certainly. So we started in the summer in May of 2021, although we had gotten some news about the OWL device before that. I'm not sure if you all are familiar with the OWL device.

One of the only departments that-- or the first departments that have started with our HyFlex pilot was the ESL department, which all three of us are from. So we did a field test when we first got the OWLs back in May. And then in June, we actually ran a class with our online students with some instructors as example face-to-face students in the audience in June.

Then in July, we had a presentation from our vendor about some more permanent solutions for video and audio, which unfortunately, due to supply chain issues, we still have not received. We're very much dependent on these mobile OWL devices. And then in July, we did some more field testing with laptops and tablets as an alternative to the OWL.

I personally ran an example with my summer class that a lot of instructors were able to attend who had been assigned a HyFlex assignment for fall. And they took the place of the face-to-face students. Then very quickly after that, since September 7 is the beginning of our semester, we were able to do a lot of training for instructional aides and faculty in August to get us ready for that September 7 launch.

So, Ingrid, would you like to cover the equity angle? And then I can--

Ingrid Greenberg: Yeah. Well, it worked out really well in the summer. We had a team of equity cultural curriculum instructors meeting to discuss, how can we deepen our equity practices on our campus and for our students? So myself, Robert Jackson, and Brian Palmiter, we analyzed our findings after working with the vendor on July 7. And those-- that analysis really shaped our approach to how do we develop both pedagogy and hardware, and then thirdly, the student services. How do we develop those three practices based on the analysis?

So even though we found many weaknesses in the July 7 presentation, it helped us develop the materials for HyFlex and the pedagogy. And it helped us further explore the hardware, like the microphones, and the video, and laptops. And how are we going to do that? And I'm going to share some of those findings with you in a moment. Let's see, Jia, do you want to talk about the ESL Program Team?

Jia Sun: Mm-hmm. Yes, so we have our dean, Jan Jarrell. And Monica Cueva is the technology coordinator, and myself, the digital literacy coordinator, and also our wonderful faculty mentor Jessica Varnado-Swall as the ESL Program Team to support all the HyFlex teachers with professional development and all the support they need.

Ingrid Greenberg: Great. OK, thank you, Jia. So after our analysis, here were some of the themes we found after the July 7 technology demonstration. So some of the strengths were that when the vendor used a stationary video camera that had a remote control for a Zoom, we found the video quality was extremely high for the presenter, the whiteboard, and the overhead projector. And the audio quality was very high for the presenter who was wearing a lavalier microphone.

But there were a number of weaknesses. The first weakness was what we call a ghost presenter. Sometimes the presenter walked away from the camera, the view of the camera. And it was like, hey, where's the presenter? Where did the teacher go?

So for some of us, this created anxiety. We were asking, hey, is my Zoom malfunctioning? What happened to the presenter? Where did he go? And so we wanted, of course, to address this as we were field testing in the summer.

The second weakness was that the instructor had to initiate selections or changes of the video presets on the video camera. So the camera was in the rear of the in-class campus classroom. And so the video, as it did a Zoom from the rear of the classroom, you're like-- it took time with the remote control to manage that, the Zooming of that video camera.

Also, because that video camera was stationary, it was on a tripod, you couldn't take it into a lab situation, like an automotive lab, or maybe a culinary arts lab, or a sewing lab. You couldn't walk around with it. The video was preset, locked down on a tripod, like it was standing on a 5-foot tripod.

Some of the other weaknesses were audio. And this was a bit of a frustration. The faculty and staff who were on campus, they did not have a microphone. So those of us who were on Zoom, we could not hear the dialogue and the questions from the faculty and staff on campus.

Even though we-- those of us on Zoom asked the presenter to repeat the question and dialogue, it didn't really happen. Also, the Zoom audience, we couldn't determine when the instructor was speaking to the in-class audience. And so sometimes those of us on Zoom, we thought there were technology malfunctions.

Also, let's talk about teacher presence and student presence. I mentioned this earlier. We talked about a ghost presenter.

The presenter would sometimes walk away from the view of the camera. And we would be left without an instructor or a teacher presence, lack of audio and visual classroom presence. So we-- those of us on Zoom could not interact with those who were on campus. So we could not imagine student engagement between the Zoom audience and the classroom audience.

So what we landed on is that our HyFlex students are going to be participating in at least three modalities. And from left to right, I have three images. So the first one is what we call on-site synchronous.

On-site means on campus. Or in adult education, we frequently rent out spaces at high schools or gymnasiums and other community centers, so any kind of brick-and-mortar campus or site. So that's number one.

And synchronous means at the same time or simultaneous. So you see here in this image an instructor is walking into the front of her classroom. And behind her is a board projection of the Zoom audience, the students who are on Zoom. So simultaneously, you see students being able to see the Zoom students as well as the classroom students.

In the second image, it's what we call Zoom synchronous. This is the Zoom audience. Students are typically in their homes. Sometimes our students will join like if they're on break from work or sitting in a car waiting for soccer practice to end.

So here in this particular image you see a student sitting at a home desk in front of a sewing machine. And the student is also watching a laptop Zoom class of an instructor providing instruction for the sewing class. So this is, again, called Zoom synchronous. And that is a simultaneous-- this instructor is providing instruction to the Zoom audience and to students in the classroom on campus.

And then in the third image on the far right, you see a screen capture of my HyFlex class that I've been teaching this fall. And it's a beginning ESL HyFlex class for literacy students. And I did a screen capture from my Canvas class. And it's the Home page, and you can see a photo of me and my co-teacher, Dreah. And so we co-teach this HyFlex class.

So there's really three main modalities that we are piloting right now-- on-site synchronous, Zoom synchronous, and then the Canvas Learning Management System is what we call asynchronous, meaning at a different time. So students can access our Canvas course at a different time outside of the synchronous Zoom classes. And I'm going to just take a pause here.

I know some of-- some of the-- today, some of you have joined us late. Are there any questions, comments, or observations at this time? Anything coming up in the Chat, Jessica? We're good? OK, great.

Feel free to type in the Chat your questions. And one of us will catch those questions. All right, Jessica, do you want to talk about live streaming and broadcasting guidelines?

Jessica Varnado-swall: Certainly. Yeah, so our Zoom students are-- we weren't sure which term to use, live stream, broadcasted. We show them on the projector so that the in-person students can see the other students. So they are live streamed in the classroom.

And then we-- our district has made some camera-- I think they changed the name from guidelines. It's like camera-- what was it, Ingrid? We were looking at it today.

Ingrid Greenberg: Recommendations, they're calling it.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Recommendations. So just in order-- because if you're on Zoom, it's very easy for you to turn off your camera or change your name. So just to let our Zoom students know that that is a possibility if they don't want to show their face, they can change their name or turn off their camera and make sure that students are able to keep their privacy. Also, the on-campus students can be live streamed or broadcasted only if the cameras are pointed towards the classroom, towards the seated students. And again, you want to make sure that you have authorization and anybody who wanted to maintain privacy can because these recordings generally are made available to the class on Canvas later.

All right, so this is a view from one of our OWL cameras that many instructors in the ESL program are using, although not all. We've been experimenting with several different devices and ways of providing the stream from the classroom and from Zoom. So if you're on Zoom, and if the instructor or classroom OWL camera is spotlighted, this is the view that you would see.

So just like a normal Zoom call, you can have that top row of the Zoom live stream or broadcast on the top or on the side. Or you could just see the speaker, depending on what you choose as your view on Zoom. But the OWL view is actually the two lower layers on here. So this one in the middle, the classroom live stream or broadcast, is if you've decided to show that, the OWL can show that as well as the bottom layer here of the instructor's and instructional assistant view who are in the front of the classroom. So this is just the OWL view.

And then not all the instructors are using OWLs in the classroom. I think that there are some benefits and drawbacks of using an all-in-one device. Some instructors have been using their own laptops or district-issued laptops.

And so you can see those two views on the right side there, laptops one and two, pointing in different directions. You can also use an iPad or a tablet. And honestly, their microphones work very well with the audio, maybe a little bit better than the OWL does.

And when you're in Zoom as the instructor, or in our case, we're very lucky to have instructional assistants in every HyFlex classroom right now, somebody needs to make sure to select who is spotlighted for the Zoom students. So if the teacher is speaking in front of the classroom, then generally that would be the instructional assistant who would make sure that that view or that camera is spotlighted. So the Zoom students can see the same thing that the online students-- or the in-person students are seeing at the same time.

So here is kind of a view of, I believe, this was during my demonstration. I was sharing my screen. And then our faculty member, who was serving as our instructional assistant for this demo, was making sure to spotlight my video also while I was sharing a screen. Is there anything more you wanted to add to that, Ingrid? I noticed you unmuted.

Ingrid Greenberg: No. You really captured it. The spotlighting is great when I want to record my class Zoom session and then provide it in my Canvas course later for students who couldn't make it to class. So that's very useful.

Jessica Varnado-swall: And one of the big pitfalls that we've noticed in our HyFlex classrooms is the whiteboard. Now that the faculty are back in the classroom with a whiteboard, I think it's just teacher instinct. You want to grab the marker and just start writing on the whiteboard.

It's so exciting to be able to have that kinesthetic experience with your face-to-face students finally in the classroom. But it's so important to keep in mind that most of our cameras that are pointed towards the front of the classroom have a very hard time picking up marker on whiteboard. There's a glare from the whiteboard. It's not high definition enough. It may not be focused in enough.

And so really, the better experience for both the face-to-face students and the Zoom students is to use the Zoom whiteboard option. Or maybe just share your screen with a Google document, just like you would on Zoom if all you had was Zoom students. And make sure that is projected to the classroom white-- to the classroom screen so that everybody in both modalities can see it.

Another big issue we have, even if the teacher is projecting their handout or something onto the screen of their classroom, they want to go over and gesture at the screen in front of the class, which leaves out the Zoom contingent. And nobody on Zoom knows what the teacher is pointing at. They can see the teacher's screen, but they don't see the teacher's hand in the classroom necessarily. So using the Annotation features within Zoom's whiteboard is a much more effective strategy if you have both face-to-face and Zoom students simultaneously.

So this is Ingrid's example. I'll let her explain how she's using the Zoom whiteboard in her class.

Ingrid Greenberg: Thanks, Jessica. Yeah, on the left is a Zoom whiteboard. And because I teach beginning ESL HyFlex, I open my class with what the day of the week is, and the date. And my students help me write it out. And we practice pronunciation.

And then on the right, near the end of class we do a dictation. And so on the right-hand side, the students are helping me spell after we've done the spelling practice and dictation. And again, I'm using the Zoom whiteboard.

So what's great about the Zoom whiteboard is my students in the Zoom audience can see it. And then the second audience, my students on campus, I'm projecting the Zoom whiteboard on a screen in the classroom. So my students sitting in the classroom, they get a great view as well. So both audiences are getting a crystal clear view of this Zoom whiteboard.

Oh, and then instead of using hand gestures, I do use the Zoom Annotation tools. And that takes over. So I'm not making hand gestures that the students on Zoom can't see. So the Zoom Annotation tools play a huge role in HyFlex.

Jia Sun: OK, and I'll be talking about what's happening with the ESL program HyFlex classes. So currently, we have 33 HyFlex classes offered. And the majority of the classes are ESL level one and level two.

We also offer a few online learning [inaudible] and citizenship classes. And we are adding more late-start classes this month and next since we have a long wait list for beginning levels. Last time when I checked, there were about 80 students on the waitlist for beginning literacy one class. And we cannot enroll any new students after the first census date, which was at the end of September.

And out of the 33 HyFlex classes, we had to convert a few HyFlex classes into fully online due to in-class attendance. But for the remaining classes-- HyFlex classes that we have, we do see an increasing number of in-class students comparing to the beginning of the semester. So students do get encouraged to go back to school because they see other students are doing so.

Technology-- we have 28 OWL cameras in total for the ESL program. We have more than enough. We have a list of one OWL camera in each HyFlex classroom.

Instead of using the OWL camera, teachers can also choose to use a webcam or their laptop. And our district provides the Logitech C920 webcams and also laptops for instructors and instructional assistants. We also have the lavalier mics that teachers can choose to use or not. And we also have the document camera that is compatible with Zoom.

So the teachers do need to set up the document camera. They have to follow the instructions. And we have the link of the instruction at the last slide.

And we also have tripods in each HyFlex classroom that can hold either the OWL device or the webcam. As mentioned earlier, we ordered some permanent installed cameras in July 2021 that will be installed on the ceiling of the classroom. And we will be receiving some of the technology soon.

Ingrid, can you go to the next page? Thank you. And we've been providing professional development for our HyFlex pioneers. So here is the list of trainings and supports that we have.

So we are offering HyFlex orientation for all registered students. So during the orientation, students will learn what is HyFlex class, how to communicate with their teacher, and get class information via email, how to use Zoom and log in to Canvas. And the project assistants, who lead these orientations, will also help the students who will study only on their mobile devices to download the Zoom app and the Canvas app during the orientation.

So our technology coordinator, Monica Cueva, and I offer three open-lab sessions for the HyFlex teachers before the fall semester starts. So teachers learn how to use the OWL camera and practice a little bit with connecting the OWL to the podium computer and setting up all the technology they need for their class. Jessica Varnado-Swall, our online faculty mentor, and Monica Cueva, and I also hosted two instructional aide trainings. In the training, the AIs learned how to support the HyFlex instructors and also some Zoom basics, like how to create breakout rooms, how to use Annotate tools, and how to spotlight a teacher's video as necessary.

We also provided on-site support for HyFlex teachers for the first two weeks of school, just to answer some questions, ease nerves, and troubleshoot when necessary. And we are-- keep providing the on-site support for new HyFlex teachers as well. This semester, we also created the HyFlex meetup group that meets every other week. And this is a great opportunity for teachers to brainstorm ideas, share best practices, and ask questions.

We also created two separate Pronto groups. One is for the instructors, and one is for the IAs. So this is also another way for people to communicate with each other and ask questions.

And the last one, HyFlex teachers can also sign up for weekly ESL tech or HyFlex mentoring to get help with any HyFlex or online teaching issues. And we also created many job aides and video tutorials. So you will find all those resources on the last page of the links.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Sorry to interrupt, Jia. We do have a couple questions in the Chat.

Jia Sun: Oh, OK.

Jessica Varnado-swall: The first one is from Jill. "Can you talk about how an interactive whiteboard could be used in a HyFlex modality?" Are we using any interactive whiteboards right now for ESL? Do you know?

Jia Sun: ESL-- interactive whiteboard.

Ingrid Greenberg: I'm not aware of any ESL classes using interactive whiteboards. Maybe the DSPS class is using it. It's possible.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Yeah, we don't have very many within our program. So, yeah, sorry we don't have a lot of first-hand knowledge with how that works with Zoom, or if it works with Zoom. The next--

Ingrid Greenberg: If the interactive whiteboard could be connected, could log into the Zoom class, that would be one way to do it. And I'm not familiar with that. So it's worth exploring, though, for sure.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Yeah, if anybody has any more experience with interactive whiteboards, go ahead and write it in the Chat. Hopefully, we can have some answer to give to Jill. The next question is from Carl. "Did you use digital pens when using Zoom whiteboards?"

Ingrid Greenberg: I have not been using a digital pen on Zoom whiteboards. And I will say, I was promised that we will soon receive iPads. And when we do, I'm going to be using a digital pen. I'm looking forward to that, to handwriting. So that'll be a great way to use a digital pen on the Zoom whiteboard.

Jessica Varnado-swall: I've personally used an iPad Pro with an Apple Pencil in a Zoom meeting, and it worked well. I haven't tried it in a HyFlex scenario. But I think it would work quite well.

Ingrid Greenberg: Yeah, I think it would be a great thing to do. I do-- while we're still on this slide, I do want to point out in this photo, in this slide, this is during the first week of the semester. And as Jia Sun said, our instructors and our instructional aides, they were nervous. This was brand new. They were pioneering this new technique, this new approach.

So I visited one of our campuses. And here I am, helping out the instructor and the instructional aide get ready to teach their first HyFlex class. I also want to point out, we've been mentioning the OWL device. If you look in this photo, the OWL device is sitting on the corner of that desk, near the left side of the photo.

And it stands about 5 inches tall. And it looks like an OWL, with big eyes, because those eyes are the cameras that move around. And-- no, the cameras don't move around. There's software that helps them capture different images in the classroom. So if you're wondering what the OWL device looks like, it's sitting there on the corner of that table on the left side of this photo. Let's see.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Diana Vera-Alba wrote in the Chat about she has had some experience, or K-8 schools use interactive whiteboards a lot. And also, she had one in her classroom at Sweetwater Adult School previously. Diana, are you able to unmute? I'm not sure what attendees have privileges.

Diana Vera-alba: Yes.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Thank you. Would you like to--

Diana Vera-alba: Yes, I did have an interactive whiteboard. But I definitely did not have an OWL. So that technology was not available to us back then.

But interactive whiteboards typically have a pen. Somebody mentioned a digital pen. So they have pens. And some of them, the instructor can use their finger.

So, yeah. But typically, they do have some kind of pen. It's very similar to the Annotations we have in Zoom, where you can-- in Zoom, we use the mouse. And on the interactive whiteboard, we had a digital pen, similar to what we have like on our iPads, like the magic pen on iPads.

But it didn't have a camera. You would have had to have a camera on your computer. And it would have had to be similar to our podiums, how we have at our district. It would have had to be installed on-- the camera would have had to have been installed on the laptop or podium, or the OWL-- somewhere nearby.

Ingrid Greenberg: Thank you, Diana. Appreciate that overview--

Diana Vera-alba: [inaudible]

Ingrid Greenberg: --of interactive whiteboards. This next slide is about the HyFlex pilot. We decided to do a survey early on in the semester. So we could capture feedback quickly from our instructors, so we could pivot our professional development and our support very quickly.

And I'm showing there's a Zoom class or a Zoom meeting here of some of our HyFlex instructors. And you can see we're at a meetup, I believe, Jia. And so this is-- these are some of our instructors who have been pioneering the HyFlex support.

So I'm going to share some survey results. 13 faculty answered as of September 21. Two of the instructors taught citizenship ESL classes. One of the instructors taught DSPS, a disability class. And there were a total of 11 ESL classes represented.

So here is some of the results. What technology would you like to order to support HyFlex instruction? So the most frequently requested tech support requested was webcam. 11 instructors, or 85% of our sample, they requested a webcam in addition to the OWL device, or in addition to their laptop.

Then 7 instructors requested a second microphone because the OWL device, sometimes the microphone wasn't picking up the classroom audio sufficiently. So some of the instructors, 54% of the instructors, were requesting another microphone. Then 3 of the instructors requested a laptop, and that was 23%. So these were some of the hardware that was requested-- webcams, a second microphone, and a laptop. And again, this was very early on in the first or second week of our semester.

The next question from the survey-- what kind of professional development would you like to request for you as an instructor and your instructional aide? So the number one requested professional development was for troubleshooting the audio. Frequently, the audio between the OWL and a laptop or a teacher podium computer, frequently, there were screeching noises, echo noises, all kinds of those noises you might hear at a live event.

And so 10 instructors, 77%, said they would like more training around troubleshooting the audio for themselves. They also reported that they would like to see their instructional aides to receive support. So 62% of the instructors requested that our instructional aides get support for troubleshooting audio. So based on these two survey questions, we put a lot of energy and support into field testing different types of microphone, different ways of handling the audio on campus and how it conveyed in the Zoom audience.

What time is it? OK, so we're almost near the end here. And I have some testimonial comments.

But I'm thinking I'd like to open the floor to-- well, maybe we should do recommendations. I'm going to skip these testimonials. And everyone has access to the link. You can read these testimonials on your own.

And what we'd like to do now is bring your attention to our Recommendations slides. So if you're thinking of implementing HyFlex, or you're in the process, before your college or organization starts a HyFlex program, we recommend that you acquire, install, and field test the HyFlex hardware-- the video, the microphones, the laptops, and the tablets. It's a little bit like you're managing a concert. You've got to figure out all the sound systems so that the audience doesn't hear that feedback noise from the different microphones and speakers.

Then, in our classrooms there's a teacher podium with a computer and a projector. We found as our instructors returned to the classroom, many of the teacher podium computers, the operating system software was out of date and needed to be updated. And in some cases, the CPU, the computer had to be replaced as well.

Also, we found that the projectors, they were kind of blurry. And they were not as sharp as we would like when we want to project either a Zoom whiteboard or the Zoom audience. So you might need to update your projectors.

The other things we noticed is you need to practice how will the teacher be present in the HyFlex class when they're in the classroom and they're also on Zoom, because it's really easy for the teacher to leave the field of the camera. And then there's what I call the ghost presenter. Oh, and by the way, it's-- Halloween's coming up. So ghost presenter fits in really well.

The other thing to consider is, what type of student interaction are you looking for? Are you going to be asking students who are on campus in the classroom, do you want them to interact with the students who are on Zoom? So do you want students between the two audiences interacting? Or will you be asking students in the classroom to interact, and then separately, the students on Zoom will interact and do pair and group work?

Also, before and during the pilot, please consider professional development. How will you customize your professional development to serve your instructors, your classified professionals who are going to be supporting this effort? While we were field testing microphones, and the OWL device, and other methods, we invited our instructors to observe, to be part of either the Zoom audience or the classroom audience. So that was extremely helpful for them to be either a participant in one of the audiences or to observe. And we recorded all of those Zoom trainings.

Also, we gave them hands-on training with hardware and practice with some of the HyFlex instruction. We also came up with HyFlex meetups. And this is really modeled on something that's been working ever since the pandemic.

The ESL program has very, very active meetup groups for the beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels in ESL. And it's on a volunteer basis. And our instructors are very passionate about showing up and presenting their best practices. So we thought we would extend these meetups into the HyFlex professional development.

Also, at some of these meetups, we would invite office managers and classified professionals to help answer questions. As we returned to campus, there were simple things that would come up like, where can I park, do I need a parking pass, who's going to open the classroom, how do I get keys? All these return-to-campus questions were coming up. And so it was super helpful to have classified professionals joining us in these trainings professional development.

The other recommendation is providing instructional assistant support in the HyFlex class. I'm currently teaching a beginning ESL HyFlex class. I cannot imagine teaching it without support from an instructional assistant.

They play such a huge role. They help me with Zoom breakout rooms. They help me with student sign-in and also with students' vaccination clearance or testing clearance before they enter the class.

Also, we highly recommend reporting your pilot findings on a regular basis to the different stakeholders. The academic and classified senates, all the academic programs, from ESL, to automotive, to sewing, whatever adult-ed programs you have, communicate your findings frequently. Also, keep in touch with all the district distance educators, your administrators, and your deans. We need to keep them in the loop.

And our union leadership-- and a quick side note. Our union leadership wrote a side letter, and it wasn't an exact match to what we're doing. And so we're going to be reaching out to them again to help us with that. Also, accessibility is extremely important, as we all know. And so make sure you're in dialogue with your resource team for accessibility.

So some more recommendations. One thing-- I think Jia, Jessica, and I, we can-- one thing we can say is we didn't consider student services enough. So I-- we recommend that you include them early on in your planning, because we have a clearance list that gets emailed to us if we are HyFlex instructors. But we didn't really get a job aid or training on how to interpret the clearance list. And it isn't obvious what the instructor role is.

So if I'm standing in my classroom, and there's a line of students about to enter, how do I screen them? Do I have to print out that list? And then do I need the student to show me their student ID? So there's a lot of details that go into reviewing that student clearance list when you're teaching on campus for HyFlex.

So we do recommend that we avoid or minimize the amount of time and effort an instructor needs to invest in screening students, because that takes a lot of effort. And when you're teaching beginning ESL, like I am, how many languages do we find in a beginning ESL class, right? Right now, I've got at least nine different languages. And sometimes it's a little hard to communicate to those low-literacy students and their vaccination requirements.

And also, continue working with your Accessibility Resource team. So, Jessica and Jia, I think that was the end of the recommendations. Did you want to add anything to that?

Jessica Varnado-swall: We just did our five-minute warning, so--

Ingrid Greenberg: OK.

Jessica Varnado-swall: --FYI.

Ingrid Greenberg: All right, and thee-- I'll just close with this revelation I had just a few days ago. Teaching HyFlex and planning for HyFlex has really been a soft launch for reopening our campuses. We have been pushing the limits in our-- as HyFlex pioneers. We've been pushing and brushing up against the limits of what our capacity is as we return to campus, and everything from when do the doors open, when is the front desk open, and how can students get their questions answered when they're on campus, when-- how late is the janitor-- I teach an evening course. And when does the class get locked down? Or when does the campus get locked down and things like that?

So we are learning together. It's an amazing collaboration between faculty, staff, administration, and students. And as we pioneer this, the most important thing is collaborating together and staying in communication. So now we'd like to open the floor to any comments or questions.

And if we don't have any, maybe we can run our Zoom poll now that we have-- looks like we have 22 people with us now.

Speaker 1: Sure. I just launched it. There you go.

Ingrid Greenberg: All right, so if everyone could answer the Zoom poll. And that will help us understand your level-- novice, intermediate, or advanced. And next time we offer some kind of training or do a presentation, we can orient our training that way.

So I know some of you need to peel away and take off. Thank you for answering our Zoom poll. "Glad I'm hearing fantastic information." Thank you for that in the Chat. And--

Speaker 1: I can-- we're at 78% participated. I can end and share.

Ingrid Greenberg: Yep, you can end and share now.

Speaker 1: OK.

Ingrid Greenberg: OK, so in our group today, we either have novice or intermediate. None of us are advanced. [chuckles] That makes sense.

All right, well, thank you for answering our poll. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you for navigating some of the tech speed bumps earlier.

We really appreciate you joining us. And we look forward to hearing from you and your evaluation. Thank you.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Definitely. And I know that we have this recording. So if you missed the first part of it, right, Mandilee? They can go back and watch the recording later. Is that right?

Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely. So I do extend apologies for the glitch on the back end. But I am happy that we were able to get a good handful of people, and more than a handful of people, in shortly thereafter we started.

For those of you that did miss the first 10-15 minutes, the recording, once processed, will be posted on the vFairs site. You can find that under the Agenda next to the session. And it should have a Play button there.

Additionally, if you were not able to grab that link with all of the resources shared by the HyFlex team here, you can also find that under the Agenda. Grab that link there as well. We thank you for concluding. This is our last session on our first day of the CAEP 2021 Summit.

Thank you so much for everyone joining and participating. Be sure to join us first thing tomorrow morning. We have our plenary speaker.

And in those off times, we ask that you check out the photo booth, and have some fun with that, connect with some colleagues statewide in the networking lounge. You can create your own private chat rooms. And then if there's any technical difficulties that come up, definitely chat us in the vFairs Technical Support or in that blue Chat icon button, which is how we found out we had a glitch and were able to get on that right away.

So thank you, Ingrid, Jia, and Jessica. It was a wonderful presentation and lots of great information.

Jessica Varnado-swall: Thank you so much.

Ingrid Greenberg: And thank you, Mandalit--

Jia Sun: Thank you.

Ingrid Greenberg: --for being our tech host today. We appreciate it.

Speaker 1: Oh, my pleasure. All right, ladies, have a good rest of your evening. And thank you all for joining us.