Pivot to Online for STEM Educators

Note: This session has passed, please view the recording and resources below.

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educators across B.C. are facing shared challenges around remote teaching. Some of these challenges include conducting labs and assessments in an online environment. We will be joined in this session by STEM educators who will share their experience and ideas about pivoting online and will discuss BCcampus’ new Virtual Lab and Science Resource Directory that lists free science resources designed to support remote STEM education. We invite you to join us and connect, learn from each other, share ideas, and collaborate as you prepare for your fall semester.

Facilitators:

Jennifer Kirkey

Jennifer is a senior instructor of astronomy and physics at Douglas College in New Westminster, B.C. She currently teaches first-year astronomy to liberal arts majors and physics to a wide range of students—from those with no physics background to those studying engineering. With over 25 years of experience, she is the BCCAT Articulation Committee Chair for Physics & Astronomy and is a founding member of Open Douglas, a group of faculty and staff interested in promoting OER at the college.

Mark Paetkau

Mark is an Associate Teaching Professor at Thompson Rivers University, in Kamloops BC.  Mark’s passion is undergraduate laboratory teaching, and has spent considerable time on development of simulations to help students prepare for labs, as well as the development of undergraduate laboratory curriculum and individual labs (beta-ray and optical based CT scanning).  Mark has also developed new ways to deliver old curriculum in courses such as Physics for Future Leaders (based on Physics for Future Presidents, developed for team teaching in f2f and Open Learning delivery), and also introducing new topics to a pan-disciplinary audience (Quantum computing intended to bring together computer science, math and physics students). The planning for the fall has led him to distill and refine basic learning outcomes of laboratories and look for simple measurements to provide students opportunities to learn transferable skills.

Derek Turner

Derek is an Instructor at Douglas College a Quaternary geologist who explores the timing and causes of Pleistocene glaciations in the Canadian Cordillera, their connection to long-term climate change and their lasting impact on the people, ecology, and landscape of northwestern North America. Derek also has 10 years of consulting experience working on projects involving infrastructure and resource development, natural hazards and terrain, and surficial geology mapping for a variety of applications. As an educator, Derek is an enthusiastic advocate of student-led, experiential geoscience education and the use of open educational resources to make Earth and Environmental Science courses more accessible for his students.

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