IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2021 - 47

Opinion
Blended Learning: New Prospects for
International Higher Education
Shidong Wang
University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 2JD, U.K.
Hua Sun and Fang Wang
Peking University (PKU), Beijing 100871, China
 Shidong wang (Sw): Please share with us
the pandemic experience of Peking University and
Oxford University. How has your university adapted
its education and teaching to COVID-19 conditions?
Hua Sun (HS): Both university campus closures
and economic stagnation have had major impacts
on higher education. Over the past months of COVID19,
online teaching has become the main teaching
method for colleges and universities globally. This
pandemic scenario has necessitated teacher training
programs on how to conduct successful online teaching
under unprecedented pressures and challenges all
within a very short time. And of course, such programs
can take place only remotely, with teachers having to
support students and their parents alongside.
We believe that online teaching can, to some
extent, make up for the loss of in-person teaching and
learning, but economic, technological, and educational
levels differ greatly between campuses in China.
For this reason, the Ministry of Education in China has
announced that all schools and universities should
coordinate, at both national and local levels, to bring
in the rich quality of online education resources and
the other support and services for continued learning
available across all regions.
Here at PKU, we have been offering 4000 courses by
3000 teachers online. We are very pleased that through
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MTS.2021.3077050
Date of current version: 3 June 2021.
June 2021
cross-disciplinary and cross-department coordination,
these courses have been delivered in consistency with
their learning goals, and it is encouraging that some
teaching performance has even been improved by
adopting innovative methods. Many teachers felt quite
nervous and anxious at the very beginning about the
new method, having never tried online teaching before.
To ease their pressure, our Center for Excellence in
Teaching and Learning has been providing training
sessions, not only on technical tools, but also on
teaching methodologies and strategies for the purpose
of improving student interaction and online learning
experience. We have also set up a hotline information
mailbox and We Chat group to provide extra support.
We offer online education in five modes: livestreamed
lectures, pre-recorded lectures, massive
open online courses (MOOCs), webinars, and studio
lectures for the best possible outcome equivalent
to the on-campus experience. Most undergraduate
classes are delivered through live stream or pre-recorded
lectures, while postgraduate courses tend to
be taught in smaller size classes so that one can have
more diverse formats. We have found that the use of
multiple modes is conducive to better learning results.
Our training courses to faculties and departments
have also covered an online examination system,
with a technology solution that supports the necessary
system security and stability. Postgraduate
research proposal presentations and thesis defences
have also been successfully conducted online.
0278-0097/21©2021 IEEE
47
Lynn Robson
University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 2JD, U.K.
IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2021
