Marisa Bardach pushes her purple glasses to her face and waits for her class to file into 206E Newhouse I. She tugs her hair behind her ear as they settle into seats behind Mac computers and pull out notebooks. Some look up and smile, and Bardach smiles back – from more than 250 miles away in her Brooklyn, N.Y., home office.

Bardach, an editor at Prevention.com’s New York office, teaches MAG 500: Writing and Editing for Magazine Web sites. Using Skype, a built-in webcam on her computer projects her face onto a screen in a computer lab of Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. A webcam propped on a tripod in the corner of the same room sends a live image of the class to her laptop.

During office hours, students Skype Bardach to discuss projects or something they learned that week – perhaps something about producing HTML slideshows or a video series.

Distance learning is nothing new at SU, where the School of Information Studies offered more than 80 online courses during the 2008-2009 academic year. A course on gaming and libraries taught via YouTube debuted this summer. The iSchool will kick off National Distance Learning Week today to celebrate the school’s classes and students with ties to online learning.

Though distance learning has been around for years, more students are taking online classes because of improvements in computer technology. Greater access to broadband, and thus innovative teaching implements such as YouTube and Skype, has led to increased interest, said Alan Foley, an associate professor of instructional design, development and evaluation in the School of Education who studies online learning technologies.

Most are asynchronous classes, meaning students can review learning material and respond, usually by posting comments on a discussion board, at a time that fits their schedule.

Bardach’s class, which will be offered again next semester, is unique in the fact that an entire class sits together and watches a professor live. Bardach’s students are able to work together and troubleshoot any problems that come up when she’s not there, she said.

‘A lot of other departments have been really curious abut how this class has been going, how it’s being done,’ said Melissa Chessher, chair of the magazine journalism department.

Because magazine Web sites are constantly evolving, it helps to have someone who’s currently working in the industry teach the class, Chessher said.

Bardach said only a few glitches have arisen, despite how dependent the class is on technology. There have been instances when she hasn’t been able to see the whole class and times when they haven’t been able to see her. Sometimes the screen freezes or the pixels jumble and distort the image on either end.

‘The students will shake the mouse on the computer, and that’s how I know I’m probably frozen at this point and they’re trying to reactivate me,’ Bardach said, laughing.

‘It’s a little weird sometimes,’ said Andrea Alemany, a senior magazine journalism major. ‘Sometimes it’s really quiet and you can tell she knows it’s really quiet, so she doesn’t know if we’re really listening. But it works.’

Next semester, Bardach said she might use technology that will better allow students to see the materials she’s teaching on screen. One obstacle she’s come across this semester is teaching visual topics such as HTML without the students being able to see something she’s pointing to.

‘It’s just a matter of giving really specific directions,’ she said. ‘You almost have to become a little like a tour-guide teacher.’

She uses an additional computer to view the materials she’s teaching the class while on Skype. The students can access the tools and Web sites that Bardach is viewing by logging onto their Ning.com accounts, which also allow them to post the videos they make for class.

Ning, which Bardach described as a site that allows you to create your own social network, offers a combination of blog, video, chat and comment features. Students log in to their accounts, and Bardach posts a blog with links necessary for each class.

Bardach will see her students on their last day of class. She has visited SU twice this semester, including on the first day.

‘That started things off really nicely. I was able to shake everyone’s hands, introduce myself, look them in the eye,’ she said, laughing.

She said she was surprised how quickly she and the students became comfortable, but then rethought the situation when she returned during the middle of the semester.

‘It was like a high school reunion,’ she said. ‘We were like, ‘Hi! How are you? How have you been?’ Even though we’d been talking twice a week all that time, and I think that’s only when we were like, ‘Wow, our situation is really weird.”

Alan Foley said distance learning has proven to be highly effective and is not significantly different than learning in a traditional classroom.

‘I really believe that online (classes) really amplify things,’ he said. ‘I think that there’s a really bright future for it.’

bmdavies@syr.edu

Published on November 11, 2009 at 12:00 pm