Transforming educators' practice: How university educators learned to teach online from home during the Covid-19 pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic triggered a large-scale change in the way university educators worked. This article examines tensions that shaped how educators adapted their teaching as they worked from home during the pandemic. The study is based on empirical data gathered at a large-scale, research-intensive UK university in the first weeks of lockdown. Activity Theory analysis is used to examine transformations in practice, how these changes were culturally and historically situated and materially and socially mediated. The themes identified are examined through a series of vignettes to pinpoint personal factors that influenced the expansion of work. This study's findings signal a call to action to support new forms of work through five policy actions related to personal factors that influence the work, life and wellbeing of educators. Going forward, there is a need for universities to develop and implement policies that take into consideration these five areas to support educators to expand how they work. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Gender and the lived body experience of academic work during COVID-19

The rapid transition to online teaching in response to Covid-19 presented unprecedented challenges for academic communities. Staff had vastly different experiences of engaging with technology, and these experiences are shaped by factors including gender, (dis)ability, socio-economic resources and caring responsibilities. We report findings from an intersectional interview examination of how 412 staff in a large London-based university adapted to teaching and researching from home at the beginning of lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this article, we construct grounded theory around the divisibility of the body, and the conflicts arising from the need to span home and work-life, our findings illustrate how patterns of inequity for women academics converge to construct ways of managing the boundary work of home and work with different degrees of successes. We document how management support and/ or existing expertise were vital to enable women academics to overcome obstacles to equitable work.)

The Choices That Connect Uncertainty and Sustainability: Student-Centred Agile Decision-Making Approaches Used by Universities in Australia and the UK during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Given that universities have significant choices to make about what is retained from our emergency measures, the authors set out to use the record of our biweekly meetings to examine the choices that we have made during the pandemic and how we have made them. In this collaborative reflective article from authors from five different institutions in the UK and Australia, we demonstrate that student-centred decision making emerged unanimously as the core value driving our decision making during the pandemic. In our reflections, supported by our diary notes, we explore and document our decision-making processes relating to educational technology through the lens of agile values and principles in the context of crisis leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic. We discuss four prominent drivers for student-centred decision making: (a) collecting and rapidly sharing student voice data, (b) offering more choice in anticipation of diverse needs, (c) giving a high priority to equalising access to technology and (d) taking responsibility for students in difficult circumstances. In addition, we discuss five emerging data-driven themes -- leadership, operational continuity, student welfare, pedagogy and technology infrastructure -- and offer insights into student-driven decision making with examples from our respective institutions. The ultimate aim for our reflection is to establish approaches that we value in higher education leadership that we should sustain and to formulate principles for student-centred agile leadership for university education which can serve us during the pandemic and beyond.

Moving Teaching Online: Cultural Barriers Experienced by University Teachers during COVID-19

This empirical study examines the experiences of academics and professional service staff in a large UK university during first weeks of the transition to online teaching and working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. The method draws on the work by Gourlay and Oliver (2018) to explore engagement with the digital university in everyday practice. Using data from 412 survey responses and 32 interviews, the study traces varying ways staff characterised themselves during the first months of lockdown in the UK (from March to July, 2020). The findings highlight that university support services underwent a metamorphosis to support the transition to online teaching. However, insufficient attention was paid to the 'identity crisis' and threats perceived by academics who were used to teaching students on campus. Academics tended to focus on transferring traditional teaching practices to the online environment, rather than on changing teaching practice, leaving face-to-face teaching as the default point of reference. These cultural barriers are a persistent obstacle to a more productive engagement with digitalisation. Transitioning to online teaching involves continuing existing work while also learning new practices. Such efforts were challenging for teaching staff who did not have dedicated space at home to work and those with caring responsibilities. This, combined with gendered patterns around caring and the extra support needed by students during the crisis, added emotional labour to already-full workloads. We recommend that intersecting forms of disadvantage be acknowledged, supported and rewarded for universities to create sustainable and just futures.