Students and Lecturers Can Benefit From Hybrid Course Tech
Institutions’ focus has shifted over time from establishing basic remote instruction capabilities in classrooms to working to ensure faculty members can provide engaging, uniform experiences with the use of tech elements such as Microsoft 365, Teams, Windows and Copilot, Jubelirer says.
“Teams provides a single digital hub for meetings, chat and collaboration, with tools like Word, PowerPoint, Excel and OneNote integrated directly into the workflow,” he says. “Whether learning happens in person, online or somewhere in between, the experience stays consistent.”
Logitech’s Rally camera components allow educators to walk around the room during class without alienating offsite students. Instructors simply tap on a wireless button to use preset mounted camera viewpoints instead of having to return to the podium to change the camera’s direction on the main console, says Jay Lyons, principal product and portfolio manager for education at Logitech.
“We've seen this firsthand in institutions, where the camera is just sitting there, the lights are dark and everybody remote is staring at an empty podium, not knowing what’s going on or what the lecturer is pointing to or referencing,” Lyons says. “Having buttons around the room is one way of solving it.”
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Logitech’s Scribe whiteboard camera can also be enabled via a button to share the instructor’s writing on a meeting collaboration program, such as Zoom.
“We actually have a ghosting mechanism; you can fade it so it’s somewhat transparent,” Lyons says. “As the lecturer is writing on the whiteboard, you can still see the arm, hand and pen, but it’s not blocking what's being written or is already on the board. That makes an impact — especially if you're trying to keep the attention of students that might be remote.”
Artificial intelligence functionality is playing an increasingly larger role in hybrid learning, according to Roy Mathew, principal for higher education at Deloitte. Smart whiteboards, for example, use it to capture notes and summarize and send the information to students.
Training, Mathew says, can help instructors understand how to troubleshoot hybrid classroom tech issues and maximize AI’s use.
“If you’re the instructor, how do you incorporate AI into learning management systems and everything from content creation to grading and plagiarism detection?” he says.
Students can leverage AI elements within videoconferencing platforms to fill in information they missed when taking notes by posing brief questions to the chat functionality or scanning a lecture summary after class, according to Lyons.
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“They have this ability to get notes hand-tailored for them, as well as catch-up mechanisms during the class,” he says. “Especially when you look at things like Google NotebookLM — I could take the video, lesson plan and notes I wrote, put them all together and tell this platform to give me flashcards, a slide deck, a quiz. That could be massively powerful, as far as preparing for finals and retaining information.”
The Interoperability Challenges of Hybrid Sessions
With students now bringing a number of personal devices to school, including laptops, cellphones, game controllers and smart printers, some institutions, Mathew says, have invested in expanding their wireless access point coverage and network capacity.
“Many campuses historically over the past 10 years or so had dead spots or slower Wi-Fi in the dorms, classrooms or certain buildings,” he says. “That’s no longer acceptable — especially when using all of these technologies in the classroom that are critical to learning.”
When incorporating audiovisual (AV) equipment for hybrid instruction in older buildings with outdated power and infrastructure elements, Mathew says, piecing together solutions designed to perform separate functions can be challenging if they don’t exchange data easily — resulting in students navigating a jumbled information ecosystem.
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All-in-one solutions are another option.
“Products like the Rally Bar can be brought into a space that may not have a bunch of technology,” Lyons says. “They’ve got the camera, speakers, mics. The tech needs to seamlessly work together; multiple manufacturers’ products don’t necessarily know how to communicate.”
Hybrid Learning’s Popularity Can Mean Recruitment ROI
Students’ enthusiasm for differentiated offerings — and schools’ desire to stand out amid heightened higher education market competition — is currently helping to drive the growing interest in hybrid modalities, according to a survey of chief online learning officers from digital teaching organization Quality Matters, EDUCAUSE and data provider Eduventures.
“Students want remote flexibility,” Lyons says. “In a lot of cases, students prefer to be in in class, but if there’s an urgent situation, it’s a lot easier for them.”
Being able to get questions answered outside of faculty member office hours through increased access to instructors and information can support student success — and hybrid course technology could also help schools recruit and retain students who are working part-time or otherwise need to participate remotely, Mathew says.
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More than half of students consider hybrid courses to be important when choosing an institution to attend, according to data from AV association AVIXA and Logitech.
“There are so many schools where enrollment has increased exponentially over the past decade or two because of these types of tools,” Mathew says. “When you look at the enrollment cliff that’s already started, there are fewer high school students available to go to college in the next five years. Offering flexibility and choice is a great way to attract students.”
