“By collaborating and sharing our content and expertise, we are all learning so much about how we can improve the online learning experience of students,” says Professor Gary Falloon.

When one of Macquarie’s international partners reached out for support in upskilling their staff to deliver online teaching during COVID-19, in just four weeks a team of our experts pulled together a comprehensive program which has just been rolled out.

The latest initiative in an ongoing partnership with Mahidol University in Thailand, the workshop has had 42 keen participants from the fields of social and medical sciences, economics, computing and business, and the university is already requesting a further two workshops before the end of the year.

Professor Garry Falloon from the School of Education assembled a group of learning designers and academics from across the Faculty of Arts, Macquarie Business School and the Faculty of Science and Engineering, to develop and deliver the practical training program.

“Mahidol didn’t have much of a history of online learning before COVID-19 started, and like every institution has had to adapt to the current situation, so they approached us requesting this training for their academics,” says Garry.

“I’ve been so grateful for the enthusiasm from people from different faculties, and to be able to work with such talented people, to deliver this program.

“Improving online learning is not just about improving online teaching, it’s also about learning task and course layout and design, e-assessment and building social aspects of students’ presence and engagement, and our learning designers’ skills at translating courses into really interesting and motivating formats and their knowledge of digital tools and methods, is excellent.

“I hope by being involved in an outward-facing program like this it is a validation of our people’s skills. By collaborating and sharing our content and expertise, we are all learning so much about what each other do, and how we can better work together to improve the online learning experience of students .”

Macquarie’s partnership with Mahidol has gradually expanded since an MOU was originally signed between the two universities in 2015, to include the establishment of the Mahidol-Macquarie Centre for International Education in 2019, international research opportunities for doctoral students, staff exchange in teaching and research, and student mobility.

One of the workshop participants, Associate Professor Astrid Kainzbauer from Mahidol’s College of Management said the experience of being an online student in the program gave her new insights into what her own students might need when learning remotely.

“One thing I really enjoyed was being a student and seeing the other perspective,” Astrid says. “It was really interesting to observe myself and my own reactions to learning, which will allow me to improve my own teaching online.”

“In the end it really depends on the topic that you’re teaching, the level of student you are teaching and also your own personality, because I think you need to find what works for you amongst all the tools that are out there. This course showed an overview of all that is out there, there is so much technology that I haven’t even heard of before, and it takes time to try different things to find out what works for you and what works for your students.”

Mahidol University and Macquarie University are currently working together to plan the delivery of this professional learning course to additional academic cohorts in 2020 and beyond.