Page 20 - Campus Technology, October/November 2020

LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS dian schaffhauser
ON A RECENT MONDAY, STUDENTS CAME
onto campus in three states at the University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences to attend class. There was no other way around it. When you’re studying physical therapy, occupational therapy and related “manual therapies,” the clinical experience and hands- on learning with role-playing is a big part of the graduate education you need to earn your credentials.
How the university is handling its opera- tions during the COVID-19 pandemic is a case study in what school opening could look like all over the country. USAHS did have some advantages. For one, it’s not dealing with tens of thousands of students; it has between 4,000 and 5,000, divided among five separate campuses. For another, not all instruction needs to take place in person; some can be done online. USAHS has long had an online component in nearly every
course, so faculty and students are accus- tomed to a mixed learning environment. Plus, in 2019, well before the term “COVID-19” became part of everybody’s vocabulary, most applications in use by the university had been moved to cloud versions, to reduce depen- dency on campus data centers to keep opera- tions running.
Adopting Cloud in 3 Stages
The evolution to the cloud came in three phases, according to Matt Moline, executive director of IT, driven by ownership of the institution. In phase one, campuses used on- premise operations at each location. That lasted until 2013, when the institution was sold to international for-profit education pro- vider Laureate International Universities. (Since 2015, the university has operated as a “B Corp Certified” institution, which commits to higher standards of social and environ-
What to Do When Hands-on Learning Is Essential
The University of St. Augustine faces a problem unique to programs delivering healthcare training — how to help students prepare for clinical careers.
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CAMPUS TECHNOLOGY | Oct/Nov 2020