Nancy Taylor: Greene Publishing, Inc.
It is 8 a.m. on a Monday morning. A group of students assemble in a classroom at Aucilla Christian Academy. Only they are not taking a class through Aucilla Christian, they are taking College Algebra at North Florida Community College, and their instructor, Phillip Taylor, is in a classroom at NFCC in Madison. It is not a mistake, the students will see and hear the instructor and the lesson, and the instructor will be able to see and hear them and answer their questions. It is part of a new technology that allows students in area high schools to interact face-to-face with their professor and other students at NFCC.
North Florida’s video-conferencing program began in Fall 2013 with two courses taught via this method with Taylor County High. In the time since, Aucilla Christian Academy, Branford High School, Jefferson, Lafayette, Suwannee, and Hamilton Counties’ High schools have all joined the program. “Students in other counties are able to have the college experience without having to drive,” says Frances Adleburg, Dean of Academic Affairs at NFCC. This pleases many parents and school administrators, who want the academic opportunities of dual-enrollment at a college but frown at the thought of a 30 to 60 minute one-way commute.
For participants, the experience is like a classroom-sized version of Skype or Facetime. Cameras, microphones and speakers in classrooms at NFCC and at the high schools convey visual and audio contact. The technology also allows students to see the instructor’s smart board on their board at school. David Paulk II, who has been teaching American History 1 and 2 in the program for three years, says the experience has been positive. “Communicating with the schools has been positive, and the facilitators are easy to work with,” he says. Each classroom has a school employee, called a facilitator, who connects with the college, supervises the students, and becomes the hands and feet of the instructor in the remote classroom.
Phillip Taylor, another NFCC instructor, who teaches math courses within the program, travels out to some of the schools periodically to meet with classes and establish a more personal connection with the students and deliver materials too cumbersome for electronic transfer. Taylor says being in a classroom with students while having the virtual classroom simultaneously allows the high school students to have a bit more of the college experience.
As the technology uses the internet, there are occasional issues when either the internet or the technology itself glitches at one end or the other. Still, Paulk says, “The benefits far outweigh the problems.” Supporting Paulk’s statement, this Spring term finds 193 high school students occupying seats in these courses. Eleven different courses are being offered to seven different schools covering not only math and History but also English, science and Academic Success, in what Adleburg calls a “significant outreach” to the community.”