UEW adopts hybrid system of teaching for next academic year

The University of Education, Winneba, (UEW) has adopted a hybrid system of teaching and learning for the 2020/2021 academic year in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the university, Professor Andy Ofori-Birikorang, has disclosed.

According to him, per the new system, 30 per cent of teaching and learning would be done online through its Learning Management System (LMS) while the remaining 70 per cent done through face-to-face interactions if the pandemic continued.

Measures in wake of COVID-19

Addressing the media to spell out measures put in place to ensure the smooth running of the university in the midst of the pandemic, he said the university had put in place the needed measures to ensure smooth academic activities going forward with or without the pandemic.

He said “since the outbreak of the pandemic which led to the closure of schools and its subsequent reopening for final-year students, the UEW had put in place the required framework to ensure the smooth implementation of the hybrid module system”

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“The new policy of the UEW is to roll out the hybrid module of teaching and learning for the next academic year if the COVID-19 pandemic lingers on making it very difficult for students to gather,” he noted.

He indicated that the university took the challenge for particularly tertiary institutions to adopt new ways of teaching and learning for the benefit of both lecturers and students, hence the introduction of the hybrid system.

Upgrading of LMS

The Pro-Vice-Chancellor mentioned that the LMS had come to stay and that between now and September, management was working towards upgrading the system to accommodate all students and lecturers in the event that students were unable to come to school.

He said “the UEW would ensure that all students and lecturers were enrolled onto the new system to take part in teaching and learning”, saying, due to the new normal, the LMS would be the only means to reach out to a large number of students of the university.

“If the pandemic continues in its ravaging form and students are unable to report to school, the LMS would be relied upon to enhance teaching and learning in order not to truncate academic activities,” he stated.

He added that management was hoping that something magical would happen to pave the way for students to report back to campus and that if it did not materialise, the LMS would be made robust to enhance academic work.

He encouraged both lecturers and students to embrace the LMS system since it had been adopted as a new phenomenon due to COVID-19 primarily to make teaching and learning interesting for users.

Prof. Ofori-Birikorang hinted that plans were underway to hold virtual graduation for all final-year students by the end of August 2020 in order not to unnecessarily delay the certificates of such students who were eager to seek employment opportunities in all fields of the economy.