DavidsonTrue: Transitioning to Remote Teaching while Maintaining Our Values as a Liberal Arts College during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in March led Davidson College to move from face-to-face classes and laboratories to mostly synchronous Zoom meetings. Prior to COVID-19, the majority of our faculty and students had little experience with remote instruction. With only 5 days to develop a plan, we revisited our individual and department learning goals and worked collectively to help each other redesign and redeploy our courses. In this reflective piece, we provide examples of how each member of our department collaborated with our students to ensure a relatively smooth transition to remote teaching across our entire curriculum while maintaining inclusive excellence. Specific strategies for adapting class meetings, assignments, assessments, additional support, and labs are provided along with select examples. Common themes across the curriculum included increased flexibility, the desire to maintain community, and the need for additional academic, technical, and emotional support. We hope our reflections will be helpful to our chemistry colleagues as we move into the uncertainty of the fall semester.