Online but Not On Your Own: Using Faculty Liaison Embedded Support Networks to Assist an Emergency Response Model

Our role as faculty liaisons is to establish and support a culture of collaboration between our centrally situated Centre for Teaching and Learning with various faculties and units across campus. When the transition to online happened in March 2020, we were naturally well positioned to draw on our networks to collaborate on and contribute to a university-wide emergency educational response. A key characteristic of our role is to strategically problem-solve various kinds of situations that may arise and identify opportunities for collaboration or innovation in a multitude of learning contexts. Our pedagogically informed approach has allowed us to develop expertise in innovative practices that involve the use of learning technology to not only support a variety of teaching formats (e.g., fully online, blended learning, hybrid learning, MOOCs) but also encourage the adoption of open educational resources and the development of open-source tools for a diverse range of learning contexts. In this presentation, we share an emergency response to collaboratively respond to, mitigate, and share resources and knowledge required to support a large research-oriented institution in the pivot to an online delivery model. The faculty liaison model enabled us to quickly share and contribute to the resources and support required to ensure a smooth transition to online delivery while maintaining academic continuity during a transition that effectively happened over a weekend.