In the lecture hall or online? Teaching at the Politecnico di Milano during the post pandemic period will be “hybrid”. The project has been created thanks to a collaboration between the Milanese University and CISCO and will combine teaching in person with online teaching.
The pandemic has changed the rules governing daily activities, and teaching is certainly among one of the most affected sectors.
In view of the new academic year starting on 14 September, thanks to a collaboration with the IT colossus CISCO, the Politecnico di Milano has adopted a series of multichannel communication solutions (also enabled by artificial intelligence), which have allowed the university to create mixed in-person and virtual classes, able to guarantee an effective and absorbing teaching experience for remote students.
Should this solution dictated by the emergency become the “new normal” and maintained in future?
“We have to distinguish the actual emergency phase, which lasted from March to July and where we acted using the tools available to us at that time, from what will happen afterwards”, explains the rector of Politecnico di Milano, Ferruccio Resta, to Business Insider Italia. “We are now in a post emergency phase and we can plan the action to be taken: when Covid will finally be over, we will be able to say that the pandemic has been a great accelerator of digital transformation. Our ground rule is that teaching must be carried out in person, students need engagement. However, at the moment we have the necessary digital tools to enrich the university learning experience.”
The short term results have already been significant: in this academic year, enrollment has increased by 3%. We were expecting a 50% presence instead the percentage is 75% for freshmen and 60% for students in their last years.
