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>> Hi I'm Alisa Cooper and I teach English
at South Mountain Community College.
One of the core competencies
for an online instructor would be flexibility
and the willingness to communicate
with students at different times.
A lot of times faculty are done when the day is over
and they're ready to head home but that's
when online students are just hitting the work so, you know,
you have to have a willingness to be available
to answer questions, to answer emails
and that requires being flexible.
>> How does that flexibility get managed though could
that also become -- can it extend too far so I feel
like I have to be available all the time
and then how do you manage that?
>> Yeah, you have to set some time restraints
but you can't just say
that you're office hours are gonna be 1 hour a day
which is what our college requires.
You have to set some during different time periods
throughout the day, so morning, afternoon
and even some evening hours and then set some guidelines
as to how long it will take for you to respond to an email.
You know, if a student sends an email and it takes a week to get
to it that's not gonna be flexible enough for the student.
>> So you're taking what workload might have been
contained say in a face to face and you're kind of spreading it
out over a wider time zone to be able to accommodate
for more student participation?
>> Yes, yes, and it does require more of your time
as an instructor but that's just part of being an online teacher.