I cannot teach a course with half of the students in a socially-distanced classroom and half in a Zoom room simultaneously.

People think I'm being a crank. Am I a crank, #AcademicTwitter ?

Another note: the rooms I have ONLY have cameras and mics at the instructor station. As soon as I leave that station, my presence on Zoom is gone. I can’t point or whiteboard. I’m stuck there being a teach-o-bot.

Theoretically they are making tech upgrades but no one has told us what rooms. There are about 2 “smart boards” on campus and I only have one because I strongly offered to pilot it. And it’s not in the room I’m assigned.

And, yes, Zoom has a whiteboard but we don’t have any stylus input unless I bring my own tablet.

So, frozen instructor, mouse-drawn sketches, no way to see a student’s screen unless THEY log into Zoom (while in class) and share it from their table.

We’ve been told that it’s important for freshmen to have a classroom experience, but if I was a freshman I would think this guy was a crazy person. Is this really the best we can do?