Bryce White: Life sciences junior
How do you like taking iCourses?
It’s different because online, you don’t get the face-to-face interaction with the professor. You don’t really get to ask questions on the spot and stuff like that. So it’s kind of a learning curve. For me, I don’t really like it so much just because you don’t get to ask questions and stuff like that.
Do you prefer online or in person?
In person, because if you have a question, you have to email them or something like that, and that could take a couple of days to get a response back … especially if you have a hard deadline or something and you need to ask a question. You might not get your answer until after the due date.
What are the pros and cons to iCourses?
I’d say a pro of online is you kind of get to do it at your leisure, you know whenever you get time to do it. And a con to that would be, with that you can kind of procrastinate a little bit easier.
Alexis Adekoya: Marketing freshman
How’d you like taking iCourses?
I strongly disliked it because there’s no in-person connection—there’s no one-on-one. It’s [also] hard to do an online class because there’s a lot of technical difficulties, and logging on takes like a good, solid half-hour, not to mention the fact that the teacher does not speak English very well, so it makes it very difficult to understand—especially over a microphone.
Do you prefer online or in-person?
In-person by far. … First of all, you don’t have to deal with technical difficulties trying to log in to your class. Second of all, online is just difficult because there’s always that issue of having to buy additional materials like headphones, and pen pads, and all these class notes. In-person, you don’t need a pen pad, you don’t need a computer and you definitely do not need a headset.
What are the pros and cons to iCourses?
I guess the pro would be you could take your class anywhere, and it’s a little less formal, so if you have a morning class you can just get up and not have to change or do anything. A con would be technical difficulties, having to buy additional materials in addition to a textbook. … And you don’t really get to meet other people in your classes. It’s online, so you don’t get to make new friends.
Kortney Aguilar: junior studying Spanish interpretation and translation
How’d you like taking an iCourse?
I like it. It was really easy.
Do you prefer online or in-person?
I think it depends on what the class is. Like, if it’s a math or science class, I prefer in-person, but if it’s something that’s pretty easy, then I would prefer online so I don’t have to get up and go to class.
What are the pros and cons to iCourses?
I think the pros are that you can kind of go at your own pace, and you can decide when you do your work, but I think the cons are that sometimes you can forget to do the work because there’s not really a class to remind you to do it.
Rory Barnes: Math 100 program coordinator
What’s your role regarding iCourses?
I am the coordinator for the math 100 program.
How do you like taking iCourses?
I enjoyed watching them evolve because they started as a simple sort of post-and-reply idea, and they’ve since turned into much more interaction between students and professors or teachers, so I’ve enjoyed seeing them change and become more interactive and collaborative than they used to be.
Do you prefer, either as a student or the coordinator, online or in-person classes?
That’s a tough decision, because I think it depends on the class. Whenever I was taking math courses, like high-level math courses for sure, I definitely would have wanted to be in-person, but any lower level or gen-ed type course, I did not have any issues doing it online. I preferred it that way because that meant it was on my time.
What are the pros and cons to iCourses?
Pros: I definitely think they’re more convenient in terms of timing. You know, you don’t have to run somewhere for class—you can do it from home. Cons: I think some people do like the in-person interaction, and if you’re one of those people, I think that could be a con but not necessarily. … I think the way that we do it with our [iCourses is] collaborative, and you get to talk to your fellow students and teachers. I think that’s nice.
