Brian Maeng, Ph.D., Associate Professor/Program Director

Welcome to a new academic year and the second week of the Summer Quarter. I want to share the new communication mechanism the School of Technology and Computing (STC) has adopted this quarter. To enhance communication with students in class, STC has implemented the use of MS Teams Private Channel for nearly all sections of our courses. The members in each channel include students, the teaching assistant (TA), the instructor, the program manager, and the program director. 

STC took the idea from one best practice of an associate faculty who actively utilized MS Teams Private Channel for communication with students in his small class during the Winter 2022 Quarter. At the time, STC was testing various ideas to improve the student experience in class. As a commitment to continuous improvement and better communication, STC used MS Teams actively in select courses as a pilot in the Spring of 2022. Now in the Summer of 2022, the MS Teams Private Channel is used in nearly all classes. 

For the best outcome, I recommend that students use this platform to ask questions related to technical issues and hands-on practice (HOP), hands-on skill (HOS), or technology tool (TT) assignments related to the class. If you post your questions, they can be seen by the class TA or students who may have already done it. When compared to an email inquiry to a TA, a post in the Private Channel is more likely to get promptly answered. Due to transparency, it is less likely to lose communication. Furthermore, students have an opportunity to interact and collaborate with other each other and help one another by using their technical knowledge and skills. In each MS Teams Private Channel, you can find different modules where you can post relevant questions and navigate through the contents. 

Instructors will host their weekly office hours with MS Teams Private Channel. You can view their office hours schedule and the link in your Outlook calendar. I recommend utilizing office hours to ask questions about your class, course contents, and the field in which they specialize. 

I hope you will find the new STC approach across all programs valuable and helpful in each class. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to your academic advisor or program manager. Thank you, and I hope you have a great new academic year.