How We Taught our Faculty to Teach Online

University Business
By Marian Stoltz-Loike
March 22, 2022


Like most universities, Touro University needed to rapidly pivot to online classes when the COVID-19 pandemic began. Touro’s approach differed from many universities in that we saw an opportunity and used this unique moment to teach the entire faculty how to be more fluent online. As a large university with 36 schools and 246 programs, we faced a significant challenge bringing everyone to a university-wide standard for online teaching. We developed a program that built on our faculty’s innate strengths and skills as academics. They were all familiar with curricula, course materials, assessment and measurements of proficiency. We used these tools to encourage participation, learning and use of technology and online education.

We designed a university-wide online curriculum

Touro’s online education team created a comprehensive program to educate educators. It included a series of courses, along with curricular materials. The team developed scores of printable how-to guides with step-by-step instructions as well as detailed videos that showed faculty how to effectively use Zoom and Canvas. All of the materials were readily available in a permanent online repository. Faculty took quizzes on the course material and earned badges at ever-increasing levels of proficiency – bronze, silver, and gold – providing them with feedback on skills mastery.

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