COVID-19’s meso-scale impacts: exploring the perspectives of geoscience department chairs in California

Abstract

Across the landscape of higher education, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused fundamental changes at a variety of scales. To understand which aspects of higher education instruction at the departmental (meso-scale) level were most and least impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, chairs of geoscience departments at public higher education institutions in California (n = 38) were surveyed on the pandemic’s impacts on teaching in their departments, and whether those changes persisted beyond Spring 2022. The shift to online teaching was the pandemic’s primary impact. The findings indicate that this shift was followed by significant direct and indirect impacts on a variety of departmental and instructional aspects, including assessment methods, course offerings, course structure and organization, enrollment, recruitment and outreach, and student learning, in both positive and negative ways. Conversely, the pandemic had relatively little impact on degree structure and course content. Key pedagogical changes include the increased use of Learning Management Systems (LMSs), non-exam assessment methods, and online and hybrid modalities. The results highlight the need for departmental and institutional support to mitigate negative effects on geoscience in-lab and in-field classes, equity and achievement gaps, graduate student needs, recruitment and outreach efforts, and department chair stress, mental health, and burnout. Continued health and resilience in geoscience departments requires that the pandemic’s negative impacts be identified, studied, and addressed by departments, institutions, and professional organizations. Analyzing effects at the meso-scale is an important part of a multi-faceted, multi-scalar assessment of the pandemic’s impacts on geoscience education.

Keywords:

• COVID-19
• geoscience education
• department chairs
• student learning
• online learning

Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate the time and insights of the research participants. Patricia Pérez, Jessica Stern, and Sean Walker contributed in the project development stage. The survey instrument was tested by two participants who provided valuable feedback for its development and improvement. Alexandra Lewandowski, Samantha Luu, and Elena Marquez assisted with data collection. Feedback from Carl Wieman’s STEM Education research group at Stanford University refined the analysis, and the suggestions made by the anonymous reviewers and journal editors strengthened the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).