What has been most profound is that the pandemic has more or less left no ‘choice’ but shift teaching practices online. In turn, we’ve had students learning or orienting experience of HE without having set foot on campus, and they’ve seen first hand what has not worked very well and what has. I’ve found what is very much disliked by those new to university in a pandemic is prerecords which have been clearly taught a while ago. Understandable circumstances, well yes. It’s left a real dehydration for learning and assessment of value at an individual level, in that their learning is perceived as important and that it matters.

Many have seen the tech capabilities, others desperate for things to get back to ‘normal’. Just as the pandemic has forced us to shift and for many rethink and reflect, consequently it has somewhat put the spotlight on roles, structure, pre-pandemic blended learning and full on remote learning and teaching – to say the least. Have the reigns seen some sort of handover or the field of discovery and experimenting just got wider, could this be just temporary, is it really such a bad thing? I can see how it can be. Could it be learning technologists reassess their core role and position themselves more meaningfully. Certainly, it’s not a time to sit back…