A Quick Turn Toward the Virtual Classroom

By Michael Fisch

While COVID-19 has created widespread hardship, it is also driving rapid innovation—including at Suffolk Law School, says Professor Gabe Teninbaum JD’05.

As the recently appointed assistant dean of innovation, strategic initiatives, and distance education, Teninbaum knew that the fundamentals of a Suffolk legal education would remain the same whether faculty and students were miles apart on a Zoom call or six feet away in a Sargent Hall classroom.

But because the two experiences can feel very different, he’s made it a priority to get faculty the resources they need to make their remote classes more intimate and interactive, as well as rich in content.

Law librarians now serve as “tech guides” or, more formally, library distance education liaisons, assisting faculty with the finer details of remote teaching. Faculty tech facilitators (FTFs), hired students, are the virtual world’s new teaching assistants, serving as an extra set of eyes to help professors.

Faculty, in turn, are gaining a sense of the new medium’s unique rhythm and how to incorporate digital tools—from instant polling of students to building in commentary from experts around the world.

“So far,” says Teninbaum, “it’s gone terrifically, because we have a staff and faculty working together to put students’ needs first.”