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Recent announcements by the B.C. and Ontario governments emphasize that institutions of higher education should plan a familiar return to campuses over the next month. Their recommendations call for\u00a0a return to normal<\/a>\u00a0with an eye on\u00a0backup plans and transitions<\/a>.<\/p>\n But the research my colleagues and I have done suggests that faculty and students hope for better futures. They don\u2019t want \u201ca return to normal.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the last year and a half, my colleagues and I have\u00a0interviewed faculty across Canada<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0sifted through surveys<\/a>\u00a0gathering the opinions of nearly 150,000 Canadian students. We have also surveyed faculty and administrators in\u00a0the United States<\/a>\u00a0multiple\u00a0times about<\/a>\u00a0their experiences with teaching and learning during the pandemic. Most recently, we have returned to interviewing faculty across Canada to learn more about their hopes and fears.<\/p>\n We heard that many of our students and colleagues are anxious, tired and\u00a0disproportionately<\/a>\u00a0affected<\/a>\u00a0by the pandemic. Students and faculty recognize that the pre-pandemic \u201cnormal\u201d wasn\u2019t optimal. It was simply the status quo, the default, that students and faculty were living with.<\/p>\n Recent announcements by the B.C. and Ontario governments emphasize that institutions of higher education should plan a familiar return to campuses over the next month. Their recommendations call for\u00a0a return to normal<\/a>\u00a0with an eye on\u00a0backup plans and transitions<\/a>.<\/p>\n But the research my colleagues and I have done suggests that faculty and students hope for better futures. They don\u2019t want \u201ca return to normal.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the last year and a half, my colleagues and I have\u00a0interviewed faculty across Canada<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0sifted through surveys<\/a>\u00a0gathering the opinions of nearly 150,000 Canadian students. We have also surveyed faculty and administrators in\u00a0the United States<\/a>\u00a0multiple\u00a0times about<\/a>\u00a0their experiences with teaching and learning during the pandemic. Most recently, we have returned to interviewing faculty across Canada to learn more about their hopes and fears.<\/p>\n We heard that many of our students and colleagues are anxious, tired and\u00a0disproportionately<\/a>\u00a0affected<\/a>\u00a0by the pandemic. Students and faculty recognize that the pre-pandemic \u201cnormal\u201d wasn\u2019t optimal. It was simply the status quo, the default, that students and faculty were living with.<\/p>\n One idea that emerged consistently in both\u00a0our work<\/a>\u00a0and the work of\u00a0other<\/a>\u00a0researchers<\/a>\u00a0is the value that flexibility affords students and faculty. Students, for instance, appreciated flexibility in deadlines, when they were facing uncertainties in their lives outside their studies.<\/p>\n Faculty whose institutions supported them in working remotely expressed gratefulness for such flexibility. Some also appreciated being able to approach their courses with flexible designs that supported student learning (for example, shifting lectures to pre-recorded sessions and using real-time meetings for workshops). Flexible approaches to teaching and learning will likely help colleges and universities grapple with future local and global threats like\u00a0climate change<\/a>.<\/p>\n 4. Trust and compassion<\/strong><\/p>\n While education is an endeavour that involves establishing standards of learning and evaluation, it is also one that involves humans, with all of life\u2019s\u00a0unpredictability and variation<\/a>. In approaching education with a humanizing lens, faculty and students hope that institutions and governments do not lose sight of the trust and compassion that was extended to them during the pandemic.<\/p>\n In practical terms, trust and compassion may translate to rethinking assessment practices that are grounded on mistrust, such as using surveillance technologies for online exams. It may mean trusting faculty to determine the best assessments for their courses. For example, a faculty member told us they felt what\u2019s needed is \u201cculture shift\u201d towards trusting students, away from an \u201cadversarial kind of relationship\u201d that assumes everyone\u2019s cheating.<\/p>\n 5. Focus on equity<\/strong><\/p>\n The pandemic has brought to light the many gaps that students of varied socio-economic and demographic backgrounds face, such as\u00a0inequitable access to technology and private study spaces<\/a>, as well as inequities in having their\u00a0basic needs met<\/a>.<\/p>\n Students and faculty are hopeful that institutions and governments continue to take action on addressing inequities. Some ideas offered include the purposeful design of courses to accommodate different people\u2019s needs, and institutional supports to enable broader access to programs and resources.<\/p>\n Rather than regressing \u201cback to normal,\u201d what our research highlights is how students and faculty hope for a better future \u2014 better than the one dominated by COVID-19, and better than the status quo that existed prior.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\nFaculty expressed anxiety about workload, program cuts and precarious academic work, hoping that they can be involved in discussions about these issues\u00a0and about campus safety<\/a>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n3. Flexibility<\/strong><\/div>\n\n