The second semester of 2021 has begun, and the current course registration has also been completed. However, many students were dissatisfied with the course registration and school guidelines. Therefore, Pharos would like to find out the current status and problems of non-face-to-face classes and explore the dissatisfaction with class registration. Why do students at Kyonggi University always express dissatisfaction during the course registration period? There may be many reasons, but the primary reason is that students usually have difficulty taking courses that they want. In addition, according to the guidelines from the school this semester, more than one-third of the classes are being given as real-time video lectures, and more students have doubts about this. We need to have non-face-to-face classes that address these doubts and satisfy everyone.

 Perfect course selection at the beginning of each semester is both a goal and a difficult task for students to achieve. The difficulty lies in deciding whether to choose the subject you want to take first or the subject you need to take for graduation. The majority of students have to choose either one or the other because it is difficult to meet both conditions. In order to graduate, you have to take essential major courses, but within large departments, it is difficult to apply for classes because these essential courses are subjects that everyone must take.

 Recently, the new semester began and a plan to operate the 2021-2 semester was announced. So far, the university has decided on operational plans from Week 1 to Week 9, and students have doubts in this area. Currently, students have been vaccinated against COVID-19 on a large scale, and schools are also working hard according to quarantine guidelines, but students are still nervous about being infected with COVID-19. Accordingly, the school announced that all laboratory, practice, and practical lecture classes will be non-face-to-face. After that, starting from the 10th week, classroom experiments, practice, practical skills, and face-to-face tests might be possible based on priority if the social distancing level is lowered to either the first or second stages.

 In addition, guidelines have been issued to conduct more than one-third of classes during non-face-to-face classes through real-time video conferencing. Accordingly, some say that if students participate in real-time lectures while also watching recorded lectures, the quality of classes will improve. But this will not be the case for large-scale lectures because there are many students, so instructors have difficulty regarding attendance, noise during real-time lectures, and managing students. 

 Another reason why students are struggling is the instability of the school website server. As one-third of the classes are being conducted as live classes under the school’s guidelines, students have to use LMS. However, many students are complaining of inconveniences due to the poor quality of the server. If you look at the school community, you can easily see an article saying that some students couldn’t properly participate in the class due to server problems. Lately, lots of students have written postings to the school community. They were asking what they should do because the server was down when there is less than 5 minutes left before the class starts. They really worried that they wouldn’t be able to take the class in time. In addition, many students faced problems due to server issues when submitting assignments or even taking tests. Assignments and tests are really important things to students because they determine grades. For this reason, students feel angry and worry about problems caused by the server. The biggest problem is that even though complaints and difficulties caused by the inadequate server appeared even before the non-face-to-face lectures began due to COVID-19, the school still has not made proper improvements. Students have to continue to endure inconvenience because they have not been able to find a proper solution from the time the problem began until now. 

 The lecture method was indeed changed due to COVID-19, and the school is trying to deal with it despite difficulties and confusion among the students. However, as time goes by the same problems continue to emerge. We need to focus on this more and try to solve this properly. Everyone is in a difficult situation, but at times like this, a wise and prompt response from the school is needed for more efficient and high-quality lectures.

75th Reporter·Kang Rok Ki·krk1754@naver.com

75th Reporter·HanSongHee·shhan0509@hanmail.net