Radio TV Film

Staying On-air

When the COVID-19 pandemic forced students and faculty to leave campus and move online in March 2020, RTF faculty and staff dove head-first into figuring out how to best meet the needs of our students. We immediately recognized that a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching online courses wouldn’t work for our department. Instead, we focused on how to best preserve course learning objectives, applying different teaching methods and technologies to fit the unique needs of each course, using live video-conferencing, pre-recorded lectures, interactive discussion forums, and a mix of all of the above. Our commitment to teaching excellence and a student-centered approach was at the heart of everything we did.

The Department of Radio TV Film remains committed to teaching excellence, while continuing to prioritize the safety and well-being of our students. Applying the lessons learned during the Spring 2020 semester, we designed our 2020-2021 course schedule to provide students with options for in-person and online learning, offering production courses in-person and non-production courses online. Through consultation with media industry professionals and a review of emerging best practices, we designed a Standard Operating Procedures document to guide all of our student productions taking place through courses and through our studentorganizations. This document was updated again in January 2021, and subsequently re-approved by the UWO Emergency Operations Team. Additionally, we worked closely with the UWO IT department to develop a virtual lab to provide remote access to our editing systems for our students.

As recently announced  by UW System President Tommy Thompson, the Fall 2021 semester will see the return of more in-person courses.  In the meantime, we remain focused on ensuring that our students receive the high-caliber media education the UWO Radio TV Film department is known for and continuing to provide additional opportunities for students to be involved in media production.