Due to the COVID 19 epidemic, the semester for human resources students in Ludwigshafen also started purely online instead of face-to-face courses. On March 16, the online study or lecture period of the summer semester 2020 began on a broad basis. Arrived at the end of the semester, it can be said that the changeover was successful and it has become a full semester of study. Students have not lost a semester.
After a steep ramp-up curve, all courses have transitioned and arrived online after about a month. Blended learning, i.e., the mix of methods of learning and teaching, is a good description of the learning methods used: i.e., a mix of synchronous online teaching in the eClassroom (video conferencing systems with live stream) plus asynchronous distance learning based on elaborated learning materials, videos of recorded lectures plus structured self-study based on literature sources.
Participation in the synchronous live online lectures via video conference system or learning management system OLAT regularly achieved participation rates of > 90%.
It was an advantage that a large part of the professorship already had experience with distance learning, online learning, blended learning or other e-learning forms from job-integrating, continuing education master's programs. The HWG Ludwigshafen has an exceptionally broad portfolio and long tradition of distance-learning and part-time programs in the master's area, as can be read on the overview pages of the HWG. HWG Ludwigshafen will be able to exploit this competitive advantage in the coming semester as well.
Exams have also been adapted to the online semester, be it term papers, seminar papers, presentations, thesis papers, videos or oral exams online. All avenues were utilized to ensure an academically complete semester, in close coupling with the student group representatives.
Currently, at the end of the examination period on July 18, the program management and the academic director can state that the academic semester has been completed. Study program management can state that the academic operation and the examinations of the summer semester have proceeded academically. The special esprit de corps, i.e. the corps spirit of the study program, has once again proven its worth.
Who is interested for the coming winter semester for the personnel courses of studies, all the same whether Bachelor or master, one can say that also for the coming winter semester 2020/21 at the HWG Ludwigshafen the academic studierbarkeit is ensured and the wiss. Level will be maintained. In addition to face-to-face teaching in selected courses, there will be synchronous and asynchronous online modules supplemented by distance learning units. The proportion of face-to-face teaching cannot be precisely quantified at the present time because it depends on hygiene standards for the protection of all participants and on the requirements of the Ministry of Science.
With all due caution, applicants can assume 20 - 30 % of the course hours (so-called SWS) in traditional lecture halls. In order to optimize travel times, a fixed, constant weekday should be expected, on which the lectures take place in the lecture hall on the Ludwigshafen campus. On the other weekdays, online events, office hours and distance learning will take place. Thus, no purely online semester is planned.
On this planning basis, applicants can expect their courses to run. Even in the case of an unexpected "red light phase", the direct switch to 100% online teaching would not be a technical problem for the professors and also for first-year students.
However, the Bachelor IPO and also the Master IHRM are and remain in principle face-to-face courses at a university with a strategically favorable location in the Rhine-Neckar metropolitan region: close to the Frankfurt-Rhine-Main and Stuttgart metropolitan regions, which promotes the so important early networking with local companies for career entry.
According to the currently valid information, the 1st semester Bachelor IPO starts on November 2, and in the Master already on September 28, 2020.