Virtual office hours connect professors, students
By Jean May Chen
Daily Bruin Contributor
A year after its inception, Craig Merlic beheld his virtual
office hours project and saw that it was good.
Virtual office hours is well known to students that have taken
courses in the chemistry and biochemistry department. The computer
service supplements regular office hours by providing another means
of communication between professor and student.
"It took a long time to get the information, but once I figured
it out it was very useful," said Jessica Nelson, a third-year
student majoring in physiological sciences.
In virtual office hours, students can electronically post
questions to their professor. All questions, and any answers to
those questions, can be viewed by any student "visiting" virtual
office hours.
"We wanted to create a very open system," said Merlic, a
chemistry and biochemistry professor. "I was initially concerned
that students might make inappropriate posts, but that hasn’t been
a problem."
Most professors in the department have also been very receptive
to the project, responding to messages within a few days of their
posting, Merlic added. Accessible through the World Wide Web,
virtual office hours save students a hike to their professors’
offices by providing syllabi, sample exams, diagrams, sound clips,
and even animation sequences.
"Roughly 10 percent of the material on reserve (at Towell
Library) is corrupted," Merlic explained. Students often ask for
reserves only to find out that they are missing pages or that all
copies have been checked out. If the material is online, it can
never be vandalized and copies can never run out, Merlic said.
With about 800,000 visits logged in by an estimated 500 to 1,000
student users, Merlic judged the project a success. So far, this
service exists only in the chemistry and biochemistry department,
but Merlic was optimistic that other departments will start similar
projects to serve their students.
He said the influence of other such projects extend far beyond
UCLA. Departments as diverse as classics and physiology, and
chemistry departments as distant as New Zealand and Virginia have
asked Merlic for help in starting similar projects.
However, Merlic hastened to reassure students that their
professors will not some day disappear altogether.
"Virtual office hours is definitely not a replacement for
regular office hours," he said.
Nelson expressed a preference for regular office hours, arguing
that it is easier to get help in person.
"I’m not sure if it was totally worth it," she said. "I don’t
know how useful it would be for an English class."
Charles Knobler, chair of the chemistry and biochemistry
department, agreed that virtual office hours does not replace all
cases of student-professor interaction.
"Occasionally there are questions that are too difficult to be
responded to by e-mail," Knobler said. "I would hope that students
wouldn’t be discouraged from coming into regular office hours. It’s
important for students to take advantage of the faculty (at
UCLA)."
Organizers said they hope to offer more online information for
students.
"In another year or so, we’ll definitely have more electronic
media," said Matt Walker, a chemistry graduate student hired to
code and update virtual office hours. "We hope to increase the
amount of material that is exclusively electronic, as opposed to
just duplicating something that’s in print."
Merlic predicted a bright future for virtual office hours, with
project funding coming from the Office of Instructional
Development, the department of chemistry and biochemistry, and the
Dreyfuss Foundation.Comments to webmaster@db.asucla.ucla.edu