Nicole Lapeyrouse ’16MS ’18PhD never knows when and where she might be recognized. Students and their significant others who have never met her in person will come up to her in stores and along sidewalks to say, “Excuse me, but aren’t you …?”

Yes, it’s her.

The chemistry and geology instructor recently walked into a coffee shop on campus and heard the barista casually singing a familiar tune: Chemsi-Tea time, Ohh-Ohh-Ohh. Flattered, Lapeyrouse said, “That’s my jingle. You must be in my online course.”

Random encounters around the community make it clear that students are engaging with the videos Lapeyrouse produces for her classes. They learn about concepts like plate tectonics and viscosity, while also getting to know the person teaching it — she likes drinking tea, for example — and that’s the point.

“I design the classes this way because I love doing it,” Lapeyrouse says. “But most importantly, it’s effective. That’s the end goal.”

On Founder’s Day, Lapeyrouse will be recognized in public again, this time by peers who have selected her to receive the Chuck D. Dziuban Award for excellence in online teaching. The award, in its 13^th year, is named for UCF’s first Pegasus Professor and an international pioneer in online learning. Dziuban will be presenting Lapeyrouse with the award at Founders Day, where he will also be honored for his 55 years of service to UCF.

“It’s a tremendous honor because Dr. Dziuban’s name is synonymous with the pillars of good online teaching,” she says. “I heard about him when I was developing my first course. At that time, I wanted to do something different, but I had no idea where it would lead.”

Merging Science with a Hidden Talent

Awards were not on Lapeyrouse’s mind when she designed her proof of concept in 2017 as a better way for one instructor to connect Chemistry Fundamentals to a class of 475 students.

“To teach the material well to that many students, I needed to be creative,” she says of the flipped class that eventually supported a fully online class. Students had known Lapeyrouse as an authority on math and science, with a doctorate in chemistry from UCF to back it up. They were not aware of her love for art.

The large enrollment class, oddly enough, allowed her to apply all her interests in a flipped classroom format. Instead of developing a standard educational video with the typical PowerPoint slides and voiceover, Lapeyrouse personalized her course. She turned her garage into a studio, borrowed her sister’s camera and, after dozens of takes and hours of editing, debuted ChemisTea Time, complete with the introductory jingle.

“Honestly, I just hoped it wouldn’t bomb,” she says.

It didn’t bomb, although interest in her classes did explode. Feedback was so positive that she used the same video format for her geology course, which has grown from 30 students to as many as 125.

Within the videos, Lapeyrouse enters discussion boards to embed questions and scavenger hunts, and make sure students understand the material. It’s working, as evidenced by pre-test scores climbing from an average of 25% to a post-test average of 83%.

Over the years, Lapeyrouse has integrated better technology to elevate the production value and engagement of her videos. She created a teleprompter and a lightboard so she can write directly on the screen and maintain eye contact with her invisible audience.

What the students do not see is the time Lapeyrouse puts into each video: 10 hours for one 10-minute video.

“When I see how engaged the students are,” she says, “that makes it all worthwhile.”

This high ranking is in part thanks to world-class UCF faculty who are industry experts and who bring real-world knowledge to the classroom. ��AV prepares students to excel in their chosen fields through well-designed and engaging courses in face-to-face, online and blended modes.

This year’s ranking is up seven spots from No. 14 just last year. UCF has been continually rising in U.S. News & World Report��rankings, including a No. 15 spot as a Most Innovative University in 2022, as well as a No. 2 ranking for Best Master of Emergency and Crisis Management degrees, among other graduate program rankings.

Also from U.S. News & World Report, UCF ranks:

• 6 for Best Online Bachelor’s Programs in Psychology
• 8 for Best Online Bachelor’s Programs for Veterans
• 8 for Best Online Bachelor’s Programs for Business, specifically the B.S. Restaurant & Foodservice Management program
• 11 for Best Online Graduate Criminal Justice Programs
• 19 for Best Online Master’s in Information Technology, specifically the M.S. in Digital Forensics program
• 20 for Best Online Master’s in Nursing Programs
• 46 for Best Online Master’s Education Programs
• For the first time this year, UCF ranked among the Best Online Master’s in Engineering Programs

UCF rose in the rankings in each of these categories.

“We have been dedicated to high-impact, high-value online programs for 26 years and remain focused on innovating to provide students from every walk of life with flexible options for earning degrees that fuel their futures,” UCF President Alexander Cartwright said. “We are thrilled to have cracked the top 10 in the national rankings — rankings that highlight and validate the work of our top-notch faculty and staff in their pursuit of high-quality online learning.”

With more than 100 fully online programs, including undergraduate, graduate, professional �������ٱ��’s and doctorate degrees, plus certificates, UCF reaches more than 6,000 fully online students each year from around the country and the world.

Online learning gives students a flexible option to earn an education from anywhere while they also often juggle work and other responsibilities. That’s why UCF consistently invests in the tools and resources to deliver a high-quality online education across a spectrum of disciplines. More than 3,080 unique fully online courses have been developed at UCF, and overall, more than 869,000 credit hours of digital learning were taught at UCF last year. As of Fall 2021, 83% of all UCF students took at least one online or blended-learning course.

To ensure their success, the UCF Center for Distributed Learning (CDL) connects faculty with dedicated instructional designers and trainings on how to deliver the most effective online course. Beyond their industry experience, all instructors who teach online are well trained in digital teaching, receiving over 80 hours of training through CDL prior to the start of their first online course.

“Ů��AV is able to provide access to high-quality online programs because of the efforts of our award-winning faculty members,” says Tom Cavanagh, vice provost for Digital Learning at UCF. “They take the time and effort to create a positive, engaging learning environment for all of our online students and have helped distinguish UCF as a leader in digital learning.”

Take Associate Professor Robin Back, for example, who brings more than 25 years of experience in retail, travel and tourism, and food and beverage industries in the United States, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the Caribbean to the classroom. Raised in a wine-producing family in South Africa, Back spent 12 years of his career setting up distribution lines for his family’s wines in North America, and as a marketing and brand manager for his family’s wineries in the United States and Canadian markets.

“I teach from my own experience,” says Back. “I tell stories and anecdotes from my career in my online lectures as they relate to the course material. I’ve found it helps students feel more engaged and the content is more personal. A student said to me one time ‘I felt like you were with me at my kitchen table as I participated in your lectures.’”

Back created the online Beverage Sales, Marketing, and Distribution course, which launched last year, from his own industry experience. In it, students learn from Back but also from industry experts from around the country who — thanks to his connections — share their knowledge and insights with the students.

Another one of Back’s most popular online courses is Wines of the World, an elective he created within the online restaurant and foodservice management degree, where students learn about wine and even participate in “virtual tastings.”

“Online students don’t have an opportunity to taste these wines like they would in an in-person class, so we discuss them in detail — what each smells like, tastes like, how they’re made, what food pairs well with them. It’s as if you’ve never tasted an apple before and I describe the different varieties to you�� — some more crisp, some more sweet due to higher sugar levels, some more tart due to higher acidity�� — you could walk into a grocery store and without ever having tasted an apple, understand what to expect from the different varieties on display.”

Similarly, Sandy Galura ’05MS ’12PhD, brings more than 30 years of nursing experience to her classes. Galura worked her way up in AdventHealth from a nurse to the hospital system’s administration, where her last role with the company was as a director of clinical excellence and research. Now, she’s an assistant professor and director of the leadership and management �������ٱ��’s in nursing program, where she regularly teaches a handful of online courses each semester.

“Teaching is one thing, but you have to have the structure in place to deliver an effective online course,” she says.

With the help of the CDL staff, Galura and other faculty are connected with resources and dedicated staff members to help build their online course with engaging elements. Galura is able to work in TED Talks, interviews with local hospital leaders and a platform for students to collaborate and discuss the coursework together into her online classes.

“There’s great interest in advance degrees in nursing beyond baccalaureate. Because of that, and because the majority of students are working adults, there’s a demand for online platforms,” says Galura. “Online learning helps us reach those who are not in urban areas where there are freestanding, brick-and-mortar schools. We need these online options to reach students so we can supply the demand in the workforce.”

“The new technology we can offer faculty members will continue to help them innovate in the classroom,” says Vice Provost for Faculty Excellence Jana Jasinski. “This is such a great opportunity for us to help our students excel and learn in new ways”

Major enhancements include new lightboard recording studios, an augmented and virtual reality studio, an audio and video editing booth with Wacom annotation monitors, and a podcast recording studio. In addition, the center now offers 3D printing, along with Oculus and Valve virtual reality systems and 360-degree cameras that can be borrowed to create and deliver course content. Collaboration spaces are improved, as well, to be more comfortable and capable for video conferencing and interactive workshops.

“The technology and facility upgrades in the Faculty Multimedia Center represent a significant step forward in UCF Digital Learning’s support of faculty innovation and teaching practices,” says Vice Provost for Digital Learning Tom Cavanagh. “We’re certain that our faculty partners will use these state-of-the-art tools to create even more effective content to fuel the success of our students.”

The FMC’s lightboards are one of the most popular tools, and the center now offers three private recording studios. The devices translate the classroom experience of writing on a whiteboard to video with a transparent board that empowers users to explain material in a unique way.

For Christine Hanlon, senior lecturer at the Nicholson School of Communication and Media, learning to make lightboard videos improved how she teaches.

“The FMC has a winning combination of cutting-edge technical tools and experienced staff who can help faculty members to learn how to develop engaging course content,” she says. “They are constantly updating their tools and technologies, so I always learn something new when I stop by the FMC.”

The FMC is open 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday for all UCF faculty, staff and graduate teaching assistants. Individual training, group workshops and headshot photography services are offered regularly and are available through the center’s . For more information, visit the or call 407-823-0519.

If you are a UCF student who is employed by one of these��companies, you may be eligible for tuition assistance depending on your academic major. Companies include:

• Bon Secours Mercy Health
• Chipotle
• Discover
• Taco Bell
• Target
• Waste Management

Academic programs are selected for and by employers based on the employer policy, strategy, and career paths they have set for their employee base.

Students employed by the companies are also encouraged to contact the Human Resources department at their place of employment and ask about Guild’s university partners program.

The partnerships were facilitated by Guild Education. Guild’s industry-leading technology platform allows the nation’s largest employers to offer strategic education and upskilling to their employees. Guild connects workers to a learning marketplace of the nation’s best learning partners for working adults with tuition paid by the company. Guild’s payments and technology platform, curated learning marketplace, and advanced education and career services come together to help working adult learners advance in their education and career, debt-free.

These new partner programs expand beyond other successful employer programs ��AV is affiliated with, including the popular Disney Aspire program. Aspire offers eligible Disney employees and Cast Members the opportunity to receive tuition benefits across a number of programs and partner schools, including UCF, who joined the network in 2019.

UCF was recently recognized as one of the nation’s most innovative universities and best value schools by U.S. News and World Report.

Hanson, who has been teaching Judaic studies at UCF since the early ‘90s, became interested in the Middle East while studying history as an undergraduate at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

“I was wanting to research the roots of Western thought and culture, way back to the cradle of civilization,” Hanson says. “As a senior, I hopped on a plane and landed in Jerusalem to study ancient civilizations. I focused on the ancient land of Israel because it also happens to be the cradle of the three western belief systems — Judaism, Christianity, Islam are all out of the Middle East.”

After learning Hebrew and completing a �������ٱ��’s degree in television and intercultural communication and a doctorate in Judaic studies, Hanson worked at an American TV station based in southern Lebanon in the midst of the Lebanese Civil War before coming to UCF.

“I commuted over a hostile border every day to broadcast family-oriented television into a war zone,” he says. “We showed a lot of American westerns and championship wrestling, but when anything major happened we had to go into news-gathering mode.”

Hanson credits his on-camera work and travels to the Middle East with inspiring immersive lessons for his online courses. But he wasn’t always keen on the idea of teaching virtually.

Judaic studies is a niche program that students would often struggle to fit into their class schedule due to conflicts with their required courses, Hanson says. So began the demand for online courses in the program, and the need for him to complete training through , a support unit that advances online teaching and learning.

“I didn’t want to go this direction at all because I take my energy from an audience, that being the students.” — Ken Hanson, Ů��AV professor

“I didn’t want to go this direction at all because I take my energy from an audience, that being the students,” he says. “I developed a lot of interactive presentations, anything and everything to make a class pop, but I did it because we wanted our courses to be more accessible to the students.”

Near the end of Hanson’s training in 2015, the CDL video team presented its��production studio and he immediately recognized he could put his TV past to use to develop content that could still make his courses “pop.”

“My first semester/course teaching online was the History of the Holocaust,” he says. “My instructional designer suggested I go over and talk to the CDL video team because I was almost in tears about how I could interface with my students.”

Hanson worked with CDL’s video team to create a concept that repackaged his 90-minute lectures into��10 to 20-minute segments while placing him at historic and archaeological sites. Eventually, he began making the productions more theatric — borrowing from his previous theatrical training — to dress up as different characters and use varying dialects for videos across five of his courses.

“Just because I’m a professor doesn’t mean I can’t play act and do theatrics anymore,” he says. “Rather than just reciting a passage from the prophet Isaiah, I’ll dress up as him and recite it in Hebrew and use subtitles so students can hear the ancient language vocalized. In that sense it’s better than a live lecture because we can do things we can’t do in the classroom.”

When UCF transitioned to fully remote learning last March due to the coronavirus, Hanson was already a step ahead of faculty who hadn’t had the opportunity or training to develop immersive content that would be needed to keep students engaged for the next year.

“In that sense it’s better than a live lecture because we can do things we can’t do in the classroom.” — Ken Hanson, Ů��AV professor

“What the pandemic has done is shown how important this technology is,” he says. “We already knew this was the future, so for me teaching during the pandemic was no problem at all. But the pandemic has really highlighted the importance of what CDL is doing.”

With more than 125 TV segments under his belt, and no plans to stop any time soon, creating this type of content for his courses has also proved beneficial for CDL.

“We’ve worked together for so long that both our skill sets have evolved,” says Aaron Hose, media production manager and lead video producer for CDL’s video team. “Ken��has become a better writer, actor and on-screen presenter. Our video producers have improved as editors and compositors. We can now deliver his content more streamlined than before. We’ve found this great ‘sweet spot’ now.”

Hanson’s efforts to go the extra mile in his online courses have paid off as he earned the Chuck D. Dziuban Award for Excellence in Online Teaching in 2017.

“Ken has long been a proponent of pushing the envelope with student engagement through video,” says Roslyn Miller, an instructional designer at CDL. “He recently began using a new technology that’s often used in performing-arts education to enhance student interaction with his dramatized video presentations so they’ll engage even more with the content, each other, and him while enjoying learning.”

Not only are students having fun with the lessons, they’re retaining them better too, which Hanson says, sometimes was a struggle for them during in-person courses.

“There are serious learning advantages to this,” he says. “When you lecture, the amount that is retained by students is maybe 20% and [many] students these days are not taking notes, so you hope they remember something. Here I think I’ve solved this because every week I give them a TV show to watch and they take a quiz on it at the end. So, they’re watching and even re-watching because they have that ability.”

“It’s all about teaching and enhancing learning to the best of your ability, and resources here at UCF, like CDL, bring that into amazing focus.” — Ken Hanson, Ů��AV professor

He also worked with UCF’s Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy in 2018 to develop a video game for his Biblical Archaeology course. Through the game students explore an underground cavern and examine pottery fragments, which Hanson says is a big part of the course that was tough to teach online before this development. And when students encountered issues playing the game because of its large file size, he worked with CDL’s Learning Systems and Technology team to make it accessible for all students on as many types of devices as possible, says Miller.

“The technology is there, embrace it,” Hanson says. “It’s all about teaching and enhancing learning to the best of your ability, and resources here at UCF, like CDL, bring that into amazing focus.”

Faculty who have been certified through or the ��course offered by CDL and would like to find out how they can enhance their course materials through video can create a consultation request at��

“Our high rankings are a testament to the terrific work of our talented faculty and instructional designers who produce engaging, high-quality courses that support our students’ success while also providing them with a flexible learning environment.”
— President Alexander N. Cartwright

Also from U.S. News & World Report, UCF ranked No. 12 (tie) for Best Online Graduate Criminal Justice Programs, No. 20 for Best Online Bachelor’s Programs for Veterans, and No. 27 (tie) for Best Online Master’s in Nursing Programs. This is based on the publication’s 2021 Best Online Programs rankings, which assess schools on student engagement, online learning technologies and support, faculty credentials and training, and the program’s reputation among other universities.

“Our high rankings are a testament to the terrific work of our talented faculty and instructional designers who produce engaging, high-quality courses that support our students’ success while also providing them with a flexible learning environment. Flexible access to high-quality courses continues to increase in importance,” says President Alexander N. Cartwright.

The first online courses launched at ��AV in 1996, marking this year the 25^th anniversary of online learning for the university. These courses have only grown in popularity since, with about 87 percent of students now taking at least one online or blended learning course each academic year.

One of the factors that contributes to UCF’s repeated success in online learning is the level of attention and detail put into creating the courses. Since 1996, UCF has invested in instructional designers who work with faculty members one-on-one to help design and develop their online courses. The working relationship paid off at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, when faculty moved an additional 6,600 courses online in about a week.

This is part of a strategy, led by , to foster a culture that empowers faculty with training, technology and the support of experts in online teaching, application development, video and multimedia content that are critical to creating a quality online experience for students.

“I think online courses are such an opportunity for real, robust learning if you do it correctly,” says Amy Gregory, associate professor of hospitality management.

That’s why ever since she took one of the many courses offered by the Center for Distributed Learning that help faculty teach and develop online classes, she hasn’t been shy in connecting with Sue Bauer, an instructional designer. The two have worked together for nearly 10 years to enhance Gregory’s classes.

“We’ve utilized virtually every tool that’s been available to us,” says Gregory, who teaches various lodging courses at Rosen College.

Some of those tools are software that’s been developed by the Center for Distributed Learning team at UCF over the last 25 years. They include interactive graphs, flashcards, video-embedding capabilities and more, and serve as an engaging way to have students interact with the course content.

In some cases, instructional designers and the team at the Center for Distributed Learning build tools customized to a faculty member’s need. That was the case for Desiree Díaz, an associate professor of nursing who teaches courses leading to the online healthcare simulation certificate, which was the first graduate program of its kind in Florida and among only a few programs nationwide. One of her courses, which teaches healthcare professionals to use simulation as a training tool in the field, assigned students to design a simulation training room. In its original form, Díaz would have her online students use paper and pencil to draw where they felt each component of the training room should go and scan the drawing to submit it online. Now, with the help of instructional designer Kathleen Bastedo and web applications developer Corey Peterson, among others, students use a custom software directly in Webcourses that allows them to design the room and submit it with no scanning necessary.

”Sometimes I have a crazy idea,” says Díaz, “but I’m never immediately shut down. Kathleen and the instructional designers are always great to work with and help bring my ideas to life.”

During the Fall 2020 semester, at least 31 faculty members provided their required course materials at no cost to students through . These efforts resulted in an estimated combined savings of $751,339.50��for 6,425 students enrolled in courses across four colleges and nine departments.

With a total enrollment of 71,444, roughly 9 percent of the UCF student-body took a course using OER — up by 5 percent from Fall 2019.

One of the largest contributing factors to the growth of OER usage from Fall 2019 to Fall 2020 was the collective work done by 10 faculty members within the in collaboration with the . These two departments were able to combine their expertise to scale ‘open’ learning through the use of Webcourses and UCF Pressbooks, both available at no additional cost to students and faculty. Their concerted efforts resulted in an estimated combined savings of $232,710.60��for 1,990 students enrolled in nearly every section of College Physics I��and��College Physics II minus the exception of one honors-level section.

“While cost may not be something faculty initially see as much of a problem, taking on the student perspective is key to exhibit a basic level of student care in terms of materials costs,” says Associate Professor of Physics Bo Chen.

While textbook expenditures have plateaued over the past few years, as reported by the , students continue to seek ways to offset the costs.��According to the Florida Virtual Campus 2018 Student Textbook and Course Materials survey, which polled 21,400 students across Florida’s public institutions of higher education, 61 percent did not buy course materials, 43 percent took fewer courses, 41 percent did not register for a course and 23 percent dropped a course altogether — all due to cost.

Health sciences major Emily Sierra has experienced financial strain due to the cost of course materials nearly every semester of her college career.

“At one point, I was living off $100 a month but [was] expected to have the money for textbooks five-times that amount,” says Sierra, who took one of Chen’s courses this semester. “Textbook fees for a single science course can be upwards of $300, so I would only buy the textbook and materials for my science classes and just hope for the best with the rest of my courses.”

OER are broadly defined by UNESCO as “teaching, learning and research materials in any medium — digital or otherwise — that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits no-cost access, use, adaptation and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.”

“I believe adopting (open educational resources) has had positive impacts on my teaching as well as students’ learning.” — Assistant Professor Ellen H. Kang

“I believe adopting OER has had positive impacts on my teaching as well as students’ learning,” says Assistant Professor of Physics Ellen H. Kang, who implemented OER materials in her College Physics course. “The free online textbook has enhanced students’ accessibility, [and] the fact that the e-textbook can be customized for each instructor has allowed for greater flexibility in the preparation of my course materials.”

According to Kang and Chen, taking a��collective, departmental approach to selecting “open” educational materials facilitates the building of shareable, well-aligned��courses that faculty can customize and, in turn, share back with their colleagues. As new concepts develop, the current systems can then be enhanced for students’ benefit.

For Sierra, not having to pay for her physics textbooks and course materials was, “a lifesaver.”

“This semester, I was able to afford all of my textbooks and supplies because my physics materials were free,” she says. “Both of my parents lost their jobs at some point this semester because of COVID-19. So having my homework, textbook, quizzes [and] practice problems given to me really was monumental for not just me but also my family.”

And the positive impact extends beyond her budget.

“To have a professor who cared enough to put in the hours of work to make the supplies free, especially in the midst of the scariest and most uncertain times our generation has faced in history, made me feel seen as a student,” she says. “It motivated me to push that much harder when studying because I knew he did very clearly care about our success as students.”

Before the global pandemic rocked the country, the U.S. Department of Education was already talking about a way to help provide technical support to higher education faculty as classes and learning trends were moving to online platforms. The pandemic that drove universities to online instruction earlier this year accelerated the federal agency’s desire to help universities and colleges better use digital tools to reach students. The agency awarded UCF and its partners a five-year, $2.5 million grant to launch the center quickly. UCF’s portion is $335,000.

After 20 years of providing online degrees, UCF has become a leader in online learning. Ranked as a top 20 online program by U.S. News & World Report, UCF offers more than 100 fully online programs. This platform will expand UCF’s reach as an online leader — ��this time for higher-education faculty.

“The three big aims of the center are to increase knowledge and awareness of education technology, to increase the capacity of faculty at institutions of higher education, and to sustain professional learning networks for technical assistance,” says Eleazar “Trey” Vasquez, a Ů��AV professor of exceptional education and one of the leaders of the new center.

“The notion of comfort with technology is highly variable, especially in higher education,” says Vasquez. “We have faculty who have had to really merge with technology later in their career, and we have faculty who are coming up as digital natives.”

Center leaders hope to help provide enough resources to get everyone who accesses the digital center on equal footing. By improving faculty’s understanding of the best way to use technology in a remote setting, students will benefit, Vasquez says.

“It’s very much like a combination of Pinterest and YouTube, where there are different topics that you can select from and then you get to do a deep dive into a particular area,” Vasquez says. “Everything is 100% accessible. It’s built on the principles of universal design for learning, which is all about intentionality – how you deliver your instructional content so that you take into account learner variability. When you design instruction with that notion in mind, it’s easier for everyone to acquire content knowledge.”

If a faculty member wants to learn how to create an editable PDF, build their own website using HTML code, or simply peruse the site to find new ways to integrate technology into their courses, the center will provide guidance through articles and videos.

Visitors to the site can interact with the content in different ways: by simply accessing it and learning or by being an “innovator,” who creates content to display on the site.

The center also plans to create a way for users to get micro-credentials for what they’ve mastered, if they are interested, Vasquez says.

Over the next few weeks, the partners and advisory board of the center will work on pre-populating the site with content. Several scholars from around the country with particular expertise are working with the center to create content. Matthew Marino, a professor of exceptional student education and the other center leader at UCF, collaborated with learning specialists in five states to develop the first micro-credential housed on the platform. Once the network and reach of the center begins to grow, the team will conduct an analysis to pinpoint any growing pains of the center and quickly address those with new content delivery, explains Vasquez.

“There have been wins and losses in terms of how effective we are at delivering instruction to learners at all ability levels. The accessibility issues are one thing. The accommodations are another thing, but the content delivery is something completely different. It’s the intent of this center to provide some level of technical assistance and support for faculty who are experiencing those realities now,” says Vasquez. “We’re really looking to impact a broad audience.”

The center collaborators include the University of Kansas and the Center for Applied Special Technology, a nonprofit education research and development organization in Boston that created the universal design for learning framework. Metiri Group will also evaluate the center’s work.

Vasquez earned his doctorate in special education from Utah State University. He joined UCF’s faculty in 2008 and has helped bring in more than $12 million of continuous funding for projects for the College of Community Innovation and Education. His research interests include STEM education, autism and technology. Vasquez is also the director of the Toni Jennings Exceptional Education Institute and serves on the board of directors for the Center for Applied Special Technology.

Marino earned his doctorate in special education from the University of Connecticut. He joined UCF’s faculty in 2012 after leaving Washington State University. Marino’s research interests include innovation in curriculum design, special education, executive function and STEM. Marino has received more than $8.5 million in federal grants during his career.

This semester, the university hit a milestone – more than 100 programs are now available fully online.

“UCF has been a leader in this field for more than 20 years, and since day one we’ve been committed to high-quality online education,” says Tom Cavanagh, vice provost for digital learning. “No matter how many programs we continue to add, that commitment to quality will never change.”

Since UCF Online was formalized in 2016, enrollment has steadily grown year after year. Cavanagh attributes its success to UCF’s emphasis on training faculty to be effective online teachers and integrating digital learning into the culture at UCF even before the pandemic.

“Before March, 86 percent of our students took at least one course online or blended every year. Almost 50 percent of our credit hours were online or blended before everyone transitioned online in March,” he says. “Teaching students online is something that was embedded at UCF, and it is done at the same high quality that you would expect from our face-to-face courses.”

Quantity with an emphasis on quality

That mindset and experience has paid off dividends as higher education has had to quickly shift gears in the wake of COVID-19. While many schools around the country grappled with struggling enrollments as a result of the pandemic, UCF Online saw an 18 percent increase from Fall 2019 to Fall 2020.

UCF Online currently offers 25 bachelor’s degrees, 34 �������ٱ��’s, three doctorates and an additional 41 graduate certificates. Eleven new certificates were created specifically in response to workforce demands created by COVID-19.

U.S. News & World Report��recently ranked UCF among the top 20��Best Online Bachelor’s Programs in the nation��for the third consecutive year, enabling students from anywhere in the world to enroll in fully online degree programs.

“Our goal has been to try to reach those non-traditional students who can’t access education in any other way and need the flexibility that online education offers,” Cavanagh says.

Bright future

Taylor Banfield is one of those students. The 25-year-old needed to balance her coursework with her job as a server to put herself through school and says UCF Online allowed her to do both.

She is months away from earning her bachelor’s degree in health services administration after persevering through a seven-year journey that saw financial hardship early on and a boating accident last year that landed her in the hospital for two weeks.

Banfield — whose leg was cut badly by a boat propeller— was able to stay on top of her homework from the hospital bed. She says she is thankful for her teachers’ understanding and willingness to work with her during that traumatic period of her life. She was also able to apply lessons from her classwork to her own situation.

“The class I was enrolled in focused on the insurance process in healthcare, and I was able to understand the explanation of benefits in my own situation,” Banfield says. “It was really helpful, and kind of cool that I could experience what I was learning about first hand.”

Banfield says finally earning her diploma will fulfill a lifelong goal she set out to make her grandmother proud.

“My grandma has 20 grandchildren, and none of them have a degree,” she says. “That made me want to be the change for my family. I didn’t want to just sit around waiting for something to happen. That’s why I went to school. This degree is going to be a stepping stone to where I’m going. I plan to get my �������ٱ��’s and eventually I want to specialize in helping people with disabilities. I want to make an impact.”

Cavanagh says the university will continue to develop and expand UCF Online’s degree inventory to continue to help students achieve their goals, and he envisions a future that holds more alternative programming such as skill-based short courses or smaller credentials that could be stacked to fit degree requirements to accommodate a variety of educational opportunities.

“That’s definitely an area of opportunity for us to explore,” he says.

Face coverings are just one of the critical prevention measures ��AV is adopting. The coverings help contain small droplets that come out of your mouth and nose. If you have COVID-19 and are not showing symptoms, a face covering reduces your chance of spreading the infection to others. If you are healthy, a covering may protect you from those around you.

UCF has begun distributing one free cotton, reusable covering to those returning to UCF. Distribution will continue throughout the summer, and additional locations will be added in the fall to accommodate the higher demand as more return to UCF.

Face Covering Distribution

Cloth face coverings are being distributed at several locations on the main and downtown campuses, with distribution stations coming to the Rosen and Lake Nona campuses in the near future. One face covering will be assigned to each member of the UCF community, and a valid UCF ID card is required to obtain one. Students, faculty and staff may also pick up a face covering for their friends and coworkers as long as they have that person’s UCF ID.

A map and listing of��distribution locations��and operating hours are listed here.

For students:

• New students who have not yet received their UCF ID will receive their face covering in conjunction with distribution of their UCF Cards at a time to be shared later this summer.
• UCF Housing will provide face coverings to residential students during the move-in process that starts in August.

UCF has ordered a face covering for each student and faculty and staff member, and they will be available for pickup throughout the summer and at the start of the fall semester. Individuals will be responsible for acquiring another face covering in the event the one provided by ��AV is lost or damaged.

About the Face Coverings

The UCF-branded face coverings are made from 100 percent cotton and are washable and reusable. These face coverings are not a replacement for medical-grade PPE or the protective gear required in some laboratories.

The decision to use the UCF-provided face covering is your own, but����requires the use of a face covering of some sort. The coverings are required to be worn in shared indoor spaces and outdoors where physical distancing is not possible.

You can also purchase other UCF-branded face coverings from Rock ‘Em, an Orlando-based apparel company started by a former student. Part of the proceeds from��the sales of these face coverings will be donated to the UCF Student Emergency Fund.

We encourage you to watch this video about����and visit the��Returning to UCF website��for additional��FAQs��about face coverings.

Other Prevention Measures

Other steps such as continued physical distancing, regular hand-washing, avoiding touching your face and staying home when you are sick are critical components in reducing the spread of COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses.

The reality is that exposure to COVID-19 is possible in any public place where people are present, and personal responsibility is required to protect ourselves, our loved ones and everyone with whom we come in contact.

Additional updates will continue to be shared on��, and we also encourage you to download the��, another tool that will be utilized to share and gather information as we return to UCF.

As Knights, we wear face coverings and take other COVID-19 prevention steps because we care about one another.

Let’s Armor Up, Knights, and Charge On!

For the latest information about returning to campus, visit UCF’s Coronavirus and Returning to UCF websites. You will be required to complete the COVID Self-Checker — available via the or online — each day before arriving to campus.