The Edinburgh Futures Institute is easily the most impressive building in the portfolio of pretty impressive buildings at the University of Edinburgh. Situated across from the flats along the Quartermile, the EFI is a dazzling new facility filled with millions of dollars worth of tech equipment for the purpose of offering fusion-style classes that allows students from all over the world to study in Edinburgh.

The Futures Institute Classrooms

The rooms are designed for fusion learning, which basically mixes in-person students with online students for taught master’s programs. Most rooms have two massive screens up front, a tech setup at the podium, plus 5-8 tables around the room each with dual monitors and a call box for Teams.

I’ve hosted a lot of Teams calls over the past few years, but nothing is as intimidating as the tech-monstrosity of the EFI. I think teaching assistants and course organizers have all shared similar feelings of overwhelm at the sheer scale of the technology in the classrooms. It’s wild to think that Edinburgh was already planning for hybrid and online teaching years ago with this facility, and it would have been great to have in 2020. Online universities have been “a thing” since the 90’s – and Canada has several online or blended universities like Athabasca and Royal Roads. But this is a whole new level.

Prepping for my first class

In the lead up to my first course, Narratives of Digital Capitalism, I’ve been checking off a multitude of tasks like:

• Getting my staff ID card
• Making sure I have access to the course module in LEARN
• Designing the class Miro board
• Attending prep meetings with the course organizers
• Figuring out the technology in the classroom
• Filling out my timecard
• Attending onboarding sessions
• Previewing the classroom
• Checking my new staff email account

I always forget how much onboarding work is required when starting with a university, and Edinburgh has substantially more tasks to complete since I have a limited work visa as a foreign student. It is significantly easier to onboard in Canada because I basically get a staff card and my schedule, and that’s about it.

Intensive teaching

The Edinburgh Futures Institute offers two-day intensive modules, rather than once-a-week classes which were standard in my master’s program. That means student get 16 hours of lecture time all crammed into a very short week. For the first class, I arrived about 45 minutes early to assess the room, and prepare for the onslaught of 23 in-person students and 13 online students. I was very fortunate to have Elif, another Teaching Assistant, who has been doing this for the past three years and she was immensely helpful in sorting out all the technology, managing the online chat, moving the camera, coordinating the mics, turning recording off/on, and muting people. On the second day, we mixed in-person and online students together to do group work – which was a massive task.

The second day was substantially more fun, and less stressful, than day one. I was able to actually chat with the students, get to hear about their programs, and offer some ideas on their work. The course lectures were led by Dr Pip Thornton and Dr Ben Collier, and both were great to work with.

Managing the technology behind the desk!

The break out groups and screens

Differences between a TA and Tutor

At Edinburgh, there are a number of roles PhD students can have such as research assistant, intern, tutor and teaching assistant. I personally got confused about the term tutor because in Canada, that refers to someone you hire if you are failing high school math and you need help – you hire a tutor. But here, the term is more synonymous with a sessional lecturer, whereby you are given one or more opportunities to lecture in a course, often under the supervision of the main course organizer.

For creative writing students, that means lecturing in one of the undergraduate English Literature classes. I was offered the mentorship opportunity to do that in my second year. However, when I had a look at the course materials, and readings, I was completely out of my depth. I don’t have an English Lit background, and the texts that were available were books I had never read before, and didn’t have any familiarity with. So, since I was already teaching full course loads in Canada, I decided not to pursue the tutoring opportunity as I already had teaching experience in writing.

The Teaching Assistant role was more appealing because I don’t have the responsibility to prep and teach the class material, but I do get to engage on the topic and offer support to the course organizer. Since the Edinburgh Futures Institute combines online and in-person students, the role often focuses more on the online student experience, to make sure they feel like they are part of the class. There is alot of “tech management” but once that becomes more second nature, there is alot of opportunity to connect with the students, support their learning, and engage in the subject matter. And in some ways, you kind of get to take the course for free.

For PhD students who want teaching experience, the tutor roles are great. But since I have taught several courses on my own already,  I enjoyed the TA role because there was less pressure to build course material, and it was a chance to learn different teaching techniques that I can apply in Canada when I am teaching. It was also a fun introduction to some adjacent research, and I was able to meet more staff at the university beyond my supervisors.

What’s next?

In a few weeks, I’ll be supporting another course at the EFI and this time I’ll be doing it on my own. So, I was very thankful to get the hang of things from Elif, and I’ll be supporting Writing Speculative Fiction with my own PhD supervisors, which will be great.

What it’s like teaching at the Edinburgh Futures Institute / Double spaced by Lexie Angelo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution CC BY 3.0