Agility & Flexibility - Camplese

>> Okay. Hi, I'm Cole Camplese. I'm the Director of Education Technology Services here at Penn State University, been at the university now for about 10 years. My focus is really on emerging technologies and how they play in a teaching and learning environment. You know, the core competency I see for teaching online probably relates to agility. It's a competency that I think is important for faculty residents, but really even more so online primarily because, you know what ends up happening is your students were all over the place. There is a asynchronous thing going on and you have to be willing to take the curve balls that come along with not just the technology, but with the pedagogy. So, being able to be flexible, feeling as though openness is okay, openness to new ways of doing things and taking what your students give you and sort of reflecting it back and amplifying it is a really key kind of a thing. >> Now, a second ago, Carla Zembal-Saul talked about the idea that the willingness to fail and to kind of recover is important. It's almost a disposition rather than a core competency. Have you experienced that? >> Failure -- yeah, a lot. No, but, you know, it goes back to what I said about agility. I mean, the whole idea of being comfortable with being agile has to do with being comfortable with failure and finding ways to correct those failures sort of on to fly. And so, of course I mean if you -- if you're not willing to fail, you're not willing to take risks. And I think if you're not willing to take risks, you're not willing to address the needs of various learning styles in the way different people come at learning. So, you have failures right there in the middle of all of this and I think it's one of the things that we need to focus more on and saying, you know it's okay to fall down every now and then because you're a little bit stronger when you get back up. >> My sense is you are having a little bit of fun with all of this stuff. >> Yeah, you know this is what it's all about. And if -- I think if you are going to spend time in the teaching and learning environment, you sort of have to live that and it has to be part of who you are, part of your makeup. So, if you're not having a good time, go find something else to think about. >> Great Cole, thanks Cole. >> Absolutely. >> Alright.