9.3 What to Avoid

There are a few specific things that instructors should avoid doing, including sharing private student information, taking a long time to respond to students, sharing screens with private, confidential, or questionable tabs or windows.

Always check first before sharing a screen. Avoid sharing the entire screen; instead share only specific apps, windows, or browser tabs. There have been instances in the past where instructors mistakenly shared grade books, private emails and chats, personal calendars, bank account information, non-course related websites, and personal correspondance. Remember that sessions are recorded and students can take frame grabs and share causing professional or personal embarrassment.

Avoid using an external grade book. Instead use the grade book facility built into the LMS. This is critical in case an instructor falls ill and someone else needs to take over a class.

Do not create private content that requires a unique access method. Be sure that all learning assets, videos, etc. are accessible to everyone in Khoury or at least a few colleagues in case of illness or departure from the university.

Check all posts, assignments, communication, learning materials, learning assets for spelling errors, grammatical mistakes, and aestetic issues. Your assets should use proper fonts, proper coloring, clean layout, and “look good” – it is a measure of quality and poor quality materials reflect poorly on you, on Khoury, and on Northeastern.

When creating learning assets or in communication with students, eliminate and avoid, whenever possible, idioms and Americanisms that may make it hard to understand for foreign students. Likewise, avoid references to popular American culture, movies, TV shows, historical events, localisms that may not be meaningful to foreign speakers and foreign students.