The pandemic was a catalyst for the use of online forums at EPFL and recent data now seems to indicate that this trend is poised to continue --even after social distancing measures were lifted and classes have been able to resume in-person.

The various shifts from on-campus to online lecturing coupled with a more generalized tendency towards flexibility --as indicated by the platform’s usage data and traditional lecture attendance rates-- have subsequently prompted the school’s education vice presidency to set up a commission tasked with assessing what modalities of hybrid teaching could and should be rolled-out school-wide.

In this context, Patrick Jermann, Executive Director of the Center for Digital Education (CEDE), presents a case study of the online forum tool named “Piazza” --already adopted by a portion of EPFL teachers-- shedding light onto how and why such a tool can support learning outcomes through leveraging the benefits of asynchronous feedback.