Experimenting with Labs

Hands-On Learning During Covid

By Wake Forest University

October 1^st, 2020

Different Look, Same Lab

From STEM to music, labs look different this fall with social distancing, face coverings, and many fewer students in-person. But the science is the same, even if some of the lab partners are attending over Zoom.

At Wake Downtown and the recently renovated Salem Hall, chemistry students spread out in their organic and general chem labs.

How Do Capacitors Work?

Wake Forest engineering students work on circuits with capacitors, in professor Erin Henslee’s Engineering 311 class at Wake Downtown.

Rehearsals Go Outdoors

Outdoors is safer, so the music department holds rehearsals outside Scales Fine Arts Center when the weather cooperates. Some classes meet in sections, as with ten choir members, or a smaller group like the wind ensemble. But there is enough room for the entire orchestra to spread six feet apart in the Scales Breezeway for a rehearsal of Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Working in Groups, Online

One member of each physics lab group attends the lab section in Olin Hall, while their lab partners attend online.

Biochem @ Wake Downtown

Students in chemistry professor Rebecca Alexander's advanced biochemistry lab work together while maintaining proper social distancing at Wake Downtown.