On college campuses everywhere, lecture halls can seat up to 500 to 1,000 students at a time. Typically, introductory freshman classes take place in lecture halls. You have one professor who lectures for an hour and a half and you have 500 students quietly taking notes.
When I was a freshman in college, during that first semester, my entire freshman dorm floor would take the same introductory freshman classes such as Freshman Composition, Introduction to Math, and Introduction to Psychology. The Math Professor looked so frail and old that we called him, 'The Teddy Bear Professor'. He stood in front of all 500 of us and lectured on a math topic. Then, his TA (Teaching Assistants--graduate students) would teach us in class sections of 25 students each.
We would attend the lecture hall lecture 2 times a week and then on Friday, we would attend our one TA class where the TA would give us tests and allow us to ask questions about the professor lecture that week. Throughout that whole time, I never once asked the math professor any questions. I just sat quietly among the 500 students.
What use are lecture halls in the digital age?
I say, get rid of lecture halls, and let the lecture part of the class be handled by a digital lecture hall where students attend classes on an online classroom.
Students no longer have to commute to class and navigate traffic. This is especially true for adult students who are working.
For students living in dorms, they can stay in their dorms and not have to go out in the cold snowy weather if you live back East and just attend lectures online in the digital classroom.
Go to Your TA class or Social Media to Socialize with Other Students
You just attend class with your TA if you want a face to face experience with other students, or want to socialize. In my day, the TA class was on Fridays so students would only have to show up for class once a week if the student is taking a hybrid class.
These days, if students want to socialize, they can always host a Zoom meeting or hang out on social media which is what students do anyway. Isn't that how Facebook got started? Lecture halls have become obsolete in this digital age.
Besides, we did not socialize much in lecture halls anyway. It was just one long boring lecture by the professor. So I say, get rid of lecture halls!
Professors can make recorded video lectures for students to watch instead.
If students listen to video lectures online, they can attend class in their pyjamas, they can listen to the lecture any time they want even at 3AM in the morning for night owl students! No need to get up early for those bleary eyed before the coffee 8AM lecture hall classes!
Also, with a recorded lecture, you can listen to it as many times as you want. This is especially helpful for ESL students for whom English is not their native language.
Or if you want to take careful hand notes to learn the material, you can listen to it as many times as you need or to slow it down to take careful notes.
Lecture Halls endanger student and teacher health due to COVID19
With COVID 19, having students take online classes is safer than having 500-1000 students all crowded in one lecture hall, and you do not endanger the professor's health and all the students' health by being exposed to germs in an enclosed area.
Re-purpose Lecture Halls for other uses!
Get rid of crowded lecture halls and replace those lecture halls with digital classrooms. P Then, the college can re-purpose the lecture hall for other uses. Without huge lecture halls, college campuses can become smaller and more cost efficient, and past down these savings in lower tuition costs to students. The need for huge college campuses filled with lecture halls is yesterday's news. I say, Get rid of Lecture Halls to Save Money!
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