FAQs

First do an audit of what you have and what you need:

• What supplies do you have available to you?

• Do you have wifi, a laptop, a phone?

• If you don’t have a laptop or desktop, please contact the helpdesk at Otis for assistance: email helpdesk@otis.edu or call 310-665-6803.

  1. If you have to use your phone to communicate with faculty and complete your work, let your faculty know so that they can make the appropriate accommodations.

  2. Check your phone’s data plan. Sprint and T-Mobil are offering unlimited data. Other phone providers may may also be offering unlimited data – check with yours. All of the phone providers are increasing their hotspots and will give free access at the hotspots.

• Charter will offer free Spectrum broadband and Wi-Fi access for 60 days to households with college students who do not already have a Spectrum broadband subscription and at any service level up to 100 Mbps. To enroll call 1-844-488-8395. Installation fees will be waived for new student households.

• Xfinity WiFi Free For Everyone: Xfinity WiFi hotspots across the country will be available to anyone who needs them for free – including non-Xfinity Internet subscribers. For a map of Xfinity WiFi hotspots, visit www.xfinity.com/wifi. Once at a hotspot, consumers should select the “xfinitywifi” network name in the list of available hotspots and then launch a browser.

If your Internet connection is weak or intermittent, there is not much you can do but there may be some useful adaptations. 

• Make sure that you shut down all unnecessary applications and close all unnecessary browser tabs. It is also a good idea to restart your computer before joining a class in Zoom. 

• If possible, try to connect with ethernet rather than wifi. Ethernet connections are often faster and more reliable. 

• If you are sharing your Internet with others, try to arrange to have them limit their use during your class meetings if possible. 

• Zoom is also accessible on mobile devices, so if your Internet is not strong, you can connect on your phone and use data.  

• If you are not able to connect reliably, communicate with the course faculty to arrange an alternative way to complete the course work.  

• Your faculty will be using Otis email, the Nest, or O-Space as their main communication platforms. Make sure that you are checking your Otis College email regularly. If you are not able to access Otis student email, please fill out this form https://otiscollege.formstack.com/forms/online_content

• It is likely that many faculty will be using Zoom video conferencing as a way to have real-time communication with you throughout the remainder of the semester. Your faculty will communicate directly with you about how you will engage in the learning for each course. In addition to being used by your professor for classes, you might also use Zoom to connect and work with classmates on group projects. Here’s a great resource to learn how to connect and use Zoom: https://otis.libguides.com/tech_help/web-conf

• If you are having difficulty connecting to the platforms your faculty are using please request support by filling out this form: https://otiscollege.formstack.com/forms/online_content

• Help is available specifically for O-Space through the Student Learning Center slc@otis.edu , Teaching Learning Center tlc@otis.edu , and Help desk helpdesk@otis.edu.

• Help is available for the Nest through 24/7 online support: https://community.brightspace.com/helpdesk/s/

• If you do not have access to the Dashboard, you can access the following platforms directly:

  1. 1. Email: https://webmail-sso.otis.edu/owa/

     2. Nest: https://lms.otis.edu/

     3. O-Space: https://ospace.otis.edu/sso/saml

     4. G-Drive: http://gdrive.otis.edu/

• To access Zoom you need the class meeting zoom link from your faculty who should have communicated that to you prior to the first class meeting. Please check the Nest (FNDT) or O-space (all other students), or contact your faculty directly.

Several software providers are generously offering free software licenses available for use from your personal computer in order to help you complete your class requirements for the remainder of the Spring semester. Please follow these instructions.

The Interim Attendance Policy remains in effect, and students are required to attend the course according to how each instructor defines attendance in their on-line course syllabus. There are no "excused" online class meetings or coursework activities in any College course when courses are online. In the virtual environment, attendance is based on some form of weekly contact between you and your faculty and/or the completion of your assigned coursework each week by the assigned date. Faculty will clearly communicate what counts as participation and attendance.

Contact your instructor immediately, and ideally in advance, if you are not able to attend a synchronous class or meet the week’s assignment.

If you become ill or for any other emergency reason are unable to complete your assignments by the deadline, please contact your instructor immediately. No doctor’s note or evidence of emergency is needed, but you must contact your instructor, preferably in advance.

All grades completed through Spring break will stand as is. For the rest of the semester, faculty have flexibility around how to complete their courses, and it is essential that they clearly communicate their plans to you, their students. Once faculty have determined an appropriate grading option for their class, they will provide details to you.

For questions about specific courses, including attendance, assignments, and grading, students should contact the instructor of the course.

The deadline to withdraw from a course has been changed to Friday, April 10. Please keep that date in mind as you move through the end of the semester. Notify your department or the Academic Advisor of your desire to withdraw before the withdrawal deadline?

The campus is now closed. Limited access to retrieve personal items from workspaces and studios is possible through March 27th at noon. After that date, please contact Interim Provost Kim Russo krusso@otis.edu

The travel aspect of Spring semester Travel Study courses has been cancelled. However, all Spring semester Travel Study courses will continue to be offered as online courses. Your faculty should have contacted you with information about how the course will proceed. If you have not heard from your faculty about the continuation of the Travel Study course, please reach out to them as soon as possible to learn more.

If you no longer intend to participate in your Travel Study course, it is important to contact advising@otis.edu in the One Stop to learn more about course withdrawal procedures and for any questions you may have regarding associated credits.

The priority registration dates have been postponed for one week. Please see the new dates posted on the Dashboard under Registration (my.otis.edu). Course advising will take place on Zoom. Please look for emails from your department letting you know how to sign up for course advising.

The Internship Fair, originally scheduled to take place on campus March 26th, was cancelled. The decision to cancel was a difficult one, but we're confident that our new efforts in lieu of an on-campus event will propel our students in securing meaningful employment this summer. Students were able to sign up for employer interviews two weeks ago via our online career portal. The Office of Career Services will submit all applications on students' behalf to the employers who registered for the event. The employers have agreed to review student applications and schedule interviews directly with the students they wish to meet with, either virtually or by phone. Employers will conduct virtual or phone interviews in lieu of on-campus interviews throughout the month of April. Students were given a deadline of March 26th to upload their updated resumes before Career Services submits their resumes to participating employers. Students should check their Otis email for more information from Career Services. Otis College continues to be committed to ensuring our students secure internships in preparation for their career success.

While our May 10 Commencement event also cancelled, we know how important Commencement is to many graduating students and their families who look forward to it throughout their years at Otis College. Commencement is a symbol of the time and dedication students have given to their studies, and the pinnacle celebratory moment of all they have accomplished. After discussing various options with a group of graduating students working with Student Affairs and consulting our Academic Leaders and select faculty members, unanimous sentiment was found toward an in-person Commencement opportunity, over the prospect of holding a virtual Commencement on May 10. Accordingly, we will invite each member of the Class of 2020 to join the Commencement ceremony in May, 2021. We will share more in the coming months about how this special, combined Classes of 2020 and 2021 event will be organized, while continuing to monitor public health guidance regarding large gatherings.

In the meantime, all graduating students will soon receive their pre-ordered Caps and Gowns at the address provided on the Cap and Gown Form. If you have not submitted this form, your cap and gown will be mailed to your permanent address on file. Please hold on to these items for next May, and on May 10th, 2020 consider sharing a photo online of yourself in your Cap and Gown to celebrate your achievement. The College is also working on a unique website to honor this year's graduating Class in time for May 10th. This site will feature pre-recorded videos from our President, Board Chair, Honorary Degree recipient, Valedictorian, and more. All graduating students' names will be listed in their respective major. Class Marshals and student award winners will also be featured while encouraging robust social media engagement for all of you to share how you are celebrating at home by using #otiscollege and #OtisGrad2020.

While the physical Annual Exhibition event was cancelled for health and safety reasons, the College has been investigating ways it can share the work of Seniors and MFA graduates with a wide audience. The Communications and Marketing Division, in consultation with Academic and Student Affairs leaders and students, are building virtual galleries for each academic program that will appear on the Annual Exhibition webpage, along with student portfolios. The virtual galleries now in progress will allow student work to be promoted around the world, and will live online long past the usual single weekend. Our Communications and Marketing staff have worked over recent weeks to build a new and enhanced web framework for these online galleries, and will continue working with academic programs and graduating students to fill them with student work. More information will be shared with all graduating students through their respective departments in the coming days. The virtual galleries will launch on the evening that the Annual Exhibition was to open to employers, May 8 and employers, families, and the public will be invited to view the online galleries. While we all share the sense of loss graduating students are experiencing around the cancellation of Annual Exhibition weekend, we know that many more people around the world will now be able to—and will—see the work of our soon-to-be-graduates. In the meantime, please look for and respond to the Leaving the Owl's Nest survey so that your portfolio can be included on the Annual Exhibition website. (An email was sent from the Office of Career Services.)

We hope that MFA and BFA courses may be able to convene on campus during the summer session. While we are moving forward with this hope, we are also planning for summer courses to be taught online, should public health guidelines continue to restrict in-person activities in the weeks ahead. Stay tuned for more information as conditions governing how we proceed continue to unfold.

This year's Academic Excellence Award recipients will be honored and our Valedictorian will be announced during an online event for the awardees and their guests on Tuesday, April 14.

The Academic Excellence Award is the highest honor given to one graduating student in each major program. Selections are made by program leaders and faculty, and affirmed by the College's academic awards committee. Criteria include a cumulative GPA of 3.5 or higher (for undergraduates), quality of work, personal character, and contributions to Otis and the larger community.

Students receiving Student Leadership Awards have been notified and acknowledged through the Student Leader Award Recipients website. Their awards have been sent by U.S. mail and all recipients have received Credly badges to include in their LinkedIn profiles. Each recipient received nominations by their peers, faculty, and/or staff. The Student Leadership Committee is proud to announce our 2020 Award Recipients. We encourage you to read about our amazing award recipients here.

In response to COVID-19, many publishers, vendors, and distributors are making their content available for free for a limited time. Some of them are limited to students only. Students can review those resources here: https://otis.libguides.com/remote_access/online