The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis on the university education has made necessary to adopt a different teaching model in order to make possible teaching activities under the existing health regulations.

The University of Barcelona is a face-to-face university and all our degrees and masters have been accredited in the face-to-face modality. However, the COVID-19 health emergency will make the academic year 2020-2021 an exceptional period with exceptional preventive measures.

At this context, the Faculty of Economics and Business of the University of Barcelona has established a mixed teaching model for the first semester of the academic year, which combines face-to-face lectures with other learning activities. In this sense and taking into account the available resources and the characteristics of our programmes, the Faculty of Economics and Business has established two different types of teaching models, one for degrees and the other for master programmes, respectively. You can read here the full document on our teaching model for the academic year 20-21  (in Catalan).

Teaching model for undergraduate programmes: Face-to-face activities at 50%.

The students of undergraduate programmes will follow in-class lectures one week and the other week remotely. This makes possible that the physical presence of the students at the Faculty is set at a maximum of 50% at all times, allowing that the security distances established by the health authorities is respected.

Professors will provide lectures in the usual way, but with only half of the students in the classroom, whereas the other half will follow the lecture through streaming at home (synchronous teaching).

The Faculty will provide the necessary technical resources (webcams and microphones) to broadcast the classes by streaming (via BB Collaborate, Teams or similar platforms).

Students will be divided into two groups depending on the number of their ID card (DNI or NIE for foreigners). Those with pair numbers will come the first week of class to the Faculty and since then every two weeks (one yes, one no) until the end of the semester. Those students with odd numbers will come the second week and since then every two weeks (one yes, one no).

While transiting common spaces, students will have to follow specific rules and schedules for entry and exit in order to avoid congestion.

Teaching model for Masters and Postgraduate programmes: Face-to-face activities at 100%.

In the case of MSc and Postgraduate programmes, considering the reduced size of the groups, the Faculty will assign larger classrooms which will allow both accommodating all enrolled students in face-to-face activities and keeping the necessary security distance between students.

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The syllabus for all the subjects will be distributed before the beginning of the academic year. They will contain, as usual, additional information about the specific functioning of each group, thus providing students all the required academic information before their enrolment.

The existing academic regulations and rules specifying the obligations and rights of the different members of the University community will be still in place even in these exceptional times. Therefore, they have to be enforced, although they could be adapted if needed.

The above teaching model was approved by the Academic Commission of the Faculty of Economics and Business on July 2020. Nevertheless, if necessary it will be modified and adjusted in order to follow the guidelines established at any moment by the health and education authorities in accordance with the evolution of the pandemic.