The efficacy of online office hours: an experience report

Abstract

To facilitate assisting students while online during the COVID 19 pandemic, we transitioned to online office hours. These were managed by an automated queue which kept track of who was waiting in office hours, and for how long. We combined data about office hour usage with students' project commit and grade history. These data afforded us a unique look at the efficacy of office hours that the usual, casual drop-in style office hours, did not allow. Amongst other findings, we saw that while individual office hours visits did increase student grades, more visits during the term was negatively correlated with the final project outcome.