Learning and leading through COVID-19: Surprising findings from a year of disrupted field experience

When the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated the closure of Kindergarten-Grade 12 schools in Alberta, the authors, who are the Directors of Field Experience, at this local university saw this disruption as both a challenge and an opportunity (Danyluk, 2022). Over 400 preservice teachers were scheduled to begin their in-school practicum two days after the announcement of school closures. While most Bachelor of Education programs in Canada halted or postponed their field experience programs, the authors decided to move forward with an online practicum course. This chapter describes how we used collaborative professionalism (Hargreaves & O’Connor, 2018) to restructure field experience in response to the pandemic and the impact it had on student and field instructor learning. A community of practice was initiated by the Directors of Field Experience to support the instructors in the implementation of the online course and to come together as a community of learners in support of one another during this complex time. Survey and anecdotal data will be shared to illuminate the positive influence the pivot to the online field course had on students and instructors as well as the challenges we encountered as we navigated these uncharted waters as educational leaders.