The Grants Leadership & Development Office is sponsoring a virtual presentation by Dr. Nicola Sochacka, from the School of Engineering at the University of Georgia. In April 2020 Dr. Sochacka received a National Science Foundation RAPID grant for her research on how students, faculty, and staff experienced the transition to online learning due to COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Sochacka’s session will have value for higher education instructors and administrators who found themselves quickly having to adapt to an online environment. The COVID-19 pandemic had a sudden and significant impact on almost all aspects of daily life in the United States. In higher education, instructors and students had limited time to adapt to online learning while observing stay-at-home orders and coping with high levels of psychological and, in some cases, financial stress. To help navigate this crisis, engineering education researchers at the University of Georgia used a novel research approach to explore how faculty, staff, and students in the College of Engineering experienced the pandemic. In this presentation, Dr. Sochacka will describe how real-time results were used to identify opportunities and early signs of risk among students so that the College could continue to deliver high quality educational programs in online, hybrid, and face-to-face formats. Dr. Sochacka will conclude with a discussion of how to translate the study’s findings into practical lessons for college classrooms. Dr. Nicola Sochacka is the Associate Director for Research Initiation and Enablement in the Engineering Education Transformations Institute (EETI) in the College of Engineering at the University of Georgia. Her multi-pronged research program is underpinned by a deep appreciation for diverse perspectives. She works closely with faculty and students within and outside of engineering to design cutting-edge qualitative studies that embody a focus on in-process research ethics and bridging the research to practice gap.