Abstract
In tertiary education, occasional cancellation of classes is not uncommon and is often of short duration (Day, 2015). Whilst inconvenient, the impact on students and organisations is often minimal. In more recent years, cancellation of classes and in some cases, short-term closure of educational institutions has become more common in connection to a range of natural disasters such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and pandemics (Day, 2015). Online teaching is reported as an appropriate and effective option during short periods of disruption, yet little is reported on the impact on course integrity and importantly, student academic continuity when courses designed to be taught face to face are moved online for the duration of the course. Although a relatively new concept in higher education and minimally reported in the literature, the concept of academic continuity is increasingly becoming a focus for educational institutions (Day, 2015; Di Pietro,2018; Regehr et al., 2017). The COVID-19 pandemic that developed through 2020 required urgent responses from higher education providers around the world to comply with government directives and resulted in a rapid and comprehensive move to online teaching (Crawford et al., 2020). This paper provides a critical reflection on the experiences of three academic staff in a Bachelor of Nursing program delivered in Singapore, and innovative teaching strategies implemented in the online environment to successfully maintain student academic continuity as the COVID 19 pandemic unfolded in the 2020 academic year.