asynchronous training events, i.e. MOOC style courses pair pre-recorded and written lesson materials with online participants following along at their own pace and convenience.

With this model, we aim to bring training events to the trainees while eliminate environmental impact of instructor and participant travel.

What is an asynchronous training event?

To illustrate a typical Gallantries/Smörgåsbord event and the different roles (1 person can have several roles), we have decided to share a story with several fictional characters

Taylor is a training coordinator of an international research consortium. They recently surveyed researchers in the consortium on their need in HTS data analysis. The results were overwhelming: over 60 scientists at the several locations would like to learn how to analyze their own RNA-seq data. To fulfill this demand, Taylor decided to organize a Smörgåsbord style event: a 3-days online workshop. Taylor is the global organizer of this event, in charge of finding the date, contact and coordinate with the teachers, advertise the event, find the instructors, etc. After the event, Taylor will aggregate all feedback from participants, helpers and hosts and share them.

Taylor recruited 2 helpers for each day, from amongst the participating incitations. One of the helpers, Casey, has some previous experience with RNA-seq data analysis and Galaxy. Before the workshop, they went through the training material and tested it. They will help participants during the workshop when they are stuck or get different results than the instructors. They will also give direct feedback to the instructor about the pace, any possible local issues etc.

Taylor also recruited 4 instructors, Farah among them. Farah is a trained bioinformatician and experienced instructor, regularly giving training to scientists on HTS data analysis. She will give the introduction and the first steps of RNA-seq data analysis lessons. Farah is located in Germany and teaches from a room at her institute in front of her computer. 2 weeks before an event she needs to record her lesson as she would normally teach it during a live training, and provide that video to Taylor. Taylor will generate captions (e.g. YouTube’s auto-captions) to Farah who must review and manually correct any captioning mistakes, before returning those to Taylor.

Alex is a PhD student in molecular biology based in Greece. They would like to learn about RNA-seq data analysis to be able to analyze the data they generated. They heard about the workshop and wish to join online. As a participant, Alex will actively participate in the workshop by running their first RNA-seq data analysis given the instructor’s instructions, ask for help from helpers when stuck, will raise their questions on the participant chat, and will give feedback using sticky notes and the dedicated feedback form.

Cost of an event

With the asynchronous training model, the cost of organizing and participating in the workshop are essentially eliminated: the instructors do not need to travel to the venue, participants can learn wherever is convenient for them, no rooms nor coffee must be organised.

Event Timeline

Here is an example event timeline we provided for a past Smörgåsbord event:

We also provided instructors with an instructors guideline page tailored to the event and more important, a set of recording guidelines like the Gallantries’ which helped instructors know what was best practice during video recording.

Workshop Checklists

To help you organize an asynchronous event, we have created some checklists, by timing but also by role. Most of the items in these checklists are not specific to Gallantries/Smörgåsbord events.

Before the workshop

Global organizers

• Identify the desired workshop contents and topics
  • Check the Video Library to identify which videos are available
  • Some may be out of date and need to be re-recorded
  • Other videos may not exist for a given tutorial and will need to be recorded
• Identify and contact instructors who will record lessons
• Choose a date in coordination with instructors

• Create a registration form, e.g. by copying our template

  Such a registration form should include: participant details, email, affiliation, location for the workshop, accessibility requirements, motivation for participating, participation on social event, agreement on privacy statement.

• Setup a webpage to advertise the event

  This page should include:

  • code of conduct
  • general information about the event, its format (async)
  • registration details and deadline
  • draft schedule
  • what participants need to do before
  • details about the instructors, helpers, hosts
  • sponsors (if any)

  We created a template of such a page that can easily adapted.

• Identify places you can promote your event. Galaxy Hub or Carpentries Discuss List are the primary places to do this

  You should do this 1-3 month in advance of your event (if you can).

• Collect contact details of the local hosts and instructors in case of last minute changes

• Arrange the schedule given the content, the instructor availability and the different time zones

  With asynchronous events, students may be working on the training at all times of day and night, so if possible, identify instructors in all of the major world regions (APAC, EMEA, AMER) who can work together to promptly answer student questions online.

• Identify the chat platform (e.g. a private Slack, or the GTN Slack)

• Arrange a conference call(s) with instructors and hosts in order to:
  • Meet in advance of the workshop
  • Divide and document the responsibilities
  • Share contact details
  • Test the technical infrastructure
• Request TiaaS infrastructure if using usegalaxy.eu
• Contact participants to remind them of the workshop webpage where you have written the joining instructions, start/end times, and contact information
• Prepare the feedback form for participants, e.g. by copying our template
• Prepare the feedback form for hosts, helpers and instructors, e.g. by copying our template

Local helpers

• Test the training material

Instructors

• Decide on the order of the lessons and who will teach which modules
• Help the organizer set up the workshop webpage
• Review the training material and suggest changes at least 3 weeks before
• Record your lessons
  • Be sure to review the recording guidelines
• Provide the videos to the organiser who will organise captions for you
• Review and correct the captions
• Be prepared to help during the week

During the workshop

• Chat online on Slack or another platform
• Enjoy!

Global organizers

• Send daily welcome messages reminding participants what will happen today
  • E.g. what materials should everyone be working on
  • Where they can get help
  • Remind them of the Code of Conduct
  • Etc.
• Prepare the participation certificates, e.g. by copying our template, and send them to local hosts

Local helpers

• Follow the relevant chat channels
• Answer student questions or help them figure out who they should ask
• Write up common questions into an FAQ document, or contribute these to the GTN.

Instructors

• During asynchronous events Instructors are more like Helpers, as the instructing portion is already done!

After the workshop

Debrief Sticky notes collection from sites share experience back: feedback from sites (extract form from issue in github) form feedback from instructors + helpers

Global organizers

• Collect the participant feedback forms
• Setup a call with the instructors to discuss feedback.
• Report the feedback and notes

Instructors

• Report any lesson errors or suggest improvements on GitHub
• Give feedback on Galaxy Training Material GitHub issue

Checklists by role

Global organizers

Before the workshop

• Identify the desired workshop contents and topics
  • Check the Video Library to identify which videos are available
  • Some may be out of date and need to be re-recorded
  • Other videos may not exist for a given tutorial and will need to be recorded
• Identify and contact instructors who will record lessons
• Choose a date in coordination with instructors

• Create a registration form, e.g. by copying our template

  Such a registration form should include: participant details, email, affiliation, location for the workshop, accessibility requirements, motivation for participating, participation on social event, agreement on privacy statement.

• Setup a webpage to advertise the event

  This page should include:

  • code of conduct
  • general information about the event, its format (async)
  • registration details and deadline
  • draft schedule
  • what participants need to do before
  • details about the instructors, helpers, hosts
  • sponsors (if any)

  We created a template of such a page that can easily adapted.

• Identify places you can promote your event. Galaxy Hub or Carpentries Discuss List are the primary places to do this

  You should do this 1-3 month in advance of your event (if you can).

• Collect contact details of the local hosts and instructors in case of last minute changes

• Arrange the schedule given the content, the instructor availability and the different time zones

  With asynchronous events, students may be working on the training at all times of day and night, so if possible, identify instructors in all of the major world regions (APAC, EMEA, AMER) who can work together to promptly answer student questions online.

• Identify the chat platform (e.g. a private Slack, or the GTN Slack)

• Arrange a conference call(s) with instructors and hosts in order to:
  • Meet in advance of the workshop
  • Divide and document the responsibilities
  • Share contact details
  • Test the technical infrastructure
• Request TiaaS infrastructure if using usegalaxy.eu
• Contact participants to remind them of the workshop webpage where you have written the joining instructions, start/end times, and contact information
• Prepare the feedback form for participants, e.g. by copying our template
• Prepare the feedback form for hosts, helpers and instructors, e.g. by copying our template

During the workshop

• Send daily welcome messages reminding participants what will happen today
  • E.g. what materials should everyone be working on
  • Where they can get help
  • Remind them of the Code of Conduct
  • Etc.
• Prepare the participation certificates, e.g. by copying our template, and send them to local hosts

After the workshop

• Collect the participant feedback forms
• Setup a call with the instructors to discuss feedback.
• Report the feedback and notes

Local helpers

Before the workshop

• Test the training material

During the workshop

• Follow the relevant chat channels
• Answer student questions or help them figure out who they should ask
• Write up common questions into an FAQ document, or contribute these to the GTN.

Instructors

Before the workshop

• Decide on the order of the lessons and who will teach which modules
• Help the organizer set up the workshop webpage
• Review the training material and suggest changes at least 3 weeks before
• Record your lessons
  • Be sure to review the recording guidelines
• Provide the videos to the organiser who will organise captions for you
• Review and correct the captions
• Be prepared to help during the week

During the workshop

• During asynchronous events Instructors are more like Helpers, as the instructing portion is already done!

After the workshop

• Report any lesson errors or suggest improvements on GitHub
• Give feedback on Galaxy Training Material GitHub issue

You've Finished the Tutorial

Please also consider filling out the Feedback Form as well!

Key points

• With hybrid training events, remote instructors pair up with on-site helpers to deliver 1 training across multiple sites simultaneously

• With asynchronous events, instead the contents are prepared ahead of time

• Asynchronous, online training events reduce costs and improve accessibility, even further than hybrid trainings

Frequently Asked Questions

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Citing this Tutorial

1. Bérénice Batut, Fotis E. Psomopoulos, Helena Rasche, Asynchronous training (Galaxy Training Materials). https://training.galaxyproject.org/training-material/topics/teaching/tutorials/gallantries-async/tutorial.html Online; accessed TODAY
2. Hiltemann, Saskia, Rasche, Helena et al., 2023 Galaxy Training: A Powerful Framework for Teaching! PLOS Computational Biology 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1010752
3. Batut et al., 2018 Community-Driven Data Analysis Training for Biology Cell Systems 10.1016/j.cels.2018.05.012

BibTeX

@misc{teaching-gallantries-async,
author = "Bérénice Batut and Fotis E. Psomopoulos and Helena Rasche",
	title = "Asynchronous training (Galaxy Training Materials)",
	year = "",
	month = "",
	day = "",
	url = "\url{https://training.galaxyproject.org/training-material/topics/teaching/tutorials/gallantries-async/tutorial.html}",
	note = "[Online; accessed TODAY]"
}
@article{Hiltemann_2023,
	doi = {10.1371/journal.pcbi.1010752},
	url = {https://doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pcbi.1010752},
	year = 2023,
	month = {jan},
	publisher = {Public Library of Science ({PLoS})},
	volume = {19},
	number = {1},
	pages = {e1010752},
	author = {Saskia Hiltemann and Helena Rasche and Simon Gladman and Hans-Rudolf Hotz and Delphine Larivi{\`{e}}re and Daniel Blankenberg and Pratik D. Jagtap and Thomas Wollmann and Anthony Bretaudeau and Nadia Gou{\'{e}} and Timothy J. Griffin and Coline Royaux and Yvan Le Bras and Subina Mehta and Anna Syme and Frederik Coppens and Bert Droesbeke and Nicola Soranzo and Wendi Bacon and Fotis Psomopoulos and Crist{\'{o}}bal Gallardo-Alba and John Davis and Melanie Christine Föll and Matthias Fahrner and Maria A. Doyle and Beatriz Serrano-Solano and Anne Claire Fouilloux and Peter van Heusden and Wolfgang Maier and Dave Clements and Florian Heyl and Björn Grüning and B{\'{e}}r{\'{e}}nice Batut and},
	editor = {Francis Ouellette},
	title = {Galaxy Training: A powerful framework for teaching!},
	journal = {PLoS Comput Biol}
}

                   

Funding

These individuals or organisations provided funding support for the development of this resource

Gallantries

This project (2020-1-NL01-KA203-064717) is funded with the support of the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union. Their funding has supported a large number of tutorials within the GTN across a wide array of topics.

Galaxy Administrators: Install the missing tools

You can use Ephemeris's shed-tools install command to install the tools used in this tutorial.

shed-tools install [-g GALAXY] [-a API_KEY] -t <(curl https://training.galaxyproject.org/training-material/api/topics/teaching/tutorials/gallantries-async/tutorial.json | jq .admin_install_yaml -r)

Alternatively you can copy and paste the following YAML

---
install_tool_dependencies: true
install_repository_dependencies: true
install_resolver_dependencies: true
tools: []

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