IT MIGHT sound a bit surprising for a university professor to say that he wouldn't mind his students missing lectures for non-emergency reasons. It might seem even more surprising when he took the time to think up and act on an idea to help them make up for the missed lectures.
'I too was a student once and I understand sometimes you can miss part or all of a lecture for different reasons,' said Hong Kong Baptist University assistant professor of accountancy and law Alex Lau Kun-luen.
'It might be asking a lot from those who have part-time jobs and those who live very far away from campus to come back to school for a lecture at eight-thirty a.m.'
Taking advantage of the wide-spread use of the Internet on campus, two years ago Lau, who recently received the Award for Innovative Excellence in Teaching, Learning and Technology at the International Conference on College Teaching and Learning, began sending his recorded lectures to his students via e-mail after each class.
'About two years ago I thought up this idea after coming across a small recorder that could be attached to a computer. The good thing about it was that even for a three-hour lecture, it would take only about a minute or two to upload the voice data to the computer.'
Lau's lectures are also available at his department's Web site for students with access to download.