Social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic forced the education system to instantly transition to online learning and teaching. Studies show that the challenges of emergency remote teaching (ERT) differ from those of online learning during routine times. Do student’s perceptions of teachers’ roles during online learning differ between ERT and routine online classes as well? Addressing this question can illuminate different aspects of the role of a teacher at different times, thus facilitating the improvement of online learning. This study compares students’ perceptions of their teachers’ roles in the online courses they attended during the pandemic, with perceptions of students who attended online courses in routine times when distance learning was a regular part of the academic program. The participants who attended online courses during routine times were 520 undergraduates in a teacher-education college. A second group of 475 undergraduates from the same college responded at the end of a semester of emergency online learning during the pandemic. Both groups answered questionnaires regarding their perception of four aspects of the role of online teachers: pedagogical, technical, affective, and differentiating. The findings showed that during emergency times, students had significantly higher expectations for teachers’ technical and affective roles than in routine times. However, students had lower expectations regarding teachers’ differentiating role during emergencies, and similar expectations for teachers’ pedagogical role in both situations. These findings highlight the need to plan curricula to suit different situations and different needs, and emphasize the different characteristics of the teachers’ role in different situations, in order to optimally address students’ needs in times of routine and emergency alike.

By the 1970s, it was clear to the western world that the days of mass armies, based on broad conscription, were over. In Israel, however, despite the presence of some elements similar to those which elsewhere were leading to military contraction and a transition to all-volunteer forces, the Israel Defense Force (IDF) broadened its conscription model and embarked on massive growth. The effects of this surprising strategy are evident to this day, with Israel remaining almost the only conscription-based army in the West. Analysis of the organizational discourse and processes within the IDF in the wake of the Yom Kippur War reveals that social legitimacy is not only a prerequisite for organizational growth and boosting of enlistment but also, simultaneously, a product of the process. The organizational mechanisms used by the IDF to achieve social consent are relevant for an understanding of the processes of militarism and military buildup in our times, too.

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