When we moved “online” at UM-Dearborn “all of a sudden” on 13 March 2020, the winter courses were finished synchronously, and more by default than anything else, I used Canvas Conferences — the most immediately available alternative right from the Canvas menu. The software seemed unstable; I often had to restart a class session. When I started teaching one course (IMSE 510, master’s-level engineering statistics) May-June, all courses became asynchronous. I have been using Zoom, which has worked well for “office hours” and also for the occasional student who, very puzzled by a concept or problem, would like a one-on-one “meeting.” Very helpfully, emails about Zoom-bombing alerted me to use its waiting-room capability. Other instructors like Blue Jeans; I would be interested in hearing their reasons and comparative merits of Blue Jeans and Zoom. I do plan to use Zoom similarly July-August (DS 520, statistics, and DS 632, system simulation; both master’s-level Business Analytics courses).
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The BlueJeans versus Zoom question is an interesting one. I’ve used BlueJeans for a long time, so I’ve kept using it these past few months mostly out of familiarity and ease of use. Zoom seems to have more flexibility with features like the waiting room, but BlueJeans works very well if you just want to meet with a group of students at a prearranged time. YouTube videos featuring Zoom bombing were served up as entertainment at my house for a few evenings, which left me pretty leery of it; but it’s become much more secure and users have obviously figured out how to use it better over time.