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Apr. 2nd, 2005 @ 08:27 am Westside Project: Innovative Integraton of Student Support Services (16th ICCTL - Jacksonville, FL)
Dragna/Turner, UNC Wilmington

“Westside” refers to a building that opened only three months ago, but aspects of the student support program have been in place for three years. The building was designed specifically to address student support needs. It was funded by a bond, but was built with the support of the student body which has “taken ownership” of both the structure and the principle.

The first room students enter is described as a “decision room,” but the only decision students seem to make in that room is their destination. Yet the presenters make a big deal of the room, and come back to the term “decision” frequently. Students access a touchscreen which details all the services and locations in the building. They can choose from advising, testing, disability services, drug/ alcohol services, health and wellness, international students, etc. – really every single student service offered by the university is centered in this building. It is described as being an “educational mall,” and the presenters suggest that this matrix of services benefits the academic mission of the university.

I can understand their point vis-à-vis academics, but don’t see the point of emphasizing the “decision” part of the process. The decisions that are made seem fairly simplistic: “I need to take this assessment in order to clep out of the math requirement, so I decide to go to Westside and once there I decide that the best facility for my needs is the testing room, so I decide to go to that room . . .", etc.
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Apr. 2nd, 2005 @ 11:54 am Teaching How to Teach – Online! (16th ICCTL - Jacksonville, FL)
Jane Tanner, Onondaga Community College

They had to recruit and train 30-some adjuncts in a short period of time. Onondaga CC’s president mandated the creation of five new diploma programs in a little more than a year, so the OCC staff was forced to scramble. Tanner was relieved of her post as a math professor and put in charge of the project.

CMS: They use the SUNY Learning Network (SLN) a state-wide system with 80,000 enrollments worldwide. All the courses were designed to be taught asynchronously in order to lift the constraint of time (even as DL itself lifts the constraint of place.” Most of the online students were traditional students who didn’t want to drive into Syracuse and park (which is apparently a problem).

Much of the training was done by six mentors drawn from the experienced faculty. They were paid $30 and hour – Tanner worked close to 70 hours but most of the mentors didn’t turn in anything over 20. Of course that means that they created all these new diplomas and doubled their online classes and student body for less than $4,000, which sounds too good to be true. They had a year to perform this miracle.

And the miracle was not to be, but they did increase online courses and enrollment – the presenter does not know to what extent the new students’ enrollment is dependant on the distance element. Increases: courses, 46 => 77; faculty 21 = 41; students, 75 => 1270. All well and good but I think the title was mis-leading. I attended this session because I thought she was going to discuss teaching online pedagogy via an online medium, but that subject didn’t come up. Ah well, ya takes your chances.
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Apr. 2nd, 2005 @ 12:40 pm Creating a Community of Learners through Online Instruction (16th ICCTL - Jacksonville, FL)
Creating a Community of Learners through Online Instruction (16th ICCTL - Jacksonville, FL)
David Colachico, Azusa University, Azusa CA

Colachico is a professor of faculty development – teaches special education, and has been online for ten years. The school has 5,000 undergrad and 3,000 graduate students scattered over several remote campuses located between San Diego and Santa Barbara. Much of the education is done by distance.

Ten years ago their president created a DL program and asked for volunteers, offering 3 credits of overload or a laptop in exchange for developing a course. The presenter chose the laptop, and as did most others; he suggests that many people volunteered just to get the computer. Like OCC (see Teaching How to Teach) one faculty member was assigned to lead the project. CMS: eCollege.

Creating a community of learners – it must:
1. . . . be planned
2. . . . be interactive
3. . . . have specific goals
4. . . . have on opportunity for feedback
5. . . . have a way of assessing outcomes.

Colachico teaches a graduate special education course concentrating on legislation. This year for the first time he is teaching f2f; this has to be one of the few times a course designed for online learning has been retro-fit for the classroom.

He uses discussion board and virtual chat. Offers two chat times a week, asking the students to agree on the days/times and to commit to one of them. He tried virtual office hours, but after two years and no takers he dumped it. The discussion is used to determine extra points. Here is something interesting – in eCollege chatters are kicked out of the system after two minutes of inactivity. Sounds somewhat harsh, what? Colachico also offers some non-proctored chats, but promises the students he is going to read the archives.

Another group project is called Night Court. Students must complete a paper and a PowerPoint online and as a group. He suggests people not meet, and goes out of his way to pair up people who do not live near each other (in order to stress the distance aspect). Each person in the group must email him the part of the project they completed – so he knows each person has contributed something – but he only grades the finished product. And finally he has a cumulative exam at the end of the course: essay, two and a half hours, timed, with only one attempt.

No disrespect to the presenter, but I found little new here. He spoke more about his course than he did about the creation of community, which I thought was the point. As with the OCC presentation what I heard was fine but didn’t match the title. It’s hard to plan a conference curriculum when the presentation titles are somewhat random.
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