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Ocotillo Meeting Notes.. Summary of the meeting on Sep 13, 2002

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Ocotillo Meeting Notes: Sep 13, 2002

September 13, 2002
1:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.
District Office Room 311

Welcome, Introductions, New and Returning Chairs
Sheila Brandt (Scottsdale Community College) and Rick Effland (Mesa Community College)

Welcome to new chair Mary McGlasson (Chandler-Gilbert Community College) and returning chair Mary Long (South Mountain Community College), as well as the two new Ocotillo General Co-Chairs Sheila Brandt (Scottsdale Community College) and Rick Effland (Mesa Community College).

All Ocotillo chairs info is at:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/chairs/

Ocotillo Goals 2002-2003
Sheila Brandt (Scottsdale Community College)
Review and discuss draft goals:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/chairs/goals.php?yr=0203

Other issues suggested by the group include:

• Portals - Shall we define it or let PeopleSoft lead the way? Alan suggests avoid the buzzword connotations and focus on the "electronic representation of our college and services to students".
• Course Management Systems
• Learning Objects

Please send to Alan additional ideas/issues from your college groups so we can modify the list of goals.

For your reference to issues, we have a summary of Ocotillo Retreat 2002 discussions (taken from the ideas put on paper in our café group activity):
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/retreat02/summary.php

Share current college activities via Ocotillo Pulse. The "pulse" represents a continually updated accounting of activities at the 10 maricopa community college technology groups.
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/pulse/

The group agreed this was worth doing as a way to electronically share what college committees are doing. Alan will send instructions by email so you know how to access it.

To use our meeting time better, Sheila, Rick, and Alan have decided to conduct inter-meeting email discussions on various topics prior to each meeting. The first discussion summary on Hybrid Courses is at:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/chairs/discuss.php

Ocotillo Technology Visioning Forums 2002-2003
Alan Levine (mcli)
Upcoming forums for Fall 2002 include:

• October 31, 2002 (one day only):
  Mark Milliron, League of Innovation
  http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/tv/forums.php?yr=0203&id=1
  
  
• Dec 5/6, 2002 (your choice):
  Carl Berger, University of Michigan
  http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/tv/forums.php?yr=0203&id=2
  
  
• Late January 2003:
  Mike Zatrosky, Gartner Research Group
  
  
• April, 2003??? Ideas? Roger asked for Alan November to return.

We need to update your team member list so we can start collecting their RSVPs for the October 31 forum.

Please confirm and update your team member's list. Return the rosters in your meeting packet to Tracy Price or send her your team names by email before September 30.

Hybrid Course Discussion / Proposal
Sheila Brandt (Scottsdale Community College)
Main discussion topic for this meeting- develop idea of a Maricopa wide definition and description for Hybrid course types. See the summary of pre-meeting email discussion:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/chairs/discuss.php

What are we trying to accomplish? We need to gain clarity within the Ocotillo committee. What does hybrid mean? Does it just mean technology or does it also include active learning activities? Do students need an orientation or is it expected that everyone knows and/or uses technology? We need to prepare the students for what they are responsible for each class. Labeling should not limit any campus.

Scottsdale Community College has been addressing this issue. See their meeting notes for the September 4th meeting notes. Simpler is better. Further, it is more important to denote deviations in the class meeting times in the Schedule of Classes. Sheila said that her thinking on this issue has changed. The 4 hybrid course labels were considered at SCC. For the long term, SCC agreed it will definitely need an identifier for Internet-Based (online) courses, as students need to know what is required for that format. For the shorter term, SCC feels it needs to include some notation to describe "Internet Enhanced" classes to "manage student expectations". For the shorter term, they fill they need to include some notation to describe "Internet Enhanced" classes to "manage student expectations".

The more flexible we are, the more problems we may face. We need to keep in mind, however, that many (more than half?) of our students attend more than one college. We need to remember that we are selling to consumers, not necessarily to students. Sharon reminded us that with a future SIS, students will be browsing among all colleges for the courses they need, and will be making more selections based on availability, not the college where it is offered (more swirling).

Ideas...
• We should start with a standard core of labels/descriptions. Some think it is important, others say it is too limiting. But how many? Do we label every type of technology used? (no)
• Maybe we should list the requirements in the description terms rather than in codes, then Scottsdale can keep IB (internet based) and Paradise Valley can keep FlexExpress, etc.
• Descriptions are better than labels; they will help to inform the student what is expected. Each college can have a clearly defined "box" that describes the different formats and requirements on their campus

How should we describe these courses?
• Define by "half a computer icon" if there is content/activities online? No clear way to quantify it (amount of material, percentage of content, amont of time??)
• The scheduling issue is more important, a deciding factor for how students choose courses- how to represent courses that may start off meeting MWF, but midway through the semester meet MW or only W? /li>
• Ocotillo can share how each campus describes their courses.
• The student should be able to click to a course gallery to get an idea what the online portions are like; maybe we should have a mini syllabus link from the registration page.
• What kinds of attributes should be coded for each class? What is allowed in the new SIS for descriptor fields/codes?
• Printed schedules are already expensive- cannot afford to make them even larger. perhaps list the course codes, but at the bottom of the brief description, state, "for further information about this course, go to: www... (Mary M worries about leaving out students w/o the tech access)

Do we know what students want? Are we guessing? We could survey students. Carol thinks it is early to try this, and we should encourage colleges to experiment (Rio has been through many iterations of describing online courses in their catalogs). Do we want to pilot this for a year? Should each campus use their own codes/symbols and report on how everything went?

Sharon Blanton will check on how/if the new SIS system can accommodate these changes and perhaps invite someone like Jim Devere to explain more in a future meeting.

To do:
Share drafts of ways each college might describe their course formats.

Find what is available for labeling courses in new SIS

Survey students on what is important to them.

Tecnology Leadership Council (TLC) Update
Pat Case (Rio Salado College)
The TLC is looking at software programs that track internet usage patterns that may impact security, e.g. excessively large bandwidth broadcasts, repeated attempts at accessing systems (not filtering, not monitoring). As more services and information go online, security will be coming more and more a priority issue.

Corporate Calendar (Steltor) was bought by Oracle. The product is being revamped. The district will have to determine if it would like to purchase the new version of this product.

Looking into possibly moving towards using MS Outlook/Exchange for email/calendar.

Questions on funding technology. Who decides what the district will buy for the colleges and what the campuses will need to buy for themselves? How can we pre plan for our technology needs?

Strategic Planning Update
Doug Sawyer (Scottsdale Community College)
The last time the committee met was late last Spring. They worked on the 6 district-wide initiatives:

1. MCCD will maximize stakeholder access to the Maricopa Colleges' facilities, programs, and services.
2. MCCD will promote and support expansion of dynamic learning environments and delivery options.
3. MCCD will maximize collaboration among the Maricopa Colleges and with external partners.
4. MCCD will significantly enhance both new and existing revenue sources to promote growth and increase cost effectiveness.
5. MCCD will recruit and retain a quality and diverse workforce.
6. MCCD will develop a strong identity that reflects its educational leadership role in the community.

Technology discussions were visible. The committee worked on how each campus fit into the 6 initiatives. They are also trying to combine the strategic planning with the budgeting cycles. For more, see:
http://www.maricopa.edu/stratplan/

Ocotillo Spotlight Schedule
Alan Levine (mcli)
Plan to continue monthly highlight of one college, can feature one faculty member, special project, etc (see past issues:)
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/spotlight

We will remind each chair for content one month before their feature is scheduled. They just provide unformatted text for the article body and related images, video, audio, links etc to include.

• October (Estrella Mountain)
• November (Glendale, provide content by October 23, 2002)
• December (Paradise Valley, provide content by November 25, 2002)
• January (South Mountain provide content by December 19, 2002)
• February (Rio Salado, provide content by January 27, 2003)
• March (Scottsdale, provide content by February 24, 2003)
• April (Phoenix College, provide content by March 24, 2003)
• May (Chandler-Gilbert, provide content by April 28, 2003)
• June (GateWay, provide content by May 26, 2003)

Ocotillo College Centers Group
Alan Levine (mcli)
Several of the Maricopa Community Colleges have developed variously named faculty support centers ("Center for Teaching and Learning", "Innovation Center", etc.) that provide faculty development, technology support and development, and other services (see the listed Maricopa Centers). The Ocotillo College Centers is a new group organized in 2002 to provide more collaboration between these centers. The Maricopa Community Colleges are a new member of the New Media Centers program, and this group will be the connection to the colleges.

First meeting for this new group is October 16, at Phoenix College:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/ocotillo/centers/notes.php?yr=0203&id=2

October 11, 2002 Meeting
Rick Effland
Discussion of ePortfolios.

To Do....

• Complete Ocotillo Pulse
• Turn in Ocotillo technology Visioning Team list.
• Engage in E-Mail Discussion topics prior to October 11 meeting
• Share local discussion of ways to describe hybrid courses