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OLG Meeting Notes Feb 7, 2003 ...

Ocotillo Online Learning Group
Meeting Feb 7, 2003

Phoenix College
2:00 - 4:00 PM in the Encanto Room (located in the lower level of the PC Library)
campus maps for Phoenix College

Welcome and Introductions
Anna Rosa Lampis (GateWay Community College) and Sandra Wells (Phoenix College)

Special Event! Estrella Mountain @ PC! Although this meeting is scheduled for centrally located Phoenix College, the demos today come from Estrella Mountain Community College

What's New in Online Learning at Your Campus
all participants
We will spend some time sharing with each other what is new in instructional technology for on-line learning across all the different campuses of the Maricopa district.

• Phoenix College - Is piloting a testing center offering proctored testing delivered with WebCT.Ê The pilot has funded a 20/hour per week position, and the process is modeled after the traditional testing center and uses the same database. Students check in with an ID. Instructors use an online form to set up the test, to indicate the test strategy, and what materials are allowed. Proctors do not confront students suspected of teaching, but they do notify instructors who can take steps.
  
  After a year of research of calls to the help line, the instructional lab revamped their intro web page with a more developed FAQ, which reduced their number of calls significantly.
  
  Faculty in the lab assistants program are looking for examples of virtual labs in their area.
• District - Ron met with the Blackboard representative again on Monday, February 3rd.Ê They are working on a new Bb license for the enterprise version. Working on putting the new e-Portfolios software on a testing server, hoping to try it out by mid to end of this semester.Ê Their are over 5200 successful courses on MIDAS; content training is available.
  
  Dave Stockburger (HCIES) also teaches Multivariate Statistics online from Southwest Missouri State University
• Skills Center - not curently doing much online, but are interested.
• GateWay - Online usage is grawing. Offering online learning workshops once a month (twice per month for Respondus) and have put Blackboard 6 on a test server. Kathleen Murphy is working on HCC 204 developed as a consortium, and interested in linking up with other faculty teaching pathology
• Scottsdale Lab support reports in not unusual to se students log into Blackboard and have 4-5 courses listed on their student page. Ê In the process of hiring an ID/Technology position to support online learning. John Kavanagh is sing Blackboard for first time in Forensic Science
• Paradise Valleye - Downlinking (and video taping) PBS videoconference, "Critical Challenges in Distance Education Series Copyright Issues Online" February 20th (also at Glendale).
• Estrella Mountain - Piloting 3 online/hybrid environment courses; SmartThinking tutoring program - using with hybrid courses.
• Chandler-Gilbert - Piloting Blackboard 6; 204 course sections are somehow supported by Blackboard; 10 hybrid instructors; Planning a summer Faculty/Staff development institute for e-Publishing.
• South Mountain - Over 100 adjunct and full time faculty currently using Blackboard (167 in the last 2 years) or are online and 75% of all students have been on Blackboard, many of them are developmental level students. Among many duties, Amy MacPherson helps in classroom orientations to Blackboard

Becoming a Successful Distance Learner
Polly Miller, E-Learning Faculty Coordinator (Estrella Mountain)
Polly will be sharing a student screening instrument used by faculty and advisors when working with students interested in online and hybrid courses.

The first point of contact for students deciding to take online/hybrid courses is the advisor. Decided to create an onlne tool to help the advisors. Since advisiing is done face to face with an advisor with a laptop, the advisor can also informally evalaute the student's computer skills as they navigate through the questions.

The ELearning site for students features a tool called "Are Elearning courses for you?"
http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/academics/Elearning/

where the questions help to probe students' time management skills, organization skills, time availability, etc- the important success factors for the hybrid format. Other questions include reading and writing skills, access to technology. The faculty were most interested in the answer to "why are you taking this as a hybrid course?"

The tool gives the student percentage score (some of the questionsd are weighted) and a score must be greater than 75% to get a recommendation to take the course in hybrid format. If they score lower, the tool suggests further consultation with an advisor. The results are saved to a database so it can be correlated with final grades.

The next tool to be developed will be one for time management assessment.

Electronic Portfolios for Program Assessment
Polly Miller for Betty Vickrey, CIS Division Chair (Estrella Mountain)
This project was designed for a cohort of CIS 105 students. It was created out of class projects- CIS 277 students built the server, a unix class installed the operating system, and a web development class created the interface. CIS 298 students will also act as webmasters

Estrella Mountain is trying to assess critical thinking and communication skills across all subjects. For each CIS 105 project, students will be asked to write a one page paper how the project mate criteria. The portfolio will use FrontPage to create a 3 page section for each project. At the end of the semester, 10% of the portfolios will be selected for assessment via a rubric currently in development by Betty Vickrey.

Questions to be answered include should the portfolios be public or private and how long should they be stored online?

Using Web Discussion Boards
Polly Miller for Alex Joncas, English faculty (Estrella Mountain)
Alex makes great use of Blackboard discussion forums to develop critical thinking exercises.

For an example, he has a Mississippi Burning assignment where students view a portion of this movie and then must discuss online, "Is it historically correct or Hollywood Hype"?

Students work in groups to discuss the question and all students must respond to the question online and reply to at least two other students' posts.

Alex has found for discussionms to be successful, the question must be well structured with specific deadlines.

There was a discussion of when students are using bulletin boards. Bernie Combs (Scottsdale) reports great usage 1-2 AM "especially right before an exam." Phoenix College reports high usage between 11 PM and 2 AM. Ron Bleed noted that on Christmas Day 2002, there are more than 7000 student transactions on the Student Information System.

StarBoard Interactive Panel Demo
Scott Celentano, Troxell Communications
(Troxell is an A/V supplier for the District). The StarPanel LCD Interactive Panel brings the interactivity of a whiteboard for Êintegration with plasma display panels or projection systems. Easily control, edit, or annotate any software application on your plasma or projection screenÊ directly from the podium, lectern or conference table! A major advantage over a SmartBoard is that the instructor does not have to turn their back on the students. It is a bit bigger than a Tablet PC

The system features handwriting recognition in desktop applications, full mouse control, and tools for annotating documents, images, and applications. All annotations are captured into a folder, can be exported as folder of JPEG images.

Pete Dimas is a Phoenix College history faculty using the StarBoard in class with digitized historical maps.

Approximate cost is $1900 for the panel and sotfware.

Next Meeting
March 7, 2003 at Scottsdale Community College. On the plate so far...

• Building Community Online

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