Faculty-centric online learning:An old tradition in a new format.

Brian Mulligan Institute of Technology Sligo, Ireland

Ray Schroeder University of Illinois at Springfield

EDUCA 2011, Berlin, Nov 30th- Dec 2nd, 2011

Is this true?

• Online courses must be developed to the highest level of quality!

• Significant investment in design and content is required for an online course!

University of Illinois at Springfield• 1997 to date• Mostly asynchronous• Autonomy of Faculty• No requirements for– Training– Design

• No extra quality assurance• 1,425 students (37% of activity)

University of Illinois “Global Campus”

• 2006 – 2009• $9m investment• Separate from normal operations• Faculty create content– Following a template– Delivered by others

• Closed in 2009– Courses transferred to departments

Institute of Technology Sligo (Ireland)

‘Evening Classes’online

IT Sligo approach• 2002 to date• Lecturer Autonomy• Live online evening classes• Textbooks and handouts

– No investment in content

• Independent learning (Assignments)• Asynchronous support

– From lecturers and peers

• Attendance where necessary

• Continuous Improvement approach

How did it go?

• 790 students (8%)• High performance and customer satisfaction

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What were other Irish (European?) institutions doing?• Developing content• Looking for scale economies• Market research• Pedagogical research.• Detailed and Planning and Design• Collaboration• Submitting grant applications• Hiring specialists (non-faculty)• Top-down initiatives

How were they getting on?

• Slow going• Scale of operations:

~140,000 full-time higher education students in Ireland

~5,000 in IT Sligo

• IT Sligo had around the same number of online courses as all the other HE institutions put together.

Observations..

..on common assumptions that might be causing the problem.

The merits of teamwork– vs. Individual work

The merits of collaboration– vs. competition

• The impact of sophisticated pedagogical approaches – vs. simple good teaching practices

• The value of research– vs. simple good teaching practices

• The impact of high investment –on operating and maintenance costs

• The reliability of deterministic approaches– vs. continuous improvement approaches in

changing environments

• The merits of high quality

“Excellence is the enemy of the good!”

• The value of content– vs. Communication– “Content is King?”

• Grant aid helps

• We have the right people.–Distance learning experts– Educational researchers– Instructional designers– Information technologists–Multi-media specialists

Any Questions

Brian Mulligan, Institute of Technology Sligo, (Ireland) mulligan.brian@itsligo.ie

Ray Schroeder, University of Illinois at Springfield (USA) rschr1@uis.edu