Shifting Sands in Instructional Design Higher Education

Over the past several months, with higher education reform being a major talking point in election debates, the role of instruction designers should be reconsidered within this changing environment, particularly in regards to the use of technology and, more broadly, innovation and quality. Despite whatever may result in national and local elections, the higher education environment is well on the path towards major changes stipulated by writings such as Bown & McPherson (2106) and Bowen & Tobin (2015), who predicts a movement towards more “horizontal thinking” in higher education decision making. It is therefore worth considering how an instructional designer or instructional design team might fit into this sort of structure. Typically being a part of academic affairs, IT offices, or through eLearning programs, instructional designers are fast becoming an integral part of the higher educational academic staff workforce (Intentional Futures [IF], 2016). This is a windfall for those who have this career path or are seeking to develop their careers in this field. However, it is important to consider how to best leverage the expertise and skills instructional designers bring to their learning institutions. At the best of times, when the role is clearly defined, there is both administrative and faculty buy-in for instructional designer-led change initiatives, and the foundations of instructional design practices are aligned with institution goals and mission. In reality, this is not always the case. Many faculty and administrators do not always comprehend the value an instructional designer brings to an institution, or see instructional design as a movement forcing a curriculum standardization (Berrett, 2016). These arguments, centered around academic freedom and a culture of faculty independence, tend to harbor resentment in faculty while working with instructional designers. Administrators, looking for efficiencies or cost-cutting measures might see instructional designers as individuals who can ramp up distance education programs, but do not always fully understand how to evaluate the work of their instruction design staff beyond enrollment numbers or putting more courses online. Misconceptions of the skills instructional designers can bring, and role they may end up filling in their institution, can actually lead to inefficiency of this valuable resource, creating a counter argument that could place instructional designers on a weakened career path. This issue may be a problem of perception, where faculty see instructional designers are part of their institution’s IT office, and therefore, an extension of the help desk, or on-demand expertise to be utilized when experimenting with new technologies. On the other hand, faculty may feel threatened when their pedagogic expertise and course design experience is challenged by the expansion of instructional design staff on their campuses. It is easy to justify the hiring of instructional designers, or even see them as one instructional designer puts it, as a pedagogic “Trojan Horse” (IF, p. 8, 2016) in eLearning implementation. With a disconnect in mind, how can the OLC membership help determine and shape the long term role of instructional design beyond something other than a temporary grant-based positions, part of distance education initiatives, or just because technology might be seen as a “magic bullet” that instructional designers are asked to implement (Bowen & Tobin, p. 112, 2015)? Among broader reform concerns, it is worth determining the function of instructional designers in helping learning institutions improve degree attainment, degree completion, and affordability.

However instructional design oteams or individuals are being utilized, justified by either internal or external pressures for efficiency, quality, and instructional innovation, several themes are beginning to emerge that are worthy of discussion. The Intentional Futures (IF) (2016) report “Instructional Design in Higher Education” and the follow-up webinars OLC hosted bring some of these to the surface, but the conversation needs to continue. For instance, the theme of inconsistency between job title and duties, and then how instructional designers’ jobs might morph into something other than what their position title designates, demonstrates a sense of misalignment. As the IF report indicates, instructional designers typically spend their days managing projects and training, and less time on actually designing instruction. This might be an indication of the horizontal structure mentioned above (Bowen & Tobin), or evidence of mismanagement. Another theme that emerges has to do with the tools instructional designers are asked to use. At its worst, a learning management system can create more inefficiencies in its implementation, creating bottlenecks during course development and rollout in Spring and Fall term setup. Poor use of technologies or outdated distance education delivery models can also create moving parts and processes that faculty can easily offload onto instructional design staff when it is not working as intended. Countless hours can be spent troubleshooting technologies that many distance education programs inherited, which may be seen as symptoms in need of change instead of the intended reform. In this case, instructional design models, project management tools, and course delivery models may not go far enough. This relates to the final theme of faculty buy-in. Oftentimes, faculty (and some administrators) resist working with instructional designers. This may be out of misunderstanding, fear, or something that is addressed through conversations around academic freedom. As the IF report indicates, more needs to be done, but this means going beyond hiring instructional design staff. Fundamental change must occur for instructional designers to be fully effective at their institutions.

This main goal of this session is to help instructional designers, administrators, and faculty better define and hopefully navigate the “shifting sands” of higher education change. Another goal is to help instructional designers develop a sense of advocacy among their colleagues. The key is to better define the role of instructional design within an institution and hopefully begin to overcome challenges of the position. This can then help instructional designers, academic administrators, and faculty best utilize instructional technologies and innovation processes, while maintaining academic freedom and commitment to quality in design. In this spirit, the session will highlight recent community development work that involved several instructional designers in University of Wisconsin system. These instructional designers have started to team up with their counterparts in other institutions through the informal group, Alliance of Midwest Instructional Designers (AMID) [LinkedIN Group https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7054036]. This group meets via web-conference to discuss the issues related the themes summarized above and many others. AMID is a response to a call to action listed in conclusion of the IF report. This session will be an opportunity to introduce the creation of AMID and inspire participants to create their own instructional designer communities.

REFERENCES

Berrett, D. (2016, February, 29). Instructional Design: Demand grows for a new breed of academic. Chronicle of Higher Education, 62(25). Retrieved from http://www.chronicle.com/article/Instructional-Design/235425

Bowen, W.G. & Tobin, E. M. (2015). Locus of Authority, New York, NY: ITHAKA.

Bowen, W.G. & McPherson, M.S. (2016). Lesson Plan: An Agenda for Change in Higher Education. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Intentional Futures. (2016, April). Instructional Design in Higher Education. Retrieved from http://intentionalfutures.com/reports/instructional_design/