Examining the Efficacy of Using a Course Design Template to Standardize an Online Program

TOPIC

Introduction

“Standardization” is rarely a word that inspires faculty at a public institution of higher education, and particularly not in a union environment. Decreasing investment of public funds, declining enrollment across many student populations, and tuition freezes motivate administrators to look for ways to increase student success and persistence in the most cost efficient way. How beneficial must a common course design be to make it a viable idea to faculty, instructional designers (IDs), and administrators? The purpose of this session is to examine the efficacy of implementing a course design template in an online RN-BSN program. We defined efficacy as the balance between the overall value of the model to students, faculty, and the program and the investment of time and effort required to implement the model.

We include perspectives of faculty, IDs, and an administrator because each have objectives, motivations, contributions, and resource limitations that are unique to each group. Viability of the model requires that the benefits and rewards of implementing the model outweigh the resources invested by various stakeholders.

Data and Analysis Procedures

We measured student behaviors, outcomes, and perceptions pre (Fall and Summer 2017) and post  (Fall 2017 and Spring 2018) the implementation of the new design through select course evaluation questions and analytics in the LMS. Faculty and IDs described their observations and perceptions on the efficacy of the model in a focus group and survey questions, including descriptions of how they thought the model could be improved. Analysis of the quantitative and qualitative data provided faculty and administrators information on the benefits of the model compared to the investments, informing decisions on how to use existing resources to provide students with the best quality of education that is sustainable for faculty, IDs, and the institution.

Preliminary Findings

Specific preliminary findings include:

• Human Capital Utilization
  • The process was more rigorous and time intensive than expected by both faculty and instructional designers, but they spent less time managing the LMS components of the course after the re-design
  • Efficiencies in the design process (e.g. one revision in the parent module updates all course sections) made updating courses much easier
  • Faculty reported that the common template made it easier to onboard new faculty – especially adjunct faculty – while maintaining consistent standards of quality and navigation ease
  • The collaboration enabled faculty and IDs to educate each other, increasing knowledge of andragogy and how to build integrated scaffolding across the courses and program
• Student Outcomes
  • Faculty perceived higher levels of mastery on student learning outcomes as a result of consistent design and inclusion of module level learning objectives in all core courses
  • Faculty observed that students appeared to have more clarify about course expectations, resulting in fewer student questions that were unrelated to content
  • Students in the treatment group reported their courses as more organized than those in the control group
• Impact on Professional Relationships and the Collaborative Process
  • Frequent and in-depth interactions among faculty, the administrator, and IDs strengthened the collaboration and further clarified areas of distinction and overlap among them
  • Faculty reported being more intentional about course design as a result of the collaborative work and implementation of the common course template

Summary and Preliminary Conclusion

The primary benefits of the model were optimizing utilization of faculty, IDs, and administrators in ways that increased course clarity and learning for students, developed new knowledge and skill sets for faculty, and made it easier to maintain consistently high quality courses that are taught by multiple faculty.

Developing and implementing a program-wide course design template benefits students and programs in ways that will pay off in student success and persistence, but requires a strong initial investment of institutional resources with more modest ongoing support in order to be sustainable.

PARTICIPANT OUTCOMES AND TAKEAWAYS

As a participant, you will:

1. Identify your own program/institutional needs and resources as they relate to using a common course template to improve course quality and navigation.
2. Identify potential challenges, investments, and benefits to implementing such a model at your own institutions, considering diverse perspectives (i.e. faculty, staff, IDs/IT, students, and administrators).
3. Discuss how our process and research outcomes may inform your own initiatives for online programs.
4. Articulate what ideas you will take back to your work, and what next steps you will take.

Deliverables you will receive include:

1. Summary of research outcomes and considerations/recommendations for implementing the model.
2. Sample design ideas and standard tools (e.g. discussion rubrics) developed by our faculty and IDs.
3. List of discussion starters and facilitation ideas for initiating the conversation at your home institution.

PLAN FOR INTERACTIVITY

We will include interactive opportunities throughout the session, with the intent of leveraging the experiences and creative ideas of the participants as well as the presenters. These include:

• Beginning the session with prompts to the following questions – answered in a digital survey and/or discussion:
  • What interested you in attending this session today? I.e. What do you hope to gain from the session?

*Briefly introduce the topic and objectives of the session, making connections to participant objectives.

• Share any ways that you or your institution has tried to standardize curricula for the purpose of improving quality, collaboration, and/or student experience.
• What were the challenges and obstacles you have faced in efforts to standardize?
• What are the benefits and rewards you have gained from efforts to standardize?

• Presentation of our process and research outcomes will be punctuated with opportunities for participants to make connections with their own institutions/objectives, and discuss them in small groups. For example, we will provide a worksheet with quadrants to represent various perspectives (faculty, IDs/IT, administrators, other) in which participants will:
  • Identify trade-offs of various parts of the model from those perspectives
  • Brainstorm ways to mitigate concerns and amplify benefits for all stakeholders
  • Discuss different approaches to implementing the model with other participants
• After verbally integrating the ideas of participants with our research outcomes and recommendations, participants will identify what parts of the model or discussion they would like to consider at their own institutions and explicitly identify those ideas and what steps they will take to start the conversation.