Making courses easy to navigate for students for students in online classes when the institution does not have instructional designers for every course can be difficult. However, accrediting bodies are concerned about the quality and format of online courses for online students. This presentation will map QM and accreditation standards in a template in order to make it easier to develop courses under ADA and accreditation standards.
For students, sometimes taking online courses can be frustrating. Courses within the same department can appear very different, and requirements can vary considerably. Some courses can be very easy to navigate with detailed weekly explanations, while others are not so accessible. In an online environment, some faculty might be very responsive to emails, while others might only answer occasionally. Although course content is completely determined by the faculty member, without the assistance of a course designer, tackling how to easily create a course format could be a daunting task for the faculty member, and frustrating to students who are taking the course.
Accrediting bodies such as Middle States are addressing quality and content of online courses in their reviews. By mapping Quality Matters standards to Middle States standards, many of the concerns raised by accrediting bodies can be addressed. Creating a format for a course shell which is consistent within the institution can address many issues.
In this presentation, we will identify and map QM standards to those of our accrediting body, Middle States, to address the important aspects of course design to ensure ADA compliance and ease of use by students. If a student is taking a Literature course or a Finance course, the format of the course’s organization will be the same.
We will break this presentation down as follows:
· Incenting faculty to engage in ensuring that their course meets our online course standards.
· Providing document templates.
· Providing coaching for developing Learning Objectives.
· Implementing a well-designed Blackboard Course Template that addresses accreditation requirements.
· Making closed captioning and templates part of the development and redevelopment plan.
· Empowering faculty with tools to promote learner engagement.