Exploring faculty support models: A “faculty concierge” model

Session Description

            As the COVID-19 pandemic surge slowly settles in 2022, institutions of higher education are actively trying to bring faculty and students back to campus in an effort to restore the traditional in-class teaching model [1]. However, the landscape of higher education has changed. Some students and faculty have come to understand and appreciate the affordances of online teaching, and they want to continue with that flexible model [2, 3]. In this shifting milieu, instructors are moving out of the remote teaching phase into various versions of online teaching. It is timely to explore how to provide robust support for instructors who are teaching online. This presentation will discuss one style of support - the “faculty concierge” model.

The Concierge Model

            The “concierge” is a familiar concept especially in the context of hotels and hospitality services. Concierges provide personalized services to guests and arrange special services such as tours or theater tickets [4]. A concierge model provides high-touch, individualized support. The concierge model has been adopted in medicine (concierge medicine) [5] and in academia as “Ready Adult Concierges,” who support returning adult learners to help them graduate successfully [6]. A concierge model for supporting faculty with online course design has also been proposed. [7]

Faculty support needs

Faculty have various support needs as they design and deliver online courses. Four faculty support features identified in the literature are:

• Ownership: Faculty want to control their course and be the decision-makers in how the course is designed [8].

• Flexibility: Faculty need flexibility and understanding regarding timelines and levels of support provided [8,9].

• Informal learning opportunities: Faculty participate more frequently in informal learning opportunities to enhance their online teaching skills. They look to mentors and peers for suggestions and support [10.11].

• Just-in-time self-directed learning: Faculty appreciate support that is available to them when they need it.

Faculty Concierge Model

This faculty concierge model addresses the needs described above and draws from the ten concierge “keys” to working with faculty [7]. This faculty concierge model is based on four principles: (1) individualizing support, (2) respecting experiences and expertise, (3) starting small, and (4) keeping it simple. 

Individualized support

Effective support needs to address the differing levels of faculty expertise in course design and technological skills. Furthermore, faculty teaching contexts are different. For the same course, one faculty might be teaching a class of 20 students, and another might have a class of 80 students. Strategies and course designs for each of them will need to vary based on this context. Finally, teaching philosophy and strategies vary across disciplines. For example, hard disciplines such as engineering and mathematical sciences lean more heavily toward a cognitivist approach, while soft disciplines such as education are more constructivist in their course design [12]. It is important to account for these differences when working with faculty.

            Faculty concierges meet the faculty where they are both intellectually and physically [7]. One-on-one consultations are scheduled at the convenience of the faculty, and these sessions focus on listening and approaching each faculty and context as unique. This individualized interaction provides the support that faculty need rather than cookie-cutter, standard solutions [7]. Furthermore, the faculty concierge model provides comprehensive longitudinal support throughout a course. Longitudinal support allows for just-in-time faculty-directed support. It also reassures faculty that they have support available throughout their course, which helps mitigate the stress faculty can experience when teaching online.

Respecting experiences and expertise

Faculty concierges enter every faculty consultation acknowledging and respecting the accomplishments of the faculty member in their subject area and as educators. This is manifested through different strategies. For example, faculty concierges provide suggestions for course design without judging the pedagogical choices of the faculty. And course ownership is never questioned. Faculty are sole owners of their course, and the role of the faculty concierge is merely to act as a force multiplier and enhance the course. 

Start small

            Teaching online can be stressful. Faculty concierges try to minimize the stress on faculty by staying within the zone of proximal development. Taking small steps and slowly expanding faculty expertise can be more successful in keeping faculty engaged with teaching online.

 Keep it simple

            Course design can be exciting, and it is natural to want to try new technologies and strategies. Faculty concierges recognize that any technology or pedagogical strategy will only succeed if the faculty member fully understands it and uses it effectively. So, a key principle for faculty concierges is to keep it simple.

Implementation

            While instructional designers can be faculty concierges, faculty members might also serve as faculty concierges. Faculty members reach out to peers more easily than they reach out to instructional designers [10, 11]. There is also a shared experience between faculty that faculty concierges can draw from. 

Case Study

This faculty concierge model has been implemented at University X for the past 2 years. Three faculty members whose areas of expertise include online education, instructional design, and educational technologies served a school of about 400 faculty members. Not all faculty needed the same level of support. Faculty with technological prowess needed a few consultations to explore pedagogical strategies of teaching online. Some faculty needed assistance with the initial setting up of their course on the learning platform but were independent after that. Only a very small number of faculty needed continued attention through the life cycle of a course. Feedback from faculty have been overwhelmingly positive as seen in the following comments: 

“I love the personalization- both to my skills level and needs.”

“I loved that this was offered virtually as a national faculty member. I enjoy being a part of the larger [university] faculty. Specifically, I learned a number of tips/tricks. The extra resources included were really helpful.” 

“Unfazed by my singular lack of familiarity or agility with electronic systems, [faculty concierge] patiently coached me. He was supportive and extremely helpful in resolving the many problems I encountered.”

Conclusion

Challenges in implementing this model must be acknowledged. Firstly, this is a resource-intensive model. However, not all faculty need intense or sustained support. Most faculty want to master online teaching skills and work independently of support. Secondly, it is challenging to add something else to faculty workload by expecting them to serve as faculty concierges. Exploring different models such as faculty concierges count as a service to the institution.

As we look ahead to a new landscape of education, it is time to explore different models. This faculty concierge model holds potential and offers exciting possibilities for the future. 

Session Format:

This interactive session will be structured as follows:

7 mins - Participant ‘Getting to Know You’. Open discussion time on faculty development models.

15 mins - Presentation on the faculty concierge model

5 mins - Examples of implementation

10 min interaction - Discussion on how participants see the faculty concierge model enacted in their institutions

5 mins - Wrap up

 

The key takeaways from this session are that participants will be able to:

• Understand the features of the faculty concierge model

• Explore challenges of the model

• Consider how the model could be implemented in their institutions

References

1. Josh Moody. Most colleges resume in-person classes. Inside Higher Ed. (January 6, 2022). 

2. Doug Lederman. The era of flexible work in higher education. Inside Higher Ed. (January 5, 2022). 

3. Lindsay McKenzie. Students want online learning options post-pandemic. Inside Higher Ed. (April 27, 2021). 

4. Concierge. Dictionary.com. 

5. David P. Paul III and Michaeline Skiba. 2016. Concierge Medicine. The Health Care Manager. 35, 1:3-8. 

6. Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education. Bringing adults back to college: designing and implementing a statewide concierge model. (November 2010). 

7. David S. McCurry and Bonnie B. Mullinix. 2017. A concierge model for supporting faculty in online course design. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration. 20, 2 (Summer, 2017). 

8. Yuan Chen and Saul Carliner. 2021. A special SME: An integrative literature review of the relationship between instructional designers and faculty in the design of online courses for higher education. Performance Improvement Quarterly. 33, 471-495. 

9. Grazia Scoppio and Ilka Luyt. 2017. Mind the gap: Enabling online faculty and instructional designers in mapping new models for quality online courses. Education and Information Technologies, 22(3): 725-746. 

10. Steven W. Schmidt, Christina M. Tschida, and Elizabeth M. Hodge. 2016. How faculty learn to teach online: What administrators need to know. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, 19, 1 (Spr 2016), 1-10.

11. Anita Samuel. 2016. Online faculty development: What works? in Proceedings of the 2016 Adult Education Research Conference, June 2 - 5, 2016, Charlotte, North Carolina. Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, 228-233. 

12. Anita Samuel. 2016. Faculty perceptions and experiences of" presence" in the online learning environment. Ph.D. dissertation, The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 1196.