After offering instructor-led, well-received 4-week workshops on guiding faculty in effective online teaching and creating quality online courses for over 10 years, we re-evaluated our efforts and re-designed training not only to fit their busy schedule with self-paced workshops but also provide variety of training to meet their needs.
Over the past 10 years, Center for Instructional Design at Central Michigan University offered the instructor-led, 4-week workshops several times a year to prepare and guide faculty in teaching effectively online and creating quality online courses. The workshops had been very well received. However, the fixed schedule, increasing demand, and limited resources suggested a more flexible and collaborative approach was needed. To address these challenges, we re-evaluated our efforts and re-designed training to better fit faculty’s needs.
A variety of training and formats has been developed to meet faculty’s immediate or long-term needs. First, we converted two fundamental workshops into the self-paced format that allows faculty to learn at their convenient time and pace and to accommodate their busy schedule. Second, we collaborated with other teams and offered one-hour webinars for special interests. Third, we designed mini programs for in-depth information and hands-on training. These programs are 100% online and asynchronous with optional live sessions.
However, differed from what we expected, participation or utilization is low in this flexible approach. There could be several possible factors.
First, in the previous workshops, we certified instructors who successfully completed and passed the training. Those instructors were eligible to be contracted to teach or develop an online course. In addition to strengthening their intrinsic motivation, these also added a very strong extrinsic incentive to their learning motivation. The new training approach focuses largely on the faculty’s professional development and personal growth.
Second, this could also be caused by the prescribed content that adjunct instructors are required to use and follow. That said, instructors have little room to make changes to a course, and this could very much hinder their motivation in learning more and exploring other strategies. This “I won’t be able to use it anyway, so why bother” kind of mindset could become a strong barrier on their training decisions.
In this session, we would like to share how and what we did, our lessons learned, challenges we face. We would also like to seek inputs and discussions on the approaches other institutions utilize to prepare and support faculty and promote their professional development.