iDevelop – NSCC’s Faculty Professional Development eNewsletter (10/4/2021)

Welcome to iDevelop, a weekly eNewsletter providing faculty with information about professional development opportunities at NSCC. The intent of this eNewsletter is to spotlight the various professional development events for faculty in one convenient location as well as share best practices, resources and tips related to the teaching practice. iDevelop is being brought to you by the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation (CTLI).  

  

  
20 Minute Online Professional Development

The Monday Morning Mentor series will be available over the fall semester to bring you professional development in twenty minute snippets. The topic for the week of October 4th is How Can I Ensure Academic Integrity in the Online Classroom? The presentation is available Monday at 10:00am and is accessible through Sunday of that week. For information on accessing the presentation and supplemental materials, please view the Bulletin or the email version of iDevelop.

More information about this session (including description, topics, and learning goals) is available at https://www.magnapubs.com/product/program/how-can-i-ensure-academic-integrity-in-the-online-classroom/. The complete fall schedule of Monday Morning Mentor sessions is available at http://nscclets.blogspot.com/2021/08/20-minute-mentor-online-faculty.html.

Looking for transcripts of past Monday Morning Mentor sessions? Please email ctli@northshore.edu with the session title and we can provide you with the transcript and supplementary materials.

Other Professional Development Opportunities

• The Growth Mindset. This virtual workshop on Friday, October 8th at 11:00am is being sponsored by NSCC’s The RAP Experience. “How we think about our ability to confidently try new things and keep going when they get hard can set us for success or serve as a barrier to success. For many of us, we must work to have a growth mindset while also navigating social structures and systems that send deficit-oriented messages about who we are and the communities we come from. Join this session to learn more about growth mindsets and identify ways to critically assess how the environments we participate in influence our mindsets.” Please see the flyer sent in the iDevelop email for as well as registration link. 
• MA Community of Teaching Symposium. Faculty representatives from Massachusetts Community Colleges invite you to join them in a symposium of teaching and learning. This symposium, Teaching through an Equity Lens: What We Learned on our Summer Vacation, will take place on October 15th from 8:30am to 1:00pm. “Facilitated by the Center for Urban Education, these faculty engaged in thoughtful, reflective analysis of their teaching practice through an equity lens to improve the classroom experience for their students. Dr. Jennifer Harris and Professor yusef Hayes will be presenting "Equity Through Multiple Lenses" at 11:00 am.” Please see the flyer for more information as well as the Zoom link. The flyer is available at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1iqt5juPln8xCvssLUQj3o2P2h4Y-jV-Q/view. 
• 2021 Open Education Conference. The 2021 Open Education Conference will be held October 18 through October 22. The annual conference brings together more than a thousand open education advocates across the country and world for a wide range of sessions on OER, open pedagogy, and open education initiatives. This year’s virtual program offers 200+ live and pre-recorded sessions, along with networking and social activities. More information about the conference is available at https://openeducationconference.org/. There is a small registration fee but interested faculty and staff can apply for a NSCC Professional Development Grant to cover the cost to attend.
• 46th Forum on Tolerance. This fall, the Forum on Tolerance’s focus will be “What does Asian American mean? Identities, Struggles, & Contributions”. The virtual event will take place October 18th through October 22nd. Speakers include: Dr. Paul Watanabe, keynote; Dr. Ben Railton; Dr. Li Li; and author Aimee Liu. To see the entire schedule of events and session topics as well as to register for sessions, please visit https://www.northshore.edu/tolerance/.
• NISOD Fall Virtual Conference. NSCC has purchased an institutional registration for NISOD’s Fall Virtual Conference to be held October 20th through October 22nd. The institutional registration allows all North Shore Community College employees to register at no cost for this event. Sessions will be focused around these tracks: Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Justice; Online, Face-to-Face, and Hybrid Teaching and Learning; and Student Services, Support, and Success. More information about the conference is available at https://www.nisod.org/virtual-events/conference/. All you need to do to participate in the conference without cost is to register by October 19th using your college email address.
• 2021 Assessment Institute. The 2021 Assessment Institute, https://assessmentinstitute.iupui.edu/index.html, will be held virtually from October 24th to October 27th. The institute is highly regarded in the field of assessment and offers the opportunity for higher education faculty, staff, and administrators to share knowledge and learn new skills regarding student outcomes assessment. If you are interested in further developing your assessment skills, this is an excellent opportunity! To learn more, please visit the institute’s presentation topics. A sampling of presentation tracks includes: Assessment in Online Courses and Programs; Assessment Methods; Community Colleges; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; STEM Education; and Student Partnership and Engagement in Assessment. Institute registration is complimentary this year, which represents a $370 cost savings. If you would like to attend, please register by October 11th at https://assessmentinstitute.iupui.edu/registration/index.html. 
• Education as Relating: A Virtual Conference. The Taos Institute will be hosting a virtual conference from November 4th to November 6th on “Education as Relating: Shedding the Industrial Model - Sharing Resources and Practices - Shaping the Future of Education”. Kara Kaufman, Professor of History and Gender & Women's Studies, will be presenting at the conference on the dialogic classroom.  More information about the conference is available at https://www.taosinstitute.net/education/taos-conferences/education-virtual-conference2021. There is a small registration fee but interested faculty and staff can apply for a NSCC Professional Development Grant to cover the cost to attend.  
• Digital Teaching Symposium. On Friday, November 5 from 9:00am to 4:00pm, Blackboard is hosting a free, virtual Digital Teaching Symposium. “Learners’ journeys are no longer linear—and the pathway to successfully teaching individual learners requires flexibility and innovation. The future of education exists in personalized experiences, delivered in methods as unique as the learners themselves. No matter what your technical abilities, learning technologies are designed to facilitate teaching and make your job easier. Let's come together to explore these tools, learn best practices, discover new strategies, and share with colleagues.” (event website) Registration information is available at https://go.blackboard.com/digital-teaching-symposium.

Upcoming Webinars of Interest

• How to Effectively Use Assessment in Online and Blended Learning to Help Your Students Succeed (Contact North webinar) on Thursday, October 7 from 1:00pm-2:00pm. "There are new opportunities to rethink and reimagine how assessment for learning and assessments of learning takes place in an online and blended learning environment. Dr. Stephen Murgatroyd, Chief Innovation Officer at Contact North | Contact Nord explores five principles for assessment: Authentic Assessment, Accessible Assessment, Automated Assessment, Continuous Assessment, and Secure Assessment." (webinar description) More information and registration link available at https://teachonline.ca/webinar/how-effectively-use-assessment-online-and-blended-learning-help-your-students-succeed-0.

Interesting Articles and Resources

• Why I Went from Proctored Exams to Open-book, https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/educational-assessment/why-i-went-from-proctored-exams-to-open-book/
• Small Changes in Teaching (nine part series by James Lang), https://www.chronicle.com/package/small-changes-in-teaching/ 
• Applying Vedic Techniques to Online Learning, https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/philosophy-of-teaching/applying-vedic-techniques-to-online-learning/ 
• Lessons Learned: A Toolkit for Post-Pandemic Higher Education with Equity and Student Care at the Center, https://www.everylearnereverywhere.org/blog/10-lessons-from-the-pandemic-on-tech-forward-teaching-for-equity-in-higher-ed/

Share Your Teaching Resources and Professional Development Opportunities

If you have any teaching resources that you would like to share with other NSCC faculty or know of any other professional development opportunities that NSCC faculty might be interested in, please feel free to send them to ctli@northshore.edu and we will share them in the upcoming issues of iDevelop.

We hope you have enjoyed this weekly eNewsletter and would love your input. Please let us know if you have any feedback on the format, content, and resources or if there is anything else you would like to see in the eNewsletter.

Thank you,
CTLI  

iDevelop – NSCC’s Faculty Professional Development eNewsletter (9/27/2021)

Welcome to iDevelop, a weekly eNewsletter providing faculty with information about professional development opportunities at NSCC. The intent of this eNewsletter is to spotlight the various professional development events for faculty in one convenient location as well as share best practices, resources and tips related to the teaching practice. iDevelop is being brought to you by the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation (CTLI).  

  

  
20 Minute Online Professional Development

The Monday Morning Mentor series will be available over the fall semester to bring you professional development in twenty minute snippets. The topic for the week of September 27th is How Can I Adapt My Teaching So Students Thrive in a Polysynchronous Classroom? The presentation is available Monday at 10:00am and is accessible through Sunday of that week. For information on accessing the presentation and supplemental materials, please view the Bulletin or the email version of iDevelop.

More information about this session (including description, topics, and learning goals) is available at https://www.magnapubs.com/product/program/adapt-my-teaching-students-thrive-polysynchronous-classroom/. The complete fall schedule of Monday Morning Mentor sessions is available at http://nscclets.blogspot.com/2021/08/20-minute-mentor-online-faculty.html.

Looking for transcripts of past Monday Morning Mentor sessions? Please email ctli@northshore.edu with the session title and we can provide you with the transcript and supplementary materials.

Other Professional Development Opportunities

• The Growth Mindset. This virtual workshop on Friday, October 8th at 11:00am is being sponsored by NSCC’s The RAP Experience. “How we think about our ability to confidently try new things and keep going when they get hard can set us for success or serve as a barrier to success. For many of us, we must work to have a growth mindset while also navigating social structures and systems that send deficit-oriented messages about who we are and the communities we come from. Join this session to learn more about growth mindsets and identify ways to critically assess how the environments we participate in influence our mindsets.” Please see the flyer sent in the iDevelop email for as well as registration link. 
• 2021 Open Education Conference. The 2021 Open Education Conference will be held October 18 through October 22. The annual conference brings together more than a thousand open education advocates across the country and world for a wide range of sessions on OER, open pedagogy, and open education initiatives. This year’s virtual program offers 200+ live and pre-recorded sessions, along with networking and social activities. More information about the conference is available at https://openeducationconference.org/. There is a small registration fee but interested faculty and staff can apply for a NSCC Professional Development Grant to cover the cost to attend.
• 2021 Assessment Institute. The 2021 Assessment Institute, https://assessmentinstitute.iupui.edu/index.html, will be held virtually from October 24th to October 27th. The institute is highly regarded in the field of assessment and offers the opportunity for higher education faculty, staff, and administrators to share knowledge and learn new skills regarding student outcomes assessment. If you are interested in further developing your assessment skills, this is an excellent opportunity! To learn more, please visit the institute’s presentation topics. A sampling of presentation tracks includes: Assessment in Online Courses and Programs; Assessment Methods; Community Colleges; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; STEM Education; and Student Partnership and Engagement in Assessment. Institute registration is complimentary this year, which represents a $370 cost savings. If you would like to attend, please register by October 11th at https://assessmentinstitute.iupui.edu/registration/index.html. 
• Digital Teaching Symposium. On Friday, November 5 from 9:00am to 4:00pm, Blackboard is hosting a free, virtual Digital Teaching Symposium. “Learners’ journeys are no longer linear—and the pathway to successfully teaching individual learners requires flexibility and innovation. The future of education exists in personalized experiences, delivered in methods as unique as the learners themselves. No matter what your technical abilities, learning technologies are designed to facilitate teaching and make your job easier. Let's come together to explore these tools, learn best practices, discover new strategies, and share with colleagues.” (event website) Registration information is available at https://go.blackboard.com/digital-teaching-symposium.

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month.

Between September 15 and October 15, we celebrate the political, literary, artistic, athletic and other contributions that Hispanic people have accomplished; these contributions have enriched all of our lives. Here are some great resources if you or your students wish to reflect and learn more or if you would like to incorporate this into your classes.

• National Archives: Hispanic Heritage Month, https://www.archives.gov/news/topics/hispanic-heritage-month
• WGBH: Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, https://www.wgbh.org/hispanic-heritage-month
• PBS: Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month 2021, https://www.pbs.org/articles/2021/09/celebrate-hispanic-heritage-month-2021/
• National Hispanic Heritage Month, https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/
• Business Insider Reviews: 20 Books to Read for Hispanic Heritage Month, https://www.businessinsider.com/hispanic-heritage-month-books

Upcoming Webinars of Interest

• How to Effectively Use Assessment in Online and Blended Learning to Help Your Students Succeed (Contact North webinar) on Thursday, October 7 from 1:00pm-2:00pm. "There are new opportunities to rethink and reimagine how assessment for learning and assessments of learning takes place in an online and blended learning environment. Dr. Stephen Murgatroyd, Chief Innovation Officer at Contact North | Contact Nord explores five principles for assessment: Authentic Assessment, Accessible Assessment, Automated Assessment, Continuous Assessment, and Secure Assessment." (webinar description) More information and registration link available at https://teachonline.ca/webinar/how-effectively-use-assessment-online-and-blended-learning-help-your-students-succeed-0.

Interesting Articles and Resources

• The Joys of Musical Breakout Rooms, https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/online-education/online-student-engagement/the-joys-of-musical-breakout-rooms/
• Attention Is an Achievement: How to Help Students Stay Present and Focused in Class, https://www.aacu.org/liberaleducation/2021/summer/lang
• Inclusive Teaching Guide, https://ctl.columbia.edu/resources-and-technology/resources/inclusive-teaching-guide/

Share Your Teaching Resources and Professional Development Opportunities

If you have any teaching resources that you would like to share with other NSCC faculty or know of any other professional development opportunities that NSCC faculty might be interested in, please feel free to send them to ctli@northshore.edu and we will share them in the upcoming issues of iDevelop.

We hope you have enjoyed this weekly eNewsletter and would love your input. Please let us know if you have any feedback on the format, content, and resources or if there is anything else you would like to see in the eNewsletter.

Thank you,
CTLI  

20 Minute Mentor - Online Faculty Professional Development - Fall 2019 Schedule

The Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation (CTLI) offers faculty a professional development series from Magna Publications, called the 20 Minute Mentor. The goal of the 20 Minute Mentor series is to offer faculty practical professional development opportunities in twenty minute snippets that can be accessed from anywhere and at any time during the given week. Session topics cover the areas of student engagement, teaching and learning, teaching online, assessment and learning goals, and classroom management.

Information on how to access the 20 Minute Mentor sessions is available each week in the Bulletin and the iDevelop e-newsletter.

New video presentations (with supplementary materials) go live at 10:00am each Monday morning and are only accessible through Sunday. 

The following sessions are on the schedule for fall 2019. For session descriptions, objectives, and mentor bios, click on the titles below. 

• August 26 - How Do I Create a Class that Supports First-year Students?
• September 2 - Beyond Syllabus Policies: What Strategies Help Students Take Responsibility for Learning?
• September 9 - How Do I Set Students up for Success in Online Courses?
• September 16 - How Can I Encourage the Growth Mindset with Three Simple Tips?
• September 23 - How Can I Increase Student Completion Rates in Online Learning?
• September 30 - How Can I Use Microactivities to Engage Students and Improve Learning and Retention?
• October 7 - How Can I Build Community with My Online Faculty?
• October 14 - What Culturally Responsive Teaching Techniques Can I Use to Improve Learning?
• October 21 - How Can I Create a Platform for Difficult Conversations in the Online Classroom?
• October 28 - How Can I Manage the Disconnect Between Faculty and Student Perceptions of Rigor to Increase Learning?
• November 4 - How Can I Ensure Academic Honesty in My Online Assessments?
• November 11 - What Can Engagement in Games Teach Me About Engagement in My Courses?
• November 18 - How Can I Create an Effective Syllabus for My Online Class?
• November 25 - How Do I Design Effective Combinations of Gamified Elements to Encourage Deeper Learning?
• December 2 - How Does Consistency Improve Quality in Online Courses and Programs?
• December 9 - How Can I Teach Soft Skills to Better Prepare Students for the Workplace?

We would love to hear your feedback on the usefulness of these sessions. Please send your input to ctli@northshore.edu.

iDevelop – NSCC’s Faculty Professional Development eNewsletter (9/18/2017)

Welcome to iDevelop, a weekly eNewsletter providing faculty with information about professional development opportunities at NSCC. The intent of this eNewsletter is to spotlight the various professional development events for faculty in one convenient location as well as share best practices, resources and tips related to the teaching practice. iDevelop is being brought to you by the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation (CTLI).
  

20 Minute Online Professional Development
The Monday Morning Mentor series will be available over the fall semester to bring you professional development in twenty minute snippets. The topic for the week of September 18th is How Do I Design Innovative Assignments to Foster Learning in the Online Classroom? The presentation is available Monday at 10:00am and is accessible through Sunday of that week. For information on accessing the presentation and supplemental materials, please view the Bulletin or the email version of iDevelop.

More information about this session (including description, topics, and learning goals) is available at https://www.magnapubs.com/online/mentor/how-do-i-design-innovative-assignments-to-foster-learning-in-the-14462-1.html. The complete fall schedule of Monday Morning Mentor sessions is available at http://nscclets.blogspot.com/2017/09/20-minute-mentor-online-faculty.html.

Looking for transcripts of past Monday Morning Mentor sessions? Please email ctli@northshore.edu with the session title and we can provide you with the transcript and supplementary materials.   

Other Professional Development Opportunities

• Meet a Muslim: NSCC’s Office of Student Engagement will be offering two co-curricular programming events this fall semester. The first one, Meet a Muslim, will take place on Wednesday, September 27th from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. in Danvers MS119. Faculty can bring their classes or encourage students to attend. Please email engagement@northshore.edu if you have questions or to let Dennis Hicks that you will be bringing a class. Please see the email version of iDevelop for a document with learning outcomes that are designed as a resource for faculty who choose to connect their teaching with these co-curricular interfaith events. If you would like support regarding assessment strategies, please contact Cate Kaluzny.

  
Share Teaching Resources or Professional Development OpportunitiesIf you have any teaching strategies or resources that you would like to share with other NSCC faculty or know of any other professional development opportunities that NSCC faculty might be interested in, please feel free to send them to ctli@northshore.edu and we will share them in the upcoming issues of iDevelop.

We hope you have enjoyed this weekly eNewsletter and would love your input. Please let us know if you have any feedback on the format, content, and resources or if there is anything else you would like to see in the eNewsletter.

Thank you,
Center for Teaching, Learning, and Innovation


 

The Digital Assignment: How Do You Accept Assignments?

When I look back even 5 years ago, I've seen a significant change in the ways in which faculty take assignments. I know faculty have been taking digital assignments as far back as the 1990s but it often seemed the exception whereas now it feels much more like the rule. We all remember the frantic whirlwind of getting an assignment to an instructor (often after waiting until the last minute to write it) by battling printers or lines at the printers, traffic, crowded hallways, etc just to get that paper in before the end of class, only to repeat this several times each semester.

While there are many benefits to taking online assignments (less chance of losing it, time stamps, environmentally friendly, less redundancy, etc), there are definitely some drawbacks and every person has their own method of doing it.  Below are some of the different methods of taking digital assignments that you may be using or considering using. 

EMAIL
Email is still a popular method of receiving digital assignments as it remains a standard go-to place for students and faculty alike. 
Benefits
Email is easily accessible for most people.  You don't have to dig too far down into a learning management system to find it and you can do searches to find things.  With NSCC's Gmail server, we have a large space (30 gigabytes and counting) with which to store our emails and attachments.  You will also have an exact time stamp of when the student sent it.
Drawbacks 
Organizing assignments as they come in can be challenging. Finding and sorting along with downloading each assignment can be time-consuming; especially if you intend to send them back with comments (and thus have to upload the assignments again).  Improper file formats mean more back and forth with the student.  The excuse "I sent it, you didn't get it?" can be come fairly common (whether truthful or not).
Tips

• Have students put a specific but unique word in their subject line (such as your course code) to make it easier to find and search.
• Create labels and use filters. 
• Be sure to reply to students to let them know you received their paper.  It can be a very simple response that you copy and paste into each, but it will be useful for the students to know.
• Include in your syllabus and elsewhere that this will be the method of submission for course assignments.

ANGEL DROPBOX
Every course at NSCC has an ANGEL shell and you can create dropboxes for your assignments.  Students would then log into ANGEL and go into the course shell in order to upload their assignment. 
Benefits
All of the assignments are in one place for you to see and to download in a single batch.  You can see what time students passed in their assignment and grade them all in the same place as well as use a grading rubric.  If you use ANGEL's Automate feature, you can have an email sent to students who haven't uploaded the paper by the appointed time.  Students can receive an email when their grade is posted. 
Drawbacks 
Using the dropbox still requires students to be shown what it is and how to use it within class time.  It also means setting up a dropbox for assignment to prevent confusion for students.  Also, it's best used when using the gradebook in full.  While there is batch download, you still need to upload graded papers with comments one by one.  Like email, there is still the issue of file format since students may not upload the preferred or required file format, causing delays. 
Tips

• Make sure you spend some class time (5 minutes or so) showing students how to get into ANGEL and upload their file.
• When setting up the dropbox, be sure to include instructions (including file format, due date, links to relevant resources, etc) in the message box.  
• Make use of the advance settings in the dropbox to determine when you will stop submissions, how many submissions you will take and other matters to make it more efficient for you. 
• Include in your syllabus and elsewhere that this will be the method of submission for course assignments.

GOOGLE DRIVE
Faculty are increasingly using and enjoying the benefits of Google Drive with its suite of programs including a word processing program, spreadsheet program, and presentation program that students can use and save themselves money by not buying expensive programs like Microsoft Office.
Benefits
The ability to create student folders where all of a student's work can be found.  No uploading or downloading.  Easy to comment and provide feedback to the student.  Opportunity to use text-chat or the comment feature to have back and forth discussions about assignment.  The program is already tied to the students' School email so it's easy to locate.  The Google Drive app allows for students and faculty to access the content regularly without signing in and out of the school's system.  Easy citation system.  Lots of good How-To resources to direct students towards (as well as for yourself).  One singular file format.
Drawbacks
There's a big learning curve since many students haven't used it yet.  The sharing of files and folders can get confusing.  Though there are work-arounds, if the student doesn't have consistent internet access, it can be cumbersome.  Google regularly updates or changes their suite of tools which can confuse faculty and students.
Tips

• Have the students create their own Folder that they share directly with you (and then put all of their folders into your own "Class Folder."
• Make note of the "Revision" feature under the File menu.  This can provide a history of the project being made which can be useful in understanding how a student is working.
• Include in your syllabus and elsewhere that this will be the method of submission for course assignments.

eCONTENT DROPBOX
Publishers are now creating very robust learning management systems that are accompanying their books.  These eContent web-based (and sometimes software-based or app-based) programs will have a dropbox similar to the one in ANGEL but may have some extra features. 
Benefits
If you are using the other eContent, then it is one central place to house your materials.  The eContent site will often have clear instructions on how to use the dropbox.  All of the assignments in one central location.  Some of them will allow for any file format to be uploaded and for the instructor to download in a preferred format.
Drawbacks
If you're not using much else of the eContent, this becomes more cumbersome to students (especially, if they did not buy a new book).
 Students may have access problems and not be able to complete the work or just email it instead. 
Tips

• Be sure to spend some class time familarizing your students with the environment.
• Include in your syllabus and elsewhere that this will be the method of submission for course assignments.

What methods and programs do you take digital assignments in?  What obstacles do you contend with when doing so?  What solutions have you found?  What tips would you add to the ones above?

Massive Open Online Courses: Massive Threat or Open Invitation? Part 2 of 2

This 2-part blog feature comes from Guest Blogger, Michael J. Badolato, Ed.D., Dean of Academic Technology and was originally featured in NSCC Technology Across the Curriculum's annual publication:  Mousetales.  Part 1 of this article can be found here.

In the course of this academic year, two Massachusetts state community colleges have partnered with edX in the delivery of an introductory computer science course on their respective campuses. Mass Bay and Bunker Hill each have integrated edX’s content within different instructional designs. Mass Bay has developed a hybrid, or blended, design incorporating the MOOC as the online component complementing weekly in-class meetings to meet the course’s total credit-hour requirement. Bunker Hill’s rendition is essentially a ‘flipped classroom’ model where the lecture provided by the MOOC is positioned as the assignment component along with a full number of in-class meetings reserved for project-based activities, collaboration and discussion. While MIT will recognize participation with a certificate of completion, course credit will be awarded through the participating community colleges.  The courses are led by the local community college professors while the MOOC portion of the course is a video lecture offering no real interaction with the MIT lecturer. In effect, both schools implement the MOOC as a large-scale reusable learning object in the service of their individual learning outcomes.

What is important to remember about this partnership is that while MIT and Harvard have elite brand recognition, they are relative novices in the world of online learning. Community colleges have the benefit of years of experience in online course design and in accommodating students diverse in their backgrounds and educational goals. Where the community colleges gain yet another strategy in their arsenal, Harvard and MIT gain valuable partners who can share their extensive knowledge of creating challenging learning experiences that benefit students of all levels.

To gain a balanced perspective on MOOCS, it is helpful to view them within the context of an emerging academic infrastructure where both content and process is less centralized and more distributed. This infrastructure embraces sources of content beyond our local development, includes individuals outside of our immediate locale, blends the physical and virtual, and rebalances the teacher-student-peer relationship towards independent learning and collaboration. Aside from MOOCs and open content, a working example can be found in our own Math Redesign Project, which is a flexible convergence model utilizing third-party content within a fixed learning environment facilitated by qualified, experienced faculty.  We have before us a greater continuum of possibilities that will continue to include us and the value we provide, yet challenge us to collaborate and literally think outside the boxes that are our texts, curriculum, classrooms, desks, buildings, and servers.  As the continuum expands, we will in-turn find ourselves moving beyond the writing of singular courses toward strategically building complete learning experiences.  The possibilities have never been greater.

To learn more, please visit:

• edX: www.edx.org
• Udacity: www.udacity.com
• Coursera: www.coursera.org
• Khan Academy: www.khanacademy.org
• MIT Open Courseware: http://ocw.mit.edu
• Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative: http://oli.cmu.edu
• Open Education Resources Commons: www.oercommons.org

Have you taken a MOOC?  What are some of your experiences with MOOCs?  

Massive Open Online Courses: Massive Threat or Open Invitation? Part 1 of 2

This 2-part blog feature comes from Guest Blogger, Michael J. Badolato, Ed.D., Dean of Academic Technology and was originally featured in NSCC Technology Across the Curriculum's annual publication:  Mousetales.

When I first encountered the word “MOOCs” a little over a year ago, I envisioned subterranean creatures lying in wait to conquer our world, or perhaps another multi-user online dungeon game.  A recent set of articles (see Laura Pappano's “The Year of the MOOC" and Kevin Carey's “Show Me Your Badge") featured on the cover of the November 2012 New York Times Education Life supplement presented a white rabbit along with the headline “Massive and multiplying, the latest word in online learning: MOOC.”  While the latter image may be far less menacing, it is no less compelling given the seemingly sudden appearance and proliferation of MOOCs across the higher education landscape.  

On the surface, MOOCs, or Massive Open Online Courses, are exactly what the term implies: an online course that is massive in terms of sheer enrollment, potentially thousands at any given time, and open, in that anyone can attend regardless of academic background, at no cost and with no official registration required.

Upon closer examination of MOOCs, there is something in them that is familiar in a manner not unlike so many ‘next big things’ we have all encountered.  Yet, their very scale and accessibility suggests implications for altering the structures and relationships of our educational systems as we have come to define them.  It is common experience, if not historical record, that whenever a new technology is first integrated into the educational practice of the day, be it chalkboard or circuit board, some disruption occurs while the innovation gradually settles into the mainstream.   Communities of practice, within a single institution or distributed across the field, establish rubrics, standards, and other structures from which to base development and assess quality.  The innovation is adopted, brought under control and integrated within an agreed upon framework. Final analysis results in acceptance, rejection or revision and the practice moves onward.

In the midst of these processes, technology in education has come to know several forms. Many colleges and universities, NSCC among them, have been developing their online learning practice and capacity for the better part of two decades. Classroom delivery, increasingly influenced by what has been learned through online practice, has also become richer and more complex in its ability to accommodate a greater variety of content and interaction.  The recent influx of mobile and wireless devices promises to take these interactions to a more immediate, untethered and personal level.  Thus, the very infrastructure of our educational delivery system is becoming distributed across an increasing number of channels while pedagogies strive to adapt.  Content for this emerging infrastructure is being prolifically developed as the means for its production and adoption becomes more accessible, less costly and, ironically, less technical.

A recent trend that has been born of these possibilities is the Open Content Movement.  Among the growing number of open content developers and distributers are individual teachers working through collaborative online entities such as the Open Education Resources (OER) Commons, as well as non-profit organizations such as Kahn Academy, a producer of internet video micro-lectures currently in its seventh year of operation. Several renowned institutions have also sponsored open content projects, such as MIT’s Open Courseware and Carnegie Mellon’s Open Learning Initiative.  Where the products of these initiatives have been adopted, they have supplemented, and in some instances replaced, traditional texts and other materials.  The educational publishing industry, however, has also responded by offering supplemental materials at no additional charge to maintain interest in their inventory.   These resources are not typically organized into whole courses and the interactions that surround them, but are offered in a format known in educational technology jargon as Reusable Learning Objects (RLOs), which are typically digital chunks and snippets of materials and curriculum guides offered in a variety of file types. They can be used as strategic parts of a larger course or curriculum, or as learning experiences that can often stand on their own.

MOOCs are essentially an extension of the open content concept, presented as an entire online course or as a series of related lectures with roots in programs offered at actual higher education institutions. As such, there are currently three recognized major MOOC producers.  The MIT/Harvard collaboration edX is an outgrowth of their Open Courseware Initiative, providing the next level  in open content to enable an experience more akin to a fully functioning online course and if desired, a process for gaininga university-backed certificate, albeit no direct MIT credit. Another university initiative spin-off is Udacity, which began life as a series of free computer science courses offered through Stanford University.  Coursera, a for-profit company founded by Stanford University computer science professors but not affiliated with that institution, was conceived as a hub for MOOCs developed at several participating institutions and as a venue for offering credit and certificates (for a fee) as well as integrated support services. The American Council onEducation recently approved five Coursera courses for college credit.

Khan Academy’s stated mission is “… the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education for anyone anywhere.”  Proponents of MOOCs, and open content in general, laud this very openness as a decentralized and democratic opportunity for access to what they view as a quality higher education experience. Doubters, for much the same reasons, are concerned about the potential disintermediation from the oversight of higher education institutions and their faculty. Both sides of the debate see the potential for alternative credentials outside of the traditional degree sequence, though each side obviously has a different opinion as to the relative merits of such an outcome.

This ends part 1--stay on the lookout for part 2, where Michael address specifically what's being done at community colleges in Massachusetts.

ANGEL Tip #8: Extended Testing Time

Sometimes you find it necessary to give a particular student(s) extra time when taking an assessment.  This is very easy to do in ANGEL when using the testing feature.  All it involves is creating two teams – one for the extended testing time and one for the rest of the class –  and then customizing the settings.

Here's what you do:

1. Go to the Manage tab in your course and click on "Teams".
2. Click on "Add a Team".
3. Give the Team a name – it might be something like “extended testing time” or whatever helps you identify the team that needs extended time. You can also just call them Team A or Team B.
4. Click "Save".
5. You will see your list of students.  From your list of students, place a check-mark in front of the name of the student(s) who needs extended testing time.
6. Click “Add Selected” and then "Done".
7. Repeat the process for creating a team that will include the rest of the students in the class.  
8. After you have created your teams, go to your Lessons tab and locate the specific assessment. 
9. Hover your mouse over the assessment and click "settings".
10. Click the "Advanced" radio button (near the top).
11. Click the "Access" tab.
12. Next to "Team Access," select "Selected Teams" from the drop down box.
13. Check the box in front of the team who needs extended times and then click that team name.
14. You should see a pop up box called Custom Team Settings.  Check off  "Advanced Settings".
15. You will see the override settings that you can select to accommodate the team who needs extended time.
16. Make sure to click "Save" once you have selected your extended time options.

If you have any questions please contact the ANGEL Helpdesk at angel@northshore.edu.