The eLog » eLearning

Clark’s eLearning is Moving to Moodle!

Cindy — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 18:34:10 +0000

It is official, the new LMS for Clark College is Moodle Joule hosted by Moodlerooms. The eLearning staff along with a small pilot group of Clark faculty dedicated their summer months to learning the new LMS. We are now ready to introduce the rest of our campus community to Moodle Joule, beginning with informational sessions at Fall Orientation, workshops for eLearning faculty, and approximately 12 live fall classes taught by the pilot group during fall quarter.

The LMS Migration
Faculty Training Plan

Between fall 2010 and spring 2011, eLearning will present three phases of Moodle workshops in defined stages:

The first stage will take place fall quarter. The fall quarter training is designed for current Clark College online/hybrid faculty. A faculty member who has taught online or hybrid for Clark College using Blackboard prior to winter 2011 and is identified to teach online or hybrid courses for Clark College in the 2010-2011 academic year qualifies as a course migrator. Three phases of Moodle training will be available to migrating faculty during fall quarter.

Phase I: Strategies for Moving from Blackboard to Moodle.
Phase II: Developing Courses in Moodle Joule: hands-on computer workshop emphasizing tool training. Faculty will receive their Moodle course shells and login information during this workshop.
Phase III: Teaching with Moodle Joule: online workshop emphasizing student engagement and retention.

*Each of the phases is approximately 3 hours in length; flexible scheduling is available upon request.

Migrating Faculty can register now for Phase I, II, and III Workshops:
eLearning Faculty – Click here to register for Fall Quarter Moodle Workshops

The second stage will begin winter quarter (January 2011). Winter and spring 2011 training is designed for faculty who are new to online teaching and faculty who use the LMS to enhance their face-to-face courses. Phases I and II are strongly recommended for all users.

Blackboard will remain available throughout the academic year. The migration process will be complete on June 30, 2011.

Recruitment for Project Manager: Open Education Project

Cindy — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 17:30:50 +0000

I wanted to pass along this job announcement as a follow up to early announcements about the Open Course Library Project of the Washington State Student Completion Initiative (a.k.a. the Gates Grant) . The project is underway and a project manager is needed. Clark College participants in the project are: Kathy Chatfield in her role of Instructional Designer, and Travis Kibota as course re-designer for Microbiology.

The Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) invites applications from qualified individuals for the position of Open Education Project Manager.

SBCTC is seeking a visionary “Open Education Project Manager” to join the SBCTC team. This critical, full-time position will provide active leadership and expertise in managing open education projects. This position is preferably based in Washington State (State Board has office locations in Bellevue, Olympia and Spokane), though qualified out-of-state candidates will be considered and are strongly encouraged to apply. This position is funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation which will last two years with the possibility of funding extensions thereafter.

The annual compensation for this full-time position is $60,000. Washington State has a generous benefit package (health, dental and life insurance, retirement, and an optional deferred compensation program). This recruitment will be ongoing until the position is filled. First screening of applications will begin on Monday, September 20, 2010. To ensure consideration, return your completed materials by 5 p.m. Friday, September 17, 2010.

For more information about this position and the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, visit http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu, or contact SBCTC’s Human Resource Office at (360) 704-4301.

Please feel free to share this position announcement with anyone who might be interested in an exciting 2 to 3 year eLearning position in the Pacific Northwest.

Quality Matters = Quality Courses

Cindy — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 17:50:17 +0000

What’s the one tool every faculty member should have in their instructional tool box?

(Here’s a hint: it’s easy-to-use, and highly effective, for course design and review…)

It’s Quality Matters! The eLearning department at Tacoma Community College has created this well-produced 9 minute video about Quality Matters. Grab a cup of coffee and take the time to watch every minute of it!

(click for video) Enjoy the video!

Although QM was designed for review of online courses, the QM review rubric is quite helpful for designing face-to-face courses, as well.

You will learn about:
· QM Faculty Learning Communities
· How individual colleges are using QM
· Why we’re using QM in Washington State’s Open Course Library Project
· What makes QM effective in designing and reviewing online courses
· Using the QM rubric

Everyone in the CTC system may use the one page, condensed, QM rubric, which is posted on the State Board website. Also, each campus has 50 copies of the full length, annotated rubric.

Want to learn more about Quality Matters?

Contact Boyoung Chae, bchae@sbctc.edu or 360.704.1011. Boyoung would be happy to answer any questions and help you use QM!

At Clark College contact Kathy Chatfield, Senior Instructional Designer and QM Master Reviewer, kchatfield@clark.edu.

‘Open’ Those Textbooks, to Spokane, WA

Brendan — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:19:57 +0000

Spokane Community College Campus

Due to increasing demand for the Open Textbook Workshop in Seattle, there will now be another workshop held at Spokane Community College. The workshop will be on April 22th, starts at 10:00 am until 3:00pm. Lunch will be included.

To register, you must sign up for the Open Textbook Advocates and Trainers Ning, then join the Spokane WA Cohort Group to officially register for this workshop.

Faculty Elluminate Meeting

Brendan — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 17:41:22 +0000

Be at your computers on March 18, at 3-4:30, there will be an Elluminate session held to study the instructional design tool: Quality Matters.

Here is the Elluminate link. (just type in your name as you do not need a password)

https://sas.elluminate.com/site/external/launch/meeting.jnlp?password=M.CB2CB2664979AE8F3065444E874D4E

Course Shell Availability

Cindy — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 23:08:07 +0000

There has been a slight change in policy here in eLearning, which will affect the date that Blackboard course shells are made available to faculty each quarter. Our team has studied the reasoning behind the original model and the technical aspects involved, and we’ve come to the conclusion that an earlier shell build date would be worth trying since this would greatly benefit our faculty. The goal is to make the upcoming quarter’s shells available to faculty during finals week of the current quarter so that prep work can be done before the quarter break. Students will not be added to the shells until the mid-break enrollments change, as usual. As we assess the process results we may decide to adjust the shell build date policy again. You will see the modification reflected in our Faculty Blackboard Planner page and in Scott Coffie’s Systems Administrator quarterly email announcements as we implement this change, effective immediately.

‘Open’ your Textbooks, Please

Brendan — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 18:01:32 +0000

North Seattle College is hosting a Open Textbook Workshop on April 20, 2010, from 10-3, with lunch included. Come and join the effort in making textbooks more affordable. Become an advocate and trainer for Open Textbooks.

This event is sponsored by the Community College Open Textbook Project and The Washington State Board of Community And Technical Colleges (SBCTC) and free for all who want to attend. SBCTC is also offering to pay for mileage of those who are traveling more than 50 Miles to attend the event.

Advocates and Trainers will learn how to:

Foster interest in open textbooks
Assist faculty with discovering, selecting, and adopting open textbooks
Assist students in choosing a format (online, downloaded, printed, bound)
Work with all the stakeholders on campus including bookstore, print
shop, library, and administration
Provide feedback to the authors and educational community
Plan, market, and deliver an adoption workshop
Find textbook usage and costs on your campus

In addition to travel reimbursement, Advocates and Trainers will receive a $1,500 stipend to assist in their development, as well as to present a faculty workshop about Adopting Open Textbooks at their local college campus.

To register for the Seattle workshop and for information on becoming an Advocate and Trainer, and locations for other workshops please visit http://opentextbookadvocatetrainers.ning.com/.

Practice Your Ellumination

Brendan — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 22:35:20 +0000

Get some practice using the collaborative online web conferencing tool, Elluminate. There is a practice session, hosted by Shoreline Community College, happening on Wednesday, March 3, from 2-3 pm. Connect from your computer by clicking this Elluminate session link:

https://sas.elluminate.com/site/external/launch/meeting.jnlp?password=M.CB2CB2664979AE8F3065444E874D4E

No need for a password, just enter your name after you click the link.

Ticket, Please…

Scott — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 01:27:48 +0000

eLearning has a new resource available on Smart Penguin for students, faculty, and staff. Although Smart Penguin provides the solutions to, or the prevention of, most technical issues that Clark College Blackboard users may experience, things may still go awry. To help students and faculty get back to their online coursework more quickly, the tech support team in the eLearning Department now provides a system called Tech Ticket, which can be used to submit the details of a technical issue. In a series of short questions about their computing environment, online users can quickly convey some of the important keys needed for an accurate diagnosis. Tech Ticket then allows direct communication with eLearning tech support for improved collaboration and information exchange to aid a swift resolution. You can find the link to file a Tech Ticket in the sidebar on Smart Penguin’s main post page, among our links at the bottom of that page, or in the following post on Smart Penguin:

That’s the Ticket!

RFP Announcement for Washington Student Completion Initiative

Cindy — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:49:24 +0000

The Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) is pleased to announce the Student Completion Initiative.

Washington state community and technical colleges may submit grant proposals in one or all of the three of the following project areas: Open Course Library; Re-Thinking Pre-College Math; and I-BEST Model Expansion. All Clark College faculty members, full and part-time, are encouraged to: review the RFP, listen in on one of the Bidder’s Conferences, and explore the opportunity to participate in this important initiative.

Grant awards will be made based on a competitive process.

Grant applications became available on January 4, 2010. Faculty Course Designer Grant
Grant proposals are due on February 17, 2010.
Grant awards will be made by March 18, 2010.

The number of grant awards and the grant award amounts can be found in the Student Completion Initiative Overview on the SBCTC website.

Colleges are encouraged to participate in one or more of the Bidder’s Conferences scheduled for January 11 and January 15. Both ITV and Elluminate sessions will be scheduled on both days.

Clark College ITV group session will be held in the Cannell Library Monday January 11th at 9 AM and Friday January 15^th at 1:30 PM.

To participate in an Elluminate session, you will need to be at a computer with speakers and a microphone. Elluminate sessions will be recorded and can be accessed on the Student Completion Initiative web site after the live sessions.

Bidder’s Conference Schedule:

January 11: ITV in the Clark College Cannell Library
9:00 am       Introductions and Purpose
9:15 am     Open Course Library: Cable Green
10:15 am    Break
10:30 am     Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
11:15 am     Break
11:30 am     I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
12:15 pm     Conclusion

January 11: Elluminate Recording
1:30 pm       Introductions and Purpose
1:45 pm      Open Course Library: Cable Green
2:45 pm      Break
3:00 pm       Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
3:45 pm       Break
4:00 pm       I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
4:45 pm       Conclusion

==================

January 15: Elluminate Recording
9:00 am       Introductions and Purpose
9:15 am     Open Course Library: Cable Green
10:15 am    Break
10:30 am     Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
11:15 am     Break
11:30 am     I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
12:15 pm     Conclusion

January 15: ITV in the Clark College Cannell Library
1:30 pm       Introductions and Purpose
1:45 pm      Open Course Library: Cable Green
2:45 pm      Break
3:00 pm       Re-Thinking Pre-College Math: Bill Moore
3:45 pm       Break
4:00 pm       I-BEST Model Expansion: Tina Bloomer
4:45 pm       Conclusion

Please consider becoming involved in this major state-wide initiative! Additional grant documents are linked to this page under the heading Documents. Feel free to contact me in eLearning if you have questions or need assistance, if I don’t have the answers I will put you in touch with the people at SBCTC who do.

Cynthia Foreman, Associate Director of eLearning

Plan Blackboard

Scott — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 01:46:25 +0000

We now have a new page on The eLog called, “Faculty Blackboard Planner.” …You’ll find it in the page links above. It’s a Blackboard activities calendar where you can see what dates we have planned for various events such as quarter shell availability, when to use the Blackboard Gradebook tool to safely store your grades before the snapshot process removes that information, and many other timely events, most of which I will also make reference to in the usual email notifications. I will be posting dates in this planner as soon as they become known to us here in eLearning and I hope you find it useful. As always, be sure to let me know if you have any ideas or suggestions.

Webinar: Perspectives on Open Textbooks from Two WA Faculty Authors

Naomi — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 23:55:50 +0000

Join this Elluminate session* about Open Education Resources hosted by Cindy Foreman

Date: 11-18-09 (Wednesday)
Time: 3:00pm (Please plan to arrive 10 minutes early)
Location: Library Room 103 (will be via Elluminate)
Contact Info: Brendan Pust, x2012 or bpust at clark.edu

Part 1: “Open Textbooks from an Author’s Perspective” (30 min)

Bio: Robert Beezer is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, WA. He joined the faculty there in 1984 after receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. Besides advocating for open textbooks, he is also a developer for Sage, a comprehensive open-source program for mathematics.

What motivates someone to write an open textbook? How much of the editorial and production process is within reach of an individual? How is the experience different from writing a traditional textbook? What is different about teaching from an open textbook? I will answer these questions with examples from my experiences writing and publishing a mathematics textbook, “A First Course in Linear Algebra.”

Part 2: “Another Perspective on Authoring an Open Textbook” (30 min)

Bio: David Lippman is a professor of mathematics at Pierce College Ft Steilacoom, a community college in Lakewood, WA, where he has been teaching since 2000. He is best known in the Washington community college math circle as the guy who created WAMAP.org (aka IMathAS), a free, open-source online course management and math assessment system.

I’ll discuss my journey of writing an open textbook “Math in Society,” including my motivation, how existing open textbooks guided my decisions, using my students as guinea pigs, and my experience with the bookstore. I’ll share some general thoughts on openness and collaboration in textbooks that need consistency and accuracy, and some thoughts about license selection.

*Note: For those who missed it, you may view the recording…

Webinar: Perspectives on Open Textbooks from Two WA Faculty Authors

Course Redesign Project Gets a New Name!

Cindy — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:58:19 +0000

The project formerly under the heading of Online Course Access and Success and commonly referred to as the Course Redesign Project will now be called the “Open Course Library Project”. The purpose of the project is still the same, to redesign 80 existing high enrollment courses to use Open Educational Resources to improve affordability, accessibility, and student success.

The renaming came about in reaction to the first “town hall” Elluminate session held on November 4^th. The session was attended by well over 100 faculty, staff and administrators all across the state. There are three more Elluminate sessions to follow, so stay tuned for more updates and modifications to this project. The SBCTC has set up a wiki with current information about this project and they are being very clear that the information is all DRAFT and subject to revision.

http://opencourselibrary.wikispaces.com

If you would like to tune in to one or all of the remaining Elluminate sessions but are unsure how to do that, refer to our blog posting about Elluminate or contact the eLearning Department and we will be happy to assist you.

Washington State Student Completion Initiative

Cindy — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 03:47:15 +0000

SBCTC has secured one large grant covering four separate projects under the heading of Washington State Student Completion Initiative. All four projects are tied together under the heading of Retention and Student Success. From the eLearning perspective we fit into the first project – Online Course Access and Success. The goal is to redesign 80 courses to use Open Educational Resources (OER) to improve affordability, accessibility, and student success. The courses were selected on the basis of High Enrollment and Low Completion, with predominantly young students who are from lower income households. That is who the Gates Foundation is most interested in helping. He has targeted Community Colleges in four different states with similar programs. There is a list of 81 courses, 80 existing courses and 1 proposed course. Money from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will fund the first 25 courses, Ford Foundation and State money is being used to add the additional 56 courses. That list may be modified between now and the end of the calendar year.

Executive Summary

Full text of Grant

The basics = redesign these 81 courses so that they are taught using digital resources available for little or no cost to the students. Those redesigned courses will then be made available to the world-wide web. Instructors and students from anywhere in the world will be able to access these course materials to use as they see fit. Our own faculty members within the state of Washington will be able to access these course materials and use them as they see fit in online, hybrid or F2F classes.

Redesign Courses

There will be room for instructional designers, librarians, eLearning staff, bookstore administrators and others to participate in the redesign project alongside the faculty members who are chosen. The process for determining who will participate in the grant has not been finalized. There will be a series of informational sessions held via Elluminate over the next month. These sessions are open to whoever is interested in listening and/or participating. (If you have not ever used Elluminate please review the information posted by Scott and take advantage of a little advance training.)

Washington State Student Completion Initiative – Course Redesign Project “town hall” meetings:

Wednesday, November 4: 3:00 – 4:30pm
Monday, November 9: 10:00 – 11:30am
Tuesday, November 17: 1:00 – 2:30pm
Friday, December 4: 2:00 – 3:30pm

Elluminate recordings for all meetings: Open Course Library Wiki

What’s New in eLearning for the State of Washington?

Cindy — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 19:24:01 +0000

Read about the latest projects and developments coming from the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges in their quarterly Newsletter – The Browser. FALL09 EL Newsletter FINAL (2)

The Clark College eLearning team are following the Lecture Capture RFP very closely so that we will be set to take advantage of this new exciting technology as soon as it becomes available. I have previous experience with lecture capture using the Tegrity system. My online students found the video streamed mini-lectures a helpful addition to predominantly text-based course content.

Clark College has two Quality Matters certified courses: “Math 107 Math In Society” developed & taught by Jennifer Farney and “WS 201 Women Around the World” developed & taught by Ann Synder. Our eLearning Senior Instructional Designer Kathy Chatfield is a Certified Quality Matters Master Reviewer. Watch for upcoming Quality Matters training events throughout the year.

The new Gates Grant and course redesign project will require a series of posts! I have reviewed the entire grant and will be participating in a number of Elluminate sessions over the next two months. This is a major statewide project and Clark College will definitely want to be involved.

Stay tuned for more information!