Happy New Year from WCET - Top Blog Posts from 2013

December 31, 2013

WCET ends the year by looking back at the most popular blog posts from 2013 and in wishing you a very happy new year.  Our offerings that received the most views include…

Is Your Distance Education Course Actually a Correspondence Course?
Oddly enough, the most popular post was written in April 2012.  It covered the U.S. Department of Education’s definitions of “correspondence” vs. “distance” courses.  If you have too many of the former, then you might have an impact on your financial aid eligibility for your institution. The reason for the popularity is that this post was listed as a resource for a MOOC and some other courses regarding distance education.  There’s more to this story and we will probably follow-up in 2014.

State Authorization Continues to Attract Attention
Several posts on state authorization were viewed many times:

• “New State Authorization ‘Dear Colleague’ Letter NOT Focused on Distance Ed” and a follow-up post were among the most popular state authorization postings.  Even with the views on this post, I still talk to people every week who think that there is a July 1, 2014 federal deadline for state authorization for distance education programs. There is not.  I’ll be following up on what is covered in the July 1 deadline in the next few weeks.
• The announcement about the April 2013 national meeting on reciprocity and the highlights from that meeting drew lots of attention.
• “10 Steps You Can Take to Begin the State Authorization Process” is another 2012 oldie, but goodie as we are always being asked “where do I begin?”

And Where Would 2013 Be Without MOOCs!?!?
We asked for several guest opinions on MOOCs

• Chuck Wight’s “Are Your Arms Too Short to Teach a MOOC?” highlighted his experience in a cryptography MOOC as he considered what it might be like to teach such a course.
• David Cillay suggested that “It’s Time to Redirect the Conversation about MOOCs“.
• Pat James gave us practical advice on “Crafting an Effective MOOC: One Community College’s Experience.”
• Although they were not among the most popular on our site, “ACE’s First Review of MOOCs for Academic Credit” and the “Confessions of a MOOC Reviewer” received much notice on eCampusNews and other site.  They gave us keen insight into the process ACE used in reviewing MOOC courses for “credit-worthiness.”

Competency-based Education, CCRC Research, and the Cost of Online Courses

• We invited guest blog posts from some of the new pioneers of competency-based learning. Fred Hurst’s entry about Northern Arizona’s experience was the third most popular blog post for the entire year.
• I took issue with the findings of the Community College Research Center’s study in Washington state. They never contacted me, but I noted some of my wording appearing in later items that they wrote on this research.
• I also opined about “Should Online Courses Charge Less? It Doesn’t Just Happen“.

If you have suggestions for topics that you would like to see covered in 2014, let me know. We look forward to a great 2014 and wish you great luck in it.

Happy New Year!!

Russ Poulin
Deputy Director, Research & Analysis
WCET
rpoulin@wiche.edu

Photo credit:  Morgue File.