Author: Lindsey Rae Downs

Helping Students with Adaptive Learning: APLU and the University of Mississippi

By Lindsey Rae Downs

January 24, 2017

1 Comment

This week we welcome Patricia O’Sullivan, Manager of the University of Mississippi Personalized Learning & Adaptive Teaching Opportunities (PLATO) Program to give us news from the APLU adaptive courseware grant front. Adaptive courseware can positively impact student outcomes and the research UM and the PLC team at APLU are conducting will have a huge impact on student success. We’re so excited to have Patricia describe the background and implementation of this program. The attitude of the different groups working together to help students is very inspiring!

Enjoy!
~Lindsey Downs

Helping Students with Adaptive Learning: APLU and the University of Mississippi

Nearly a decade ago, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) made a commitment to support postsecondary success for low-income and first-generation college students. The BMGF seeks to remove barriers contributing to the education gap, including college readiness, affordability, and access. In 2014, The Foundation invested $20 million in The Next Generation Courseware Challenge. Educational technology companies selected for the challenge designed adaptive courseware to solve two problems in higher education: personalizing the learning experience for students in high-enrollment classes and scaling the personalized learning experience so it is available to thousands of students at the same time.

Research in the early stages of adaptive courseware adoption indicates that adaptive courseware used in blended courses (a mix of online and face-to-face) positively affects student outcomes. More research needs to be done, but adaptive courseware’s potential to make postsecondary education more accessible to low-income and first generation college students convinced the Gates Foundation to move forward with it.

BMGF Funds Adaptive Learning at Land-grant Universities

In 2015, the Gates Foundation awarded $4.6 million to the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) to support a program called Accelerating Adoption of Adaptive Courseware at Public Research Universities. An APLU team, led by Dr. Meaghan Duff, Executive Director of the Personalized Learning Consortium (PLC) at the APLU, developed a grant opportunity to assist universities implementing adaptive courseware in courses with high drop, withdrawal, and failure rates. Of the eight university recipients of the APLU adaptive courseware grant, six are WCET institutional members, including my own institution, the University of Mississippi (UM).

At UM, the APLU grant committee was spearheaded by Robert Cummings, Chair of the Department of Writing and Rhetoric, and included Chancellor Jeffrey Vitter, former Provost Morris Stocks, Interim Provost Noel Wilkin, Dean of Liberal Arts Lee Cohen, Assistant Dean of Liberal Arts Stephen Monroe, and Assistant Provost Tony Ammeter. Upon being awarded the grant, UM established the Personalized Learning & Adaptive Teaching Opportunities (PLATO) program to work with departments in the implementation of adaptive courseware. PLATO is housed in the College of Liberal Arts and supervised by Assistant Dean of Liberal Arts, Stephen Monroe.

Early Observations on Adaptive Learning at the University of Mississippi

With the grant goals in mind, UM will pilot six courses using adaptive courseware in 2017: college algebra, statistics, trigonometry, biology for non-majors, first-year writing, and chemical concepts. We are in early days of the grant program, but I’d like to highlight three observations.

Instructor-rank Faculty are Key to Success. First, the majority of UM faculty currently participating in the grant are instructors, not tenure-track or tenured faculty. These instructors have asked important questions of the administration and of courseware suppliers to ensure the pilots run smoothly for students. They are developing courses, training to use the courseware, and engaging in communities of practice. Supporting our instructor-rank faculty is critical to the grant’s success.

General Education Faculty Eager to Personalize Learning. Second, I’ve found UM’s general education faculty eager for solutions to the problems that prompted the grant: high failure rates and low student engagement in large, lecture classes. The task of teaching thousands of students each semester is immense, and personalizing the general education learning environment for students has been a challenge. By partnering with suppliers who participated in the Next Generation Courseware Challenge, departments are able to maximize the use of limited resources to bring personalized learning to our students.

Working Together, Universities Accomplish More. Finally, the APLU adaptive courseware grant has generated both formal and informal inter-university cooperation to effectively implement the courseware. The APLU has set up regular meetings between the eight universities so we can support each other and share resources. In addition, early adopters of adaptive learning at the University of Central Florida, Colorado Technical University, Arizona State University, University of Maryland University College, and American Public University System have been exceedingly generous of their time and expertise in helping those of us who are new to it. This kind of inter-university cooperation is not generated by excitement over the technology, although there is plenty of that sentiment among us. What stirs our passions is working together to create solutions for post-secondary students who want higher education, but face obstacles outside of the ‘traditional student’ model. The face of the typical college student is rapidly changing as is her experience of college. If higher education wants to continue to drive educational and economic progress, it is imperative to find solutions to educational barriers.

Adaptive Learning Focuses Us on Improving Student Success

Adaptive learning gives students a personalized learning experience tailored to their individual knowledge base. Using data from adaptive learning courseware, instructors are alerted to class-wide trouble spots in the curriculum, allowing them to target their instruction to those areas in which students need the most help. In addition, early on in the semester, well before the first high-stakes exam, instructors can see which students are falling behind, and intervene to keep students on track.

If we’ve learned anything from student support services, it is that lack of college readiness and financial struggles are key indicators for students failing classes and not completing their degree. If we can address college readiness through adaptive courseware, and work with publishers and EdTech suppliers to offer courseware at reasonable costs to students, we are on the right track.

At the heart of the APLU adaptive courseware grant is students, not technology. Although it has shown promise, adaptive courseware may not be a panacea for the problems of readiness, access, and affordability. Regardless, the grant has led those of us using adaptive courseware to form communities both on our campuses and across the nation to raise awareness of the education gap and to work for solutions to it.

Patricia O’Sullivan,
Manager of the PLATO Program
University of Mississippi

Adaptive/Personalized Learning, Collaboration/Community, Faculty, Student Success

Practice

Do Closed Captions Help Students Learn?

By Lindsey Rae Downs

December 14, 2016

5 Comments

This week we are happy to welcome Dr. Katie Linder, Oregon State University Ecampus, as our guest blog post author. Dr. Linder is here to discuss a national research project on student use of closed captions and transcriptions. The important results show that while these resources are not yet widely available, many students, even those who may not need these resources as an accommodation, are able to use transcriptions and captions to increase their success. Thank you Dr. Linder for bringing these important results to our attention!

Enjoy the read,
-Lindsey Downs

Recently, the Oregon State University Ecampus Research Unit completed a national research project in which we surveyed students on their use of closed captions and transcripts to support learning. This study was conducted in collaboration with the closedcaptioning company 3Play Media. We focused on a broad population of students from 15 colleges and universities who both need these resources for academic accommodation for disability, as well as students who choose to use these resources for access and learning purposes. About 50% of those who responded take most of their courses online.

What We Learned on Student Use of Closed Captions

This data set is one of the first we have that tells us more about how students use closed captions and transcripts in academic environments. Here are some of the things we learned:

Closed captions are still not being made widely available. When asked in the survey how many videos in their courses had closed captioning or transcripts as an option, only 30% of respondents reported that closed captions were available for “all,” “most,” or “many” videos. Almost an equal number (a combined 26.7%) said that closed captions were available for “just a few” or for “none” of the videos in their courses. Over one quarter of respondents were unsure about the availability of closed captions (27%).
Transcripts are even less available to students than closed captions. Only 12.2% of students surveyed reported that transcripts were available for “all,” “most,” or “many” videos and 61% said that transcripts were available for “just a few” or for “none” of the videos in their courses. One in five survey respondents were not sure about the availability of transcripts (18.4%).
When they are made available as resources, students are using closed captions and transcripts to help them learn. When we asked about how students use these tools, their qualitative responses showed that they are using both tools as learning aids. In the case of closed captions, qualitative comments mentioned using them as a learning aid 75% of the time. In the case of transcripts, qualitative comments mentioned using them as a learning aid 85% of the time. More specifically, students use these tools to help with accuracy, comprehension, retention, and engagement.
Students with and without disabilities are using closed captions and transcripts. When we looked just at the group of students who did not identify as having a hearing impairment or deafness, over 70% of that group were using closed captions at least some of the time. The study clearly shows that closed captions are not just being used by those who need them for disability accommodation purposes.

What Barriers are there for Closed Caption and Transcript Use?

The study also helped us to identify some “hindrances” that students associate with closed captions and transcripts. Here are some of the most common:

Closed captions are distracting or required too much cognitive load. This was the top hindrance shared in 41% of the qualitative comments on hindrances and students mostly mentioned that their attention strayed to the text rather than the visuals in the video.
Closed captions include incorrect information. This was the second highest hindrance cited in about 35% of the comments. In particular, survey respondents mentioned things like typos or captions being incorrectly synced with the audio.
Closed captions block important information. Mentioned in about 32% of the qualitative comments, this hindrance was tied to the design of captions and their placement within the videos.

In the case of transcripts, there was some overlap in the hindrance cited by survey respondents:

Transcripts are distracting from the video or visual cues or required too much attention or cognitive load. Almost half of survey respondents who offered qualitative comments noted this hindrance.
Transcripts include incorrect information such as typos, are not well-written, or are not formatted well. About one in five respondents who provided qualitative comments found the lack of accuracy or poor formatting to be a hindrance.
Transcripts are too long, are too much to read, or require too much time. About 12% of the qualitative comments focused on this hindrance.
Transcripts are costly and/or inconvenient to print out and carry around. Approximately one in ten students noted this hindrance.

One of the most important things to note is that most of these hindrances are fixable with a strong quality assurance process for the creation of closed captions and transcripts.

Get the Full Report

Interested in learning more about our findings? The full student study report is available for download at 3Play Media’s website. While you’re there, you might also want to check out a second study we completed with 3Play Media on closed captioning implementation at U.S. institutions of higher education.

Dr. Katie Linder
Research Director
Oregon State University E-campus

Access, Accessibility, Digital Learning, Disabilities, Faculty, Managing Digital Learning, Student Success, Survey, Teaching

Uncategorized

Virtually Inspired Website Showcases Practical Innovations

By Lindsey Rae Downs

December 8, 2016

1 Comment

This week we welcome Dr. Susan Aldridge, President of Drexel University Online, and Marci Powell, Chair Emerita of the U.S. Distance Learning Association, to discuss Drexel’s success in teaching and learning in virtual environments. Their story is not only “virtually inspired” and, in my opinion, just plain old inspiring as well! Thank you both for a great post,

~Lindsey Downs

Having spent the past two decades working in the online higher education space, I am proud of the progress we’ve made since the early days when course modules were little more than a series of hand-outs published and delivered online. Back then, virtual study was, for the most part, a lonely (and shall we say, somewhat boring) experience, due, in part, to the read-only, chat or talking head video formats. Still, for many, it was an acceptable tradeoff for the privilege of learning from anywhere, at any time.

Now fast forward 20 years and we find ourselves with an amazing array of interactive technologies at our disposal. Technologies that can further empower us to provide our students with what research over the years has proven to be an ideal learning experience – one that is engaging and customized, authentic and measurable. And when we succeed, our students win, because they leave us having cultivated the expert knowledge and complex skills requisite for their success.

Of course, we really need to share those success stories more often. Because as empowering as these technologies may be, they are constantly evolving; and unfortunately, we have yet to produce much in the way of a “how-to” guide for effectively implementing, much less optimizing, them. So in the spirit of collaborative investigation, Drexel University Online (DUO) – with my (Marci) help as an outside consultant – launched a rigorous research project, to uncover “pockets of innovation” in the technology-enhanced education arena.

Pulling the research together

After conducting dozens of interviews with faculty, administrators, and training officers worldwide, DUO compiled more than 70 case studies that exemplify virtual success in using some of the latest and greatest technologies to support an ideal learning experience. But we didn’t stop there. We created a website we are calling Virtually Inspired. Our goal is to showcase some of the brightest minds and best practices in connected learning, and also building and sharing an evolving repository of replicable ideas.

Virtually Inspired features a series of high-quality videos that highlight some of the many ways educators are inventing the future of connected learning. Likewise, this website will incorporate interviews with online learning experts; a section for visitors to share their own leading-edge practices; and a space for reviewing published books and articles in the field – all of which is designed to encourage ongoing collaboration, as we explore the ever-expanding frontiers of our profession.

Here is a sneak preview of three especially promising technologies we identified in our research: virtual reality, holography, and robotic telepresence.

Creating virtual worlds for real learning

For years, educators have touted the many educational benefits of authentic learning experiences like internships and apprenticeships, when it comes to mastering expert knowledge and complex skills. But with increasingly sophisticated skills to learn, these in-personal experiences no longer suffice on their own. That’s why instructional designers are embracing virtual reality (VR) to enhance and, in some cases, replace them altogether, with multi-level, sensory-rich simulations and videogames.

Put simply, these VR enhancements allow students to perfect mission-critical or even life-threatening skills, by immersing themselves in a safe, but challenging environment, where they apply relevant knowledge, while considering multiple perspectives and practicing different responses. Likewise, these virtual worlds generate a tremendous amount of data to use in assessing performance and customizing instruction. And because they usually incorporate some sort of immediate feedback or reward, they stimulate the release of dopamine in the brain, which, in turn promotes greater engagement and better knowledge recall, over time. Take Tina Jones, for example, an avatar developed by Shadow Health, that we use at Drexel’s College of Nursing and Health Professions to help online nursing students sharpen their clinical practice skills from a distance. This 29-year-old virtual patient responds just like any real-life patient, offering a unique chance for students to perform high-stakes, full-system, patient assessments – over and over, if necessary. Their instructors observe the interaction online, using videoconferencing applications to provide face-to-face feedback around targeted areas for improvement.

Adding new dimensions with holography

Holography offers yet another great opportunity to engage students in interactive learning experiences and environments that are authentic, measurable and customized. A hologram is essentially a three-dimensional, free-standing image, created with photographic projection and viewed with the help of special headsets or other wearable devices. And with a little imagination, this technology can be used to enhance all sorts of learning activities.

For instance, holography can take videoconferencing to a physical level, by facilitating remote collaboration among students, faculty, and experts worldwide, in what feels like face-to-face interaction. Students can also use holograms to conduct science experiments that are too dangerous, expensive, or complicated to perform in real life; or to complete a design project in three dimensions that can be reproduced on a 3D printer. Educators are also employing holography for hosting virtual field trips, enabling students to “visit” a national park or a natural history museum far from where they live.

With the help of a Microsoft Hololens headset, professors at Case Western Reserve University are transforming how students learn about the human body, a hands-on academic exercise that has always required physical labs and human cadavers. But using three-dimensional holograms, they can now cut into a virtual human body to explore, experience and understand the intricacies of and connections among all of its systems – organ and skeletal, vascular and nervous – something that is much harder to teach without this digital enhancement.

Connecting students through robotic telepresence

Although videoconferencing has long been the “go-to” for connected learning experiences among students, faculty, and outside experts, robotic telepresence offers an even more effective way to personalize the interaction – particularly from a social or collaborative learning perspective.

In fact, independently mobile telebots (as telepresence robots are often called) add that all-important in-person dimension to hands-on learning activities that would normally require a physical or onsite presence. Just ask the Duke University’s School of Nursing, where these amazing digital devices are paving the way for students in the fully online MS in Nursing program to work remotely with students in the campus-based Accelerated BS in Nursing program, as they engage in high fidelity, life-like clinical simulations.

Using their tablets, computers, or smartphones to remotely control the robot, online graduate student preceptors can maneuver it around the room, while panning or tilting the iPad screen in basically any direction, to provide clinical guidance – from a distance – to onsite undergraduate students. Equally important, they are all mastering the art of telemedicine, as they practice furnishing remote healthcare without losing that essential face-to-face patient connection.

Looking Ahead

Given the lightning speed with which technologies such as these are moving into the mainstream of academia, there is no doubt that the future of connected learning is well within our collective power to invent. And in joining forces to create that future, we hope you will help us make Virtually Inspired both an ongoing source of ideas and a nexus for collaboration.

You may reach us at info@virtuallyinspired.org.

Dr. Susan Aldridge,
President, Drexel University Online

Marci M. Powell,
Chair Emerita and Past President, U.S. Distance Learning Association

Research, Virtual/Augmented Reality

Practice

The Impact of Adaptive Learning on CTU’s Culture

By Lindsey Rae Downs

November 30, 2016

1 Comment

This week we welcome Niki Bray, WCET Adaptive Learning Fellow, to discuss the impact of adaptive learning at CTU. I loved reading this post from Niki, especially the focus on one of our 2016 WOW Award Winners! For more on CTU’s adaptive learning programs watch Niki’s interview with Connie Johnson and Judy Komar from Colorado Technical University, which we’ve included at the end of the blog. Thank you Niki for this great post highlighting the outstanding work happening at CTU.

~Lindsey Downs

Adaptive Learning with CTU

In May, I had the opportunity to travel to Schaumburg, Illinois to visit Colorado Technical University’s Chief Academic Officer and Provost, Dr. Connie Johnson, with the aim of learning what makes CTU’s adaptive learning program so successful. To date, over 32,000 students have completed at least one of CTU’s 100+ adapted courses. Connie says what motivates CTU’s administration and faculty are student outcomes. Seeing the impact adaptive learning is having on the student’s experience and their success has permeated the entire culture at CTU. During my visit, I spoke mainly with administrators and staff who’s behind-the-scenes role has been vital to the success of adaptive learning at CTU. Every person I spoke with was excited about adaptive learning and its impact on the lives of CTU students.

Adaptive Learning and Culture

While we never discussed culture specifically, how adaptive learning has shaped CTU’s academic culture was vividly clear. Connie gave me a tour of CTU’s campus support center, and I had the privilege of meeting numerous individuals who work tirelessly to support CTU’s adaptive learning efforts. Everyone I spoke with was enthusiastic about adaptive learning and agreed it was a transformative force at CTU.

“Adaptive learning really lets students be in control and is personalized to the student experience on how they’re going to best learn and achieve what they want to out of the course.”
–Dr. Doug Stein, Vice-Provost, CTU

“Adaptive learning has provided our students with a really great venue to learn across the scope of several different courses in a way that not only challenges them but is also adaptive to where they are in their learning.”
-Dr. Stacia Klasen, Director of Academic Operations, CTU

“Adaptive learning has been a great engagement learning tool for students. They are getting that immediate feedback so they are encouraged as they’re going through and learning the material. It helps motivate them to keep continue within the adaptive learning system, which has been really great. From a faculty perspective, watching my students want to keep striving to improve.”
– Director of Learning Solutions, CTU

“Adaptive learning is a progressive, up-to-date fascinating tool that not only puts learning in greater perspective for our students. We have a lot of students who are coming back and haven’t been in classes for a very, very long time. It gives them the opportunity to get in touch with not only their learning style but to reorient themselves with learning. Adaptive learning has helped a lot of our students to get back into the frame of learning. Most of the classes I have taught have used adaptive learning and all of our students have found it really fascinating. It has its slight drawbacks because students don’t expect as much intensity, in terms of the learning, and some of them coming back, it takes them a minute to get into that mindset. Other than that, fantastic!”
– Dr. Bright Justice, Lead Doctoral Faculty, CTU

“From the student advising perspective, adaptive learning tends to pull students further along than they intend. With adaptive, it kind-of pulls you through the process so that the more you figure out that you already know or the more that you learn the more that you want to do. So, it kind-of keeps you connected to it and makes it more interesting than just going into a book and finding interesting facts and regurgitating it. That’s what’s been really helpful, at least for our students especially as we try to get them to engage earlier. If we get them started on a Monday, they tend to do so much more as opposed to waiting until the weekend. A lot of our students are coming back to something like this and it’s online and it can be difficult for students to adapt to that.”
– Jack Lewandowski VP Student Affairs, CTU

“Adaptive learning enhances the student’s learning experience. One advantage is that students get to see their progress immediately. It helps students drive a lot of their education pursuits. And it has proven to be an effective learning tool for students.”
– University Dean, College of Business and Management

CTU administrators and faculty have published numerous articles describing the impact of adaptive learning on their faculty and how faculty support for adaptive learning has driven student success (Educause Review). Additionally, CTU has won numerous awards for their work around adaptive learning, including a WCET WOW award in 2014. The reason CTU has had success with adaptive learning is due to support from administration and staff. While innovation in teaching is often championed from the bottom up, top down support for innovation is essential to bringing it to scale. The value of adaptive learning brings to students is well-documented, but at CTU, adaptive learning is shaping their institutional culture as well.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgELDAL1XIk&w=560&h=315]

photo of niki bray
Niki Bray
WCET Fellow, Adaptive Learning
Instructor|Instructional Designer
School of Health Studies
University of Memphis
@adaptivechat

Adaptive/Personalized Learning, Student Success, WOW Award

Practice

Education & Family Life: An Interview with a Portmont College Student

By Lindsey Rae Downs

November 17, 2016

This summer before transitioning from WCET to APUS, I had the opportunity to interview Adina Martinez, who was a student at a progressive institutional upstart, Portmont College at Mount St. Mary’s. Portmont was run in conjunction with My College Foundation and at the academic helm was Dr. Vernon Smith, now my APUS colleague. It is a small world. Much has changed since Adina attended the program, it is no longer offered as Portmont College but the insights Adina shares are evergreen. We’ve also included several short videos Portmont made of Adina discussing her time as a student.

It’s stories like Adina’s that help us remember why we’re here, why we are a part of the WCET community so committed to finding new ways for students to succeed by using technology effectively.

Enjoy this interview!
-Cali Morrison

Interview with Adina Martinez

Adina: I grew up here in Colorado. All of my family is from here and I had a son when I was 18, so right at the end of my senior year of high school. I went to work right away. I started off as a file clerk at a credit union and within a couple of months I moved up to becoming a loan processor. And I did that for about a year and a half, but just never really felt satisfied with that. It wasn’t something that I enjoyed doing.

photo of a smiling Adina who is about 31 years old with shoulder-length hair — Adina Martinez

I had always disliked my hair growing up, because I have a lot of hair. It’s very thick, it’s kind of in-between curly and straight, so it’s got a wave to it but I can’t do either – I can’t wear it straight without effort and I can’t wear it curly without effort so I just never liked it. And I never liked the haircut that I got. So I started cutting my own hair and doing things to it when I was about 14 and when I was 20 or so, after I had left the credit union, I decided that I wanted to go to cosmetology school. My personal experience is what led me to that. For the last 12 or so years I’ve been in that profession. So that’s how I met Vernon. I’ve been focused on men’s grooming, men’s hair-cutting for the last six years and so he was a client of mine for a few years.

Cali: That’s great! So, through that, as most stylists do, you get to know your client. You got to know him while he was working at Portmont, which was based in Denver, CO?

Adina: Correct. He had moved to Denver, I believe, to take on the challenge of starting that online program and that’s when I met him. We have a membership program which is a better value at our high-end barber shop. Vernon took part in that right away which means I saw him every two weeks, allowing us to get to know each other pretty well.

Cali: Through that relationship you learned of Portmont?

Adina: Yes.

Cali: What intrigued you first about the program or was there, aside from meeting Vernon, was there something else? Had you been looking to go back to college?

Adina: At that time I wasn’t actively looking into going back to school. Throughout my adult life—I had always had an interest in nursing. I basically fell in love with the idea of nursing with the experience of having my oldest son because I had never really been in a hospital or anything like that before. I’d certainly never been a patient. And I just felt the entire experience and watching how the nurses interacted with each and with me as a patient and my family, I just thought it was the coolest thing ever. Especially labor and delivery—just being a part of a person’s life, one of the most significant times in a person’s life, it intrigued me. It’s something I’ve always thought of and always said that’s what I want to do. But just being a young mom and things like that, it seemed like such a big commitment to make, you know, time-wise, money-wise, all of that. That’s why I never really thought that I could do it before.

But it was something that from time to time throughout the years I would go and take some classes that would put me on the track towards some sort of degree in the medical field. At one time I thought maybe I’ll for medical assisting or go for a lower level like an LPN nurse or something like that. But, again, I just felt I’ll always have my kids and my family and felt like I was taking away from that. And that’s kind of why I always put it off and I was never successful. I was also married to the father of my two boys and he wasn’t discouraging at all but he definitely wasn’t encouraging and he wasn’t as supportive as I needed somebody to be to be successful. Because it is a challenge when you have a family to take care of.

When Vernon and I first started talking, he was really excited about Portmont and everything that it was about. And I did everything that I could for him– leaving flyers at my station at work and talking to people about it. But originally I believe they were targeting kids that were about to come out of high school and thought that maybe traditional college was not for them. So this was supposed to be an alternate route.

Somewhere along the line they decided to kind of change it up and he said they were going to try to target more of the adult learners. And that’s where the conversation started a bit more. One time we were talking about my son or just education and things like that in general. And he threw out some statistic, and I don’t remember the exact numbers but it was basically a very high percentage of kids that go on to college straight out of high school and are successful is dependent on the fact of whether or not their mother has a college degree. And that really just struck me, that’s what got me started.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmw1PbTqaSA&w=560&h=315]

Cali: So, Portmont allowed you to get started? They didn’t have a nursing degree, did they?

Adina: No, they didn’t. Their degrees were all associate degrees. I believe they had liberal arts, business, and then science or pre-health degree. I went that route and it basically sets you up with all of the prerequisites that you need pretty much to enter any realm of health care, whether it’s veterinary school or nursing or even trying to get into med school.

Cali: Awesome. And then it sounds like you’ve gone on from there?

Adina: Yeah, I’m about to enter my second quarter in nursing school.

Cali: That’s great. And now, are you doing that face-to-face, online?

Adina: It’s in-class. Every now and then—this quarter, coming up, I have a couple of classes that are online and three of them that are in class. So, I’m pretty excited because I feel like I have somewhat of an advantage amongst my classmates because I did my entire associate degree online so I kind of know the format and the commitment that it takes. Because I think it’s really hard to basically be a self-learner and I feel like that’s what a lot of online is.

Cali: Yeah, you have to have that self-motivation and discipline.

Adina: The way that I’ve experienced it and I’ve seen others—my dad’s taking classes, college courses, online now too. In both of our schools you have assigned reading and assignments that are due and things like that, but it’s not like you have to log in at 10 p.m. on Mondays or there’s not a certain time, so it definitely takes a lot of self-discipline.

Cali: What has helped you be successful in your studies?

Adina: One of the things that really helped and I think is helping me to be successful now on this journey in nursing school is the online format gave me what I felt like an option to try and be successful. I have four kids. They range in age from 15 to a year and a half. So I actually found out that I was expecting my youngest, the baby, a few months after I had started at Portmont. It came down to, I could use that, the fact that I was having another baby, as an excuse to say now’s not the right time, again. Or I could continue with the mindset that I already had and just say we’ll work through it and we’ll get through it somehow. So that’s what I decided to do. Being able to learn online was huge for me because while it’s still a time sacrifice but if I needed to step away from the computer to make dinner or just to give some attention to my family, I was able to. That was a big reason why I decided to pursue my education, because it felt like I could fit it into my family life.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fcwe2tBbrdQ&w=560&h=315]

Check out these other videos with Adina discussing her Portmont journey:

Thank you again, Adina for sharing your insights with us and we look forward to seeing you at a Metro-area hospital, taking great care of patients, in the near future.

Cali M.K. Morrison, M.Ed., Ed.D. candidate
Director, Alternative Learning
American Public University System
cmorrison@apus.edu
@calimorrison

Distance Education, Online Learning, Student Success, Workforce/Employment

Practice

Meet Maura, A Virtual Intelligent Agent Answering Student Services Questions

By Lindsey Rae Downs

November 10, 2016

1 Comment

In the spring semester of 2013, American Sentinel University was experiencing the welcomed issue of high student traffic. The university had back-to-back years of significant growth in enrollment, and new degree program requirements were being implemented in the spring, naturally creating curiosity among the student population. While we encourage and are happy to talk with our students and give them the answers they need, at the time the bandwidth of our student success advisors was beginning to be stretched thin.

Coincidentally, the success of Apple’s Siri had become mainstream. A team within our university, including then-Chief Academic Officer John Bourne and former advisor-turned instructional designer Trevor Rasmusson, were conceptualizing how similar technology could benefit our students’ experience.

The result, a virtual intelligent agent: Maura (My Anytime University Resource Aide)

Their idea: A virtual intelligent agent, complete with a face and a voice, who lived inside university webpages and could answer the questions of American Sentinel University students. Day or night. Weekdays and weekends. 365 days a year

Introduced to our students in September 2013, Maura’s avatar appeared on our registration site as well as the login page for our classroom. And while Maura received a rather warm welcome from our students (an objective analysis based on the higher than expected questions/inputs that Maura received in her first few days of going live), she did not go without some hiccups in this implementation stage.

The first, and arguably most disadvantageous, obstacle was the agent’s response accuracy. Since most student questions previously came in the form of emails and phone calls, there was no conceivable way to catalog all questions our students could ask Maura. Therefore, Rasmusson and a team of student success advisors relied on their experience working with students to generate the content for Maura. Many of the agent’s responses were specific to frequently asked questions, such as how to register for a class to the steps necessary to complete a graduation audit. And while these questions were accounted for when Maura went live, it was impossible to anticipate all the questions (not to mention how they would be asked) our students would ask. Therefore, Maura began at a rather low response accuracy rate (around 40%).

We also had to work on acceptance from Maura’s human colleagues

This lead to a second problem: Lack of buy-in within the university. In seeing the low success rate Maura began at, there was understandable skepticism among staff and faculty as to whether this resource was advantageous to the student experience.

So, to enhance Maura’s response accuracy as well as her overall value to the university, we conducted an extensive audit process. We needed a log of as many possible questions Maura could be asked in order to create appropriate responses. We reached out to faculty and advisors, asking them to take student questions they have received and ask those to Maura. We asked for students to challenge Maura with university-related questions they could think of. These, along with other live questions our agent received, helped us to generate a much more extensive catalog of questions that Maura could accommodate for. With this, Maura was able to learn a lot in a short period, building her knowledge base to over 500 unique responses and raising her response accuracy rate to around the 80% mark.

Maura has grown and continues to learn

Since then, we review the log of questions Maura receives on a weekly basis to continue to help her learn. To make these necessary revisions, our team uses Artie™, a product of Healthcare Learning Innovations that allows users to create and revise virtual intelligent agents from scratch. While the 100% response accuracy rate may be an unachievable goal, we now proudly point to Maura’s two years of functioning at over 90% accuracy and happily call her a member of the American Sentinel family.

Gregory Dennis
Manager, Writing Center
American Sentinel University

Artificial Intelligence, Innovation, Technology, Virtual/Augmented Reality

Uncategorized

Six Ideas to Innovate Higher Ed Conferences

By Lindsey Rae Downs

November 2, 2016

3 Comments

Leading up to the 2016 Annual Meeting, the WCET team and Steering Committee discussed making future conferences more of an experience that includes facilitated discussions, loosely organized conversations around key edtech topics, and other session types to make the event more interactive and the content more timely. Carolyn’s recommendations support this thinking. We thank Carolyn for her thoughtful recommendations and also invite your ideas.

~Lindsey Downs

It’s Time to Innovate the Conference Experience

A recent Inside Higher Ed blog post by Joshua Kim argued that it might be time to kill the conference panel. Having just come from WCET’s annual meeting, I agree that it’s time to re-envision academic conferences. Don’t misunderstand. The WCET conference was a very good experience. In fact, it was the best conference I’ve been to in about three years. But the pace of change in higher education is too great for traditional conference models. It’s time to innovate the conference experience.

“Innovation” is Happening Now

Consider an upcoming conference on “innovations in blended and online learning.” The call for proposals closes this week, a full five months before the April conference. This is a standard time lapse and allows for the practical realities of putting together a conference, but it also argues against the very concept of “innovation.” With the way things are changing in our industry, information that was ready for public viewing five months ago is likely to be outdated today.

Even the best conferences suffer from one of two kinds of presentations: those that have stale information and those that promised more than they deliver. No matter how we try to maneuver in the traditional conference model, we end up with many sessions that fall squarely into one of these two categories. The more we try to address stale information, the more we risk hearing from people who thought several months ago that their project would be interesting to hear about today. Some of these proposals pan out; others do not.

My Six Ideas

Unfortunately, seeing the problems is easier than figuring out the solutions, but here are six ideas to support innovative conference design:

Allow presenters to propose flexible topic ideas. Trust your presenters to bring the best information to table once the time comes.
Support more working and interest groups where attendees can work together to solve current challenges in our industry.
Encourage much more social media use of all kinds. We have only begun to explore the ways Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms can be used to support interaction among attendees. Use social media to highlight and validate disagreement and dissent instead of limiting conference re-Tweets to compliments.
Support lasting connections among your attendees. “Networking” is not enough. What can conferences do to help attendees take the next steps to really get to know each other professionally?
Make it much easier to access and share conference presentations before, during, and after they are given. Too many conferences put that material behind a pay wall or bury it in an app. Push out all conference content as much as possible before all that content is too old to matter.
Support a conference “pot luck” where attendees can each bring an idea/product/solution they want to share with others in the industry. Provide a free thumb drive or Dropbox folder to make sharing easy.

As I see it, in order to innovate higher ed conferences, we need to take the focus off of information and put it on the people. Experience supports this paradigm shift. Who among us hasn’t been in a presentation where the audience knew more than the presenter? This isn’t a problem. It’s a solution. The way forward is one where conferences serve to bring us together to innovate in real time. Anything less is yesterday’s news.

What innovations would you suggest? What conference activities have you found to be fruitful?

Carolyn I. Speer
Manager of Instructional Design and Technology
Wichita State University

WCET Annual Conference

Practice

University of Nebraska System Makes Its Website Marketing Online Offerings Sing

By Lindsey Rae Downs

October 27, 2016

Thank you to WCET members University of Nebraska and Ranku for today’s post. The University of Nebraska Online Worldwide was seeking a solution for a user-friendly web tool enabling prospective students to search the offerings of the four system institutions. They picked Ranku, a Wiley Brand, as the solution to best fit their needs.

Enjoy the post,
Lindsey Downs

Overview

Created in 2009, the University of Nebraska Online Worldwide is a university-wide initiative with the primary goal of pulling together the collective strength of the four University of Nebraska (NU) campuses in the area of online education to provide increased access to a quality education for Nebraska residents and to people throughout the world.

In order to provide prospective students with a single destination for finding information about all NU online programs, in 2010 NU Online Worldwide launched a centralized website: online.nebraska.edu. This site offers students a consistent search experience to quickly find a program of interest.

The Challenge

After an initial few years of increasing traffic to the website and positive lead generation, changes in search engine algorithms and shifting student search behavior and preferences began to catch up to the NU Online Worldwide website and negatively impact these key performance indicators. NU Online Worldwide needed to make major changes to its website, and do so quickly.

The Strategy

In the summer of 2015, NU Online Worldwide partnered with Ranku, a Wiley Brand, a leader in online student recruitment technology, to redesign the NU Online Worldwide website. Objectives of the redesign included updating the site to a responsive, user-friendly, SEO-centric and lead generation-focused design with a powerful analytics backend.

All aspects of the new site revolve around optimal user experience leading to lead generation. A clear emphasis was placed on displaying the depth and breadth of program offerings and quickly getting users to a program page. The homepage was overhauled with a prominent degree level filter and keyword search box, along with an interactive subject area tile feature giving users multiple ways to find their program of choice.

Once on a program page, users can easily scan key information with the introduction of the program highlights ribbon. State authorization status by program is displayed on the Admissions and Requirements tab so prospective students have this information as they enter the recruitment funnel. Programs are consistently organized with information pertinent to adult online students and content is optimized for organic search.

Information request and ‘Apply Now’ buttons have been strategically placed on the site to encourage prospective students to submit contact information.

With the introduction of campus icons, the redesign makes a distinct connection between programs and their corresponding campus, something that had caused undue confusion for prospective students in the past.

“We had taken the first step by creating a ‘one-stop-shop’ website for prospective students to research all the online programs offered by the four campuses of the University of Nebraska,” said Mary Niemiec, Associate Vice President for Digital Education and Director of NU Online Worldwide. “The Ranku design took that concept to the next level by creating a clean, user-friendly interface that provides the kind of sophisticated search experience web users have come to expect in other areas of life.”

The Results

The foundation of the NU Online Worldwide-Ranku marketplace was based on an analysis of historical inquires and live-data patterns. By centering the design and function on the prospective student’s experience, NU Online Worldwide is able to convert significantly more of their organic traffic to inquiries. Now, the search for a degree for prospective online degree is more akin to a digital shopping experience than reading a brochure.

By redesigning NU Online Worldwide’s website and developing a data tool to provide insight and actionable information on key performance indicators, NU Online Worldwide has surpassed its goals and significantly increased inquiries from potential online students. The partnership has been very successful in converting more of NU Online Worldwide’s most valuable source of traffic— organic traffic. Average monthly traffic has doubled since launch and monthly inquiry growth increased nearly 200%.

Ranku’s analytics have helped NU Online Worldwide identify programs to scale based on demand, and highlighting the essential role that lead nurturing plays in the enrollment management funnel. Recruiting online degree students is incomparable to recruiting campus students due to the significant difference in demographics. As a result, the strategy for recruiting online students must be adjusted to account for the ways in which this population of students obtain and use information.

NU Online Worldwide has further leveraged website data by integrating information into their Customer Relations Management (CRM) system, enabling university leaders to make better data-driven decisions, which has exponentially improved the ability to strategically market to and recruit this unique demographic.

The positive impact of improving a university’s ability to recruit online students cannot be overstated. Currently, more than 35 million adults started, but have not completed their college degree. Many of these people are seeking a way to achieve their goal of obtaining a degree in higher education, while continuing to work and provide for their financial needs. Often, prospective students seeking information about online programs become frustrated and confused by the fractured network of campus sites which often are not clearly labeled as offering programs online or on-campus. In many cases, when these prospective online degree students leave those sites, they do not go to another school – rather, they do not go back to school at all.

The Take-Away

The number one lesson learned from the partnership with Ranku is to focus on the institution’s online degree demographic and the psychology of this unique student population to improve recruitment by creating a user-centric experience. Every university has a unique demographic of prospective online students. Ranku’s technology and data analytics dashboard has allowed NU Online Worldwide to more effectively surface information and trends, enabling the institution to strategically target its efforts and better serve its students studying at a distance.

Contact information

NU Online Worldwide:
Laura Wiese,
Marketing Director
ljwiese@nebraska.edu

Ranku:
Cecilia Retelle,
VP of Central Operations
cecilia@goranku.com

Data and Analytics, Digital Learning, Marketing, Online Learning

Practice

#WCET16

By Lindsey Rae Downs

October 20, 2016

2 Comments

Hello WCETer’s!

Today I’d like to share the highlights of the meeting from my point of view as a new WCET staff member and first timer at the WCET Annual Meeting. As I, sadly, could not be everywhere at once, Mollie and Russ kindly donated their notes to fill out this post! Thanks both of you and our active WCET Tweeters for extra info!

Before I get started, a public service announcement:

You can access meeting materials by use of the Program tab on the annual meeting website. You can also watch several of the recorded sessions. If you presented at the meeting and would like to share your materials then please email them to Megan Raymond. If you would like to add your take-aways, comments, bloopers, fun stories, etc. about the meeting please do so in the comments below!

Back to our regularly scheduled program…

The WCET 28^th Annual Meeting was held October 12-14^th in Minneapolis, MN. Thank you to the Marriott City Center hotel, which was a great venue and host hotel! I have to say, the food especially (and the red and green lit bar for our opening reception) was great!

I’ve attended several conferences and this was my first time attending a WCET event. While I’ve enjoyed other conferences I’ve attended, I noticed that each conference excelled at either community building or facilitate learning experiences. At the WCET Annual Meeting, not only did I meet new people but I learned valuable information during the sessions and discussed significant topics in higher education and educational technology.

The 28^th Annual Meeting event overview

A majority of attendees this year were returning WCET’ers.

There were 396 attendees from 47 different states and the District of Columbia, with the most from Minnesota (way to represent!). WCET attendees represented many different job categories.

Tuesday, October 11^th, 2016

The meeting started Tuesday with the WCET Steering Committee and Executive Council meetings. The Steering Committee dedicated themselves to moving the fields of educational technology and education forward. The Chair of the Committee, Nick White, said that:

“Our job is to accelerate and facilitate change. We need to think about our members and what their needs are.”

Annual Meeting Sessions

The Annual Meeting sessions covered topics from student success, Open Educational Resources (OER), Accessibility and competency-based education. Speakers presented information on change management, adaptive learning, student privacy and 21^st Century Credentials.

Wednesday, October 12^th, 2016

At the WCET Academic Leadership Forum…

…two dozen senior level academic leaders engaged in a provocative discussion of:

“Risk adjusted metrics” for higher education (we use them in health care, why not higher education?),
Using sound social science to evaluate student outcomes,
Higher education innovation and scale,
Looking for opportunities within institutions to innovate.

The opening keynote from Jaime Casap was an outstanding way to kickoff WCET 2016.

Jaime, the Chief Educational evangelist with Google, told us about the impact of education, which brought him from his hometown of Hell’s Kitchen, NY (not the Hell’s Kitchen restaurant up the street from the conference hotel), to not only speaking at the White House during the Beating the Odds Summit, but speaking to us at WCET16! He spoke of power of education to disrupt poverty and invited us to consider how we can change the focus of education to prep our students to answer “what problem do you want to solve?” instead of “what do you want to be when you grow up?” Educational technology can be developed to prepare our students to be innovative creators and problem solvers.

Thursday, October 13th, 2016

Thursday started early as Rosa Calabrese, WCET’s digital and project services coordinator/extraordinaire, and I took groups for walks and jogs around downtown Minneapolis (for the record, I did not jog and thank you to my group for navigating so well!).

We had a great and chilly time and I especially enjoyed the view while going over the Mississippi River using the Stone Arch Bridge.

After a great breakfast it was on to sessions for the day!

Adaptive Learning in Higher Education: A Progress Report

Over the past three years, adaptive learning has gone from an ill-defined concept in higher education to an important category of teaching and learning technology.

Eric Frank, CEO of Acrobatiq, said that:

“when considering adaptive learning resources, he uses the refrigerator model. My refrigerator of adaptive resources includes complete meals, or all the necessary ingredients I need to make my meal, or the refrigerator is empty and has zero resources. The latter is really tough to scale! What resources does your institution have to implement adaptive learning?”

We need to fill up the adaptive learning refrigerator with resources!

The presenters reminded attendees that adaptive or personalized learning is not new. Today it’s just scalable. Adaptive products today are standing on the shoulders of giants from decades of research on brain science and learning science.

Dale Johnson encouraged allowing faculty to try adaptive learning several times, saying,

“Give faculty breathing room. Let them know it’s okay to fail.” He advises using the “Three Times Teaching” theory. Allow faculty to teach an adaptive learning course at least three times. This will allow them to truly understand how their role is different, how to use the analytics, what interventions their students may or may not need. You can also ask your faculty: If you didn’t have to lecture, what would you like to do in class? Create? Evaluate? Analyze? Apply?”

Then, give faculty the time and space to try out those options.

An Update on A Multi Year Captioning Compliance Pilot Project

During this session, Suzanne Tapp and Justin Louder, Texas Tech University (TTU), provided updates on a Texas Tech student run captioning lab pilot (2014-2015). The lab was student run by four undergraduate students observed by a graduate student. Students were trained on best practices found in Described and Captioned Media Program Captioning Key.

Campus wide captioning processes and policies were brought up several times by presenters and attendees. At TTU they are completing their captioning policy. The policy will require that all hybrid and online classes and all face-to-face classes with a Letter of Accommodation (LOA) require captioned videos.

Video captioning is handled depending on the priority and length.

Classes with LOA: sent to 3^rd party vendor so they are completed quickly,
If video is less than 15 minutes: instructor is encouraged to self-caption,
Video length is 15-40 minutes: sent through the student captioning lab,
Video length is 40 minutes or higher: sent to 3^rd party vendor.

I’m looking forward to seeing Texas Tech’s publication on best practices in captioning! Visit this link for the slides from this session.

Understanding and Changing the Conversations Around ‘Regular and Substantive Interaction’

We were fortunate to have Amy Laitinen, director for higher education with the Education Policy program at New America, and Van Davis, Associate Vice President of Higher Education Research and Policy at Blackboard, update us on the latest with the “regular and substantive interaction” requirements for distance education and competency-based education (CBE). The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Inspector General has issued reports criticizing two regional accrediting agencies in their oversight of competency-based programs, especially with respect to interaction regulations. A new report regarding Western Governor University’s implementation of “regular and substantive interaction” is due soon and is expected to be negative. It could be costly to WGU in terms of financial aid eligibility. Such a ruling will have a chilling effect on CBE.

WCET joins Amy, Van, and others in trying to figure out solutions in working with the Department and Congress in creating solutions. WCET will continue to update you and work on advocacy positions.

WCET Awards Lunch

The WCET Awards Lunch honored the WCET Outstanding Work (WOW) award winners and the higher education professionals who won the Richard Jonsen and the Sally Johnstone awards.

A WOW Award recognizes outstanding efforts by member institutions and organizations in applying an innovative, technology-based solution to a challenging educational need. The institutions listed below were honored for their solutions:

California State University, Northridge: Creating In-House Faculty-Authored Instructional Apps to Enhance Learning: An Entrepreneurial and Sustainable App Development Strategy, which creates free apps to augment learning resources.
Colorado Technical University: CTU Mobile offers students access to a personalized learning experience on the go.
University of Central Oklahoma: the Student Transformative Learning Record (STLR) is designing, tracking, and assessing students’ beyond-disciplinary learning in both the curriculum and the co-curriculum.
University of Hawaiʻi System: Scaling Integration of Data Analytics and Tools to Transform Decision-Making for Student Success is producing great results with student retention.
Western Governors University: Responsible Borrowing Initiatives help students make informed decisions to borrow wisely.

The videos showcasing these innovative projects (shown during the lunch) will be available soon. More information will be posted on the WOW award webpage.

The Sally M Johnstone Award, named in honor of WCET’s founding executive director, recognizes a professional who has made an exceptional contribution to technology enhanced teaching and learning. The award acknowledges leadership and excellence in practice.

The inaugural winner of the award is Dale Johnson, adaptive program manager at Arizona State University.

The Richard Jonsen Award is given each year to an individual who has made a significant contribution to the e-learning community and WCET during his or her career. The Richard Jonsen Award was established in 1998 to recognize the contributions of Richard (Dick) Jonsen, who, as WICHE’s executive director, founded WCET.

WCET was honored to present Dr. Robbie Melton, Associate Vice Chancellor of Mobilization and Emerging Technology for the Tennessee Board of Regents, with this award. Dr. Melton is not only known for her research on mobile apps for education, but her efforts to improve opportunities for learners and willingness to assist others in the technology community. She even helped us with taking very fun VR photos at the meeting! I agree, Robbie, “Life is good!”

21st Century Credentials: Can Higher Ed Regain The Trust Factor?

The hiring process is changing for graduates. Major industries are moving away from required degrees for positions and instead want to know what applicants can actually do.

The Credential Transparency Initiative is an organization working to is to improve transparency in the credentialing marketplace.

Panelists discussed the following:

The opportunity for higher education institutions to experiment with shorter, alternative, employer credentials. These are a different value proposition for student in a time when a degree seems a waste of time and effort,
Higher education cares about student success. Employers care about “employee success” and are looking deeply at the people skills applicants bring to the job. Higher Education must help facilitate their search.
Making competency data available to employers (similar to applicant tracking systems) using portfolios, competency based assessments, alternative credentials.
Platforms such as WOW award winner STLR we can help employers filter not only based on the skills for which they need to hire but also competencies such as global or cultural awareness and experiences.

Friday October 14th, 2016

Friday dawned with yoga for a few, a networking breakfast for most and a steering committee working meeting for others! Sessions included discussions on possible combinations of professional certifications and academic coursework, accessibility, accreditation and student metrics. WOW award winners continued to present on their solutions (WGU’s borrowing initiatives and University of Central Oklahoma’s STRL tool).

The “Ask an Accreditor” Roundtable Panel

This panel was a lively discussion with Karen Solomon (Higher learning Commission), Ellie Fogerty (Middle States Commission on Higher Education), and Leah Matthews (Distance Education Accrediting Commission). They updated us on the regional accreditors new focus on institutions with low completion rates. The panelists talked about the increased expectation by the Department of Education and Congress that accrediting agencies act as compliance officers, which is ill-suited to the accreditation model of peer review.

The accrediting agencies are eagerly awaiting the plans that the next administration will have for them. There is an “explosion” of dual credit applications and they expressed concern that some (or, perhaps many) institutions are not ready to assure the quality of their offerings.

The closing session, Innovation Hubs and Labs: Driving Change and Creativity…

The final session of WCET 2016 featured Vernon Smith as a moderator discussing higher education innovation with Missy Bye, Unviersity of Minnesota, Jeff Grabill, Michigan State, Thomas Yen, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Julie Legault, Amino Labs.

In this session we heard about the Internet of Things Lab at University of Wisconsin-Madison, where students can conduct research and hands-on experimentation in and IoT sandbox. Thomas Yen spoke about training students to connect their personal passion with what they want to do in life. So that wherever they go, whatever company they work for, they can find passion in whatever they are doing. Jeff Grabill, Associate Provost for Teaching, Learning, and Technology at Michigan State University (MSU), introduced us to the MSU Hub for Innovation in Learning and Technology, where Spartans are working together to develop projects like the Brody Engagement Center, an art exhibit designed to showcase the connections between art and science, in spaces such as the Media Sandbox, a collaborative arena to promote creative application of media knowledge through an integrated program. Missy Bye talked about University of Minnesota’s work in the Wearable Product Design Center, a think-tank designing and producing smart clothing. Visit their page for information on their projects (the idea of smart clothing protecting our firefighters in hazardous environments really struck me!). Finally the Creative Director and CEO of Amino Labs, Julie Legault, spoke with us about her journey founding Amino Labs and her work making science and technology much more approachable and intriguing.

My three takeaways /thoughts from this session:

Teaching is important in successful innovation in higher education. What does this mean for faculty development at our institutions?
We need to train people in how to design learning experiences. And they are also building the capacity around the effective use of #edtech.
I love that the Amino mini lab was inspired by Tamagotchis. I also love that the design makes learning about synthetic biology intriguing and fun.

I’m so happy I had the opportunity to attend WCET 2016 and meet with other WCET’ers! I could not have asked for a better welcome as a first time attendee and as a new staff member with WCET. Thanks to all of you for the warm welcome and thank you to my team at WCET for making the time so special for me!

Want more highlights? We had a very stimulating, informative and entertaining discussion on twitter (#WCET16). Relive the chatter with the storify!

I’m looking forward to the 29^th annual meeting in Denver. I hope to see you there October 25-27^th, 2017,

Thanks,

Lindsey

Lindsey Downs
Manager, Communications
WCET – WICHE Cooperate for Educational Technologies

Mary Tyler Moore statue with Mary tossing her hat — Russ took this picture the Mary Tyler Moore statue. He said that “some of you will appreciate Mary tossing her hat while the younger set will need to ask their parents…or Hulu.” Thanks Russ!

Social Media, WCET, WCET Annual Conference, WOW Award

Practice

Lessons Learned as a WCET’er

By Lindsey Rae Downs

October 13, 2016

2 Comments

For the last 7.5 years I have had the opportunity to work with some of the best people in technology-enhanced higher education – the WCET staff and members. I am a better person, a better learner, and a better educator because of the experiences I’ve had and the relationships I’ve built through WCET.

20160121_1611161 — WCET team at the Escape Room, Boulder CO, 2016

Since 2008, I’ve worn a WCET staff hat – the title on it changed a few times and I’ve been through 2 major grants, 1 minor grant, the birth of 2 kids, 3 dogs, 3 computers, over 12,000 tweets, and a million laughs. I will always be grateful for my time as a WCET staffer.

But now it’s time to change hats – to that of a WCET Member. On August 8th, I began my tenure as director of alternative learning at American Public University System. I’m ecstatic to be on the APUS team, many of whom I’ve worked closely with for years – since we embarked on Transparency by Design together – and help support learners in their pursuit of credentials together.

As director of alternative learning, I have the opportunity to put many things I’ve learned over the years at WCET into practice to help learners – from competency-based education to badges and microcredentials – I get to get my hands into the innovation I’ve been studying for years.

I will admit, when we at WCET were doing our badging and gaming initiative “Who’s Got Class?” and our Badges MOOC with Mozilla and Blackboard, I wondered “to what end?” Sure, I worked with amazing people on those, but what I wondered all along is, “how would that possibly help our members in their practice?” Now I know. Without these demonstration projects, I would not have the base I do to be able to build out these kinds of programs for learners.

Which is a nice segue into my Top Lessons Learned as a WCET Staffer:

Participate in Demonstration Projects. Seriously, folks. The staff work hard to put these on, and while it may seem like fun and games at the time, there is real value to be gained.
Read the Articles Digests. Lindsey, the new manager of communications at WCET, will be doing all the hard work for you. She combs through all the outlets and pulls together the things you need to know most for your practice. When I got the DETA grant, I identified Lindsey for the articles digest role, and am so glad that she will now be on the WCET team. I now depend on these digests and can assure you they couldn’t be in any better hands.
Follow WCET on Twitter. There is even more great information shared here – not just announcements of what WCET has going on but interesting news you should know. Follow WCET @wcet_info.
Engage with other WCET’ers – at the Annual Meeting, the Summit, during webcasts, and on social media. I am so grateful for my WCET colleagues all over the nation. I learn so much with you all and value the friendships I’ve built. I truly feel that those who gather around WCET are some of the brightest, most hard working educators in the nation.
Get involved with WCET. Write a blog post about a project you have going on so others can learn from your trials and triumphs. Run for the Steering Committee. Write a Talking Point about a topic you are an expert in. WCET is truly a cooperative – a community that comes together around excellence in technology-enhanced learning – and it is only strengthened by the contributions of WCET members.

So this is not a farewell, I will still be a part of the community, just in a new role. I look forward to seeing many of you, my people, my mentors, my friends at the WCET Annual Meeting in Minneapolis this week.

And if you’re ever in southwest Montana, near Yellowstone, be sure to drop me a line (calimorrison at gmail dot com), tweet me @calimorrison, call or me 406.580.5894. I’d love to tell you about the spots we locals love!

Will see you in WCET circles!

Cali Morrison
Director of Alternative Learning, APUS

Practice

Helping Students with Adaptive Learning: APLU and the University of Mississippi

BMGF Funds Adaptive Learning at Land-grant Universities

Early Observations on Adaptive Learning at the University of Mississippi

Adaptive Learning Focuses Us on Improving Student Success

What We Learned on Student Use of Closed Captions

What Barriers are there for Closed Caption and Transcript Use?

Get the Full Report

Pulling the research together

Creating virtual worlds for real learning

Adding new dimensions with holography

Connecting students through robotic telepresence

Looking Ahead

Adaptive Learning with CTU

Adaptive Learning and Culture

Interview with Adina Martinez

The result, a virtual intelligent agent: Maura (My Anytime University Resource Aide)

It’s Time to Innovate the Conference Experience

“Innovation” is Happening Now

My Six Ideas

Overview

The Challenge

The Strategy

The Results

The Take-Away

The 28th Annual Meeting event overview

Tuesday, October 11th, 2016

Annual Meeting Sessions

Wednesday, October 12th, 2016

At the WCET Academic Leadership Forum…

The opening keynote from Jaime Casap was an outstanding way to kickoff WCET 2016.

Thursday, October 13th, 2016

Adaptive Learning in Higher Education: A Progress Report

An Update on A Multi Year Captioning Compliance Pilot Project

Understanding and Changing the Conversations Around ‘Regular and Substantive Interaction’

WCET Awards Lunch

21st Century Credentials: Can Higher Ed Regain The Trust Factor?

Friday October 14th, 2016

The “Ask an Accreditor” Roundtable Panel

The closing session, Innovation Hubs and Labs: Driving Change and Creativity…

The 28^th Annual Meeting event overview

Tuesday, October 11^th, 2016

Wednesday, October 12^th, 2016