WCET- Managing Online Education 2010
This one snuck by me. It came out last month. As of yet I have only read the executive summary, but the numbers here do show that progress is being made in the area of campus awareness and acceptance of distance education. More importantly, it shows where the largest areas of resistance are. I say more importantly, primarily because the deficiencies point toward the areas that need the most attention. If one can identify the problems, then one knows where to allocate resources to improve practice.
The study focuses on the managerial middle, the policies and people that make up the distance education team at any given school.
There are a couple of gems in this overview that really do indicate opportunities for improvement are in ADA compliance, where over 50% of the 183 responding two and four year schools have no policy, or depend upon faculty to make certain that online courses meet the requirements. There is a huge opportunity, as I see it, for training and professional development in this area.
Likewise, and no surprise, the majority of issues and impediments are internal, not external.
The video is well worth watching. By far my favorite quote from the presenter, Casey Green, is “The easy part of the infrastructure is the hardware and the software. The hard part of the infrastructure are the the people and the resources. And the explosion of online ed really still demands people and resources.”
This does relate to excellence from the standpoint that it gives us a snapshot of where we are right now and what the prevailing forces, both positive and negative are from a distance education management perspective.
http://www.campuscomputing.net/survey
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