Online Retention FIG: Notes

March 30

Present on call: Ellie, Rae Ann, Ramona, Jan, TJ, Minta, Lisa, Aldrian.

Agenda Items:

·  Decide how we are going to disseminate the online teaching tips

·  Check-in on pilots

·  W survey

·  Videos

·  Reports for end of term/summer

·  Begin to think about how our efforts and work can be continued into the future

Priorities for today:

·  Our priorities for the remainder of the semester:

o  Online teaching tips

o  Reports

o  Video

o  Outcomes/deliverables

o  Pilots

  1. Thank you to Rae Ann for getting Tips Wiki going. Thank you to Rae Ann and Ramona for contributions to it.
  2. Discussion of possible dates for future calls. Ellie will create/send a doodle survey. We touched on the length of calls. Our calls are scheduled for 2 hours, though we don’t always go that long.
  3. Reports
  4. Video idea discussed
  5. We still need to submit a written report, but a video could be a part of our final product
  6. Choose one (or more?) of our pilots and how it worked
  7. Include screen shots from pilot/s Bb
  8. Real progress
  9. Outcomes
  10. What we can offer to other online instructors
  11. Deliverables
  12. Best practices
  13. Data collected during first semester
  14. First video (December 2011)
  15. W Survey
  16. Online instructor survey
  17. Online tips
  18. W Survey: Lisa and Minta
  19. ITS gives them a list as an excel file. Lisa and Minta will send after the April 6 W deadline using SARS
  20. Question about previously sent link by instructors: The mass distribution will have a flag for students not to retake if they have already participated
  21. Pilots
  22. Qualitative or quantitative?
  23. Discussion: It depends on the pilot. For quantitative we would need two groups, for comparison.
  24. Even if numbers don’t change, anecdotal information is relevant: Qualitative
  25. Pilot reports due to Ellie by end of June
  26. Giving extra time for assignment submission
  27. Rae Ann has had great success. Others have also used this with success
  28. Discussion: How much extra time do we put in in order to keep students?
  29. In the end many still drop or if they stay, how much time have we invested for each student?
  30. Ramona pointed out issue of enrollment management
  31. Question: does online learning always work well? Are we spending our time on students who are at higher drop risk?
  32. Aldrian has been email and meeting with students. He has also assigned two due dates.
  33. Our common theme: It’s complex
  34. Online Teaching Tips
  35. Continued discussion of how to distribute
  36. Email
  37. Lisa and Minta feel a variety of senders would engage more instructors to read the emails.
  38. Community of Practice
  39. This was the intention of the BOLT site but it was underused
  40. Should BOLT be revamped?
  41. Ramona created blog, but did not get a good response
  42. Newsletters
  43. Lisa and Minta are revamping online learning link
  44. Website: in Chabot site. It can be copy/pasted into email
  45. Visuals: 30 seconds to better online teaching (Ramona)
  46. Minta: Twitter is a good tool for quick blurbs
  47. Lisa and Minta are handling Facebook site: We have an approved site
  48. Lisa thinks departments can have Face book accounts, but we need a content manager, as with websites.
  49. Minta: uses Facebook/Online teaching conference. Do we know if online instructors are using FB? And beyond?
  50. Discussion: How do we engage the online teaching community at Chabot? We have to sell it. How do we gain their attention?
  51. Ramona will add links to COOL site
  52. How many of our online instructors are tenured, vs. adjuncts?
  53. Return to discussion of students who do not have literary functionality level to succeed.
  54. TJ proposed in English Dept. revised throughlines and articulated assumptions