Conference Presentations

This presentation will examine faculty satisfaction and perceived benefits of participation in communities of practice (CoP) for supporting online faculty. Faculty isolation and navigating the transition from face-to-face  to online teaching will be discussed. A brief presentation will be followed by a community brainstorming session to explore ways to sustain faculty buy-in, promote online pedagogical excellence, foster peer-to-peer community, and encourage continued improvement in online instruction.

Student's grades on assignment for an undergraduate nursing research course the academic year before QM certification were compared to grades the academic year after QM certification. Significant improvement was found in grades for research papers and posters. Changes made to the course will be described, study findings presented, and implications discussed.

Nursing faculty responsible for the Quality Assurance (QA) of one of our state’s largest online nursing programs will present a Quality Talk. Our question is “What is the difference in students’ scores before and after QM certification for the eight core courses of an online Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) program?” We will use story-telling technique to share transformation of online courses into a complete QM certified program for registered nurses (RNs) earning a BSN.

This session focused on courses where the curriculum is mandated, either by state licensing requirements, testing requirements, or industry standards. It can be difficult to keep learners interested when course material must be geared to a test or licensing requirement - but it can be done! Methods for keeping learners engaged, encouraging learning, and achieving the results that learners want are the focus of this session.

Competency-based education (CBE) is getting a lot of attention. Defined by personalized learning and "authentic" assessment, advocates position CBE as a powerful toolkit to address some of higher education's biggest challenges- namely, high tuition, low completion and vague/uneven student outcomes. It could be argued that these challenges are relevant for "traditional" online learning, too. Amid the hype, what is truly distinctive about the new generation of CBE programs, and is CBE really a mainstream solution or a more specialized one?

In the last eighteen months, the number of higher education institutions publicly committed to competency-based education (CBE) has risen from 24 to over 225. Undersecretary Ted Mitchell said, “CBE is...the single most promising set of innovations we have to make improvements against the challenges facing our education system today.” (Competency-Based Education Network convening July 22, 2014). The marked increase in interest and commitment to CBE presents significant challenges for instructional design professionals.

Building buy-in from faculty during the course audit process is paramount for the successful improvement of an academic program. Traditional recommendations for successful audits include openness, with timely and relevant feedback, as well as clear expectations. An innovative, collaborative approach towards course auditing can incorporate these recommendations, and create an audit process that fosters success within an academic program. Using the acronym, BUY-IN, peer auditing practices can produce results that motivate and empower faculty to achieve QM Certification.

This session will provide a Course Developer's Guide with information on applying best practice, a checklist, and basic templates for online course design following Quality Matters Standards in an easy-to-use format.

Do you lead a QM initiative, the accreditation process, or oversee quality assurance at your institution? If you answered yes, this session could assist with tying all of these initiatives together in a way that saves time in the long run while maximizing the institutional reward.

During this session, participants will review and develop course activities that allow students to actively engage with content and with each other. In addition, issues and strategies related to facilitation of student-to-student activities and group work will be presented and discussed.

As those of us well versed in QM know, the primary focus of the rubric is design. While quality design is an essential component of a quality online program, it is not the only component required to achieve overall quality assurance. Those of us who have taken the APPQMR would also recognize the pie image that is a trademark training piece of this workshop. While participants of the APPQMR are made aware of the fact that QM does not try to address all pieces of the pie, they are often hear about how the other pieces could be effectively addressed.

Providing your online students with engaging video lectures is great. Yet, figuring out how to create engaging video lectures can be daunting, especially when you are not tech savvy. Come see some examples and learn about what simple tips you can do to make your online lectures interactive.

What is the QM Community? How can we benefit from it? How can we get involved? Come learn from a group of faculty, instructional designers, administrators, Peer and Master Reviewers, and QM Coordinators who watched as simple conversations resulted in established connections to create the QM Community. Listen to stories about how each of us became a part of the QM Community. Brainstorm with us about how to join the conversation, get connected, and continue blazing new trails in the QM Community.

Panel Discussion with Audience Participation

This is a 5 minute Quality Talk Presentation over an initiative to standardize departmental policies and practices as they relate to online education. The slides are mostly cut and pastes from our policy document.