September Online Ed News You Can Use

Hope your semester is starting well!

Online Education Initiative (OEI) Update and Opportunities

You probably heard that MiraCosta is one of 24 colleges selected to participate in the pilot of the statewide Online Education Initiative. Much more information will come as this initiative proceeds; feel free to contact me if you have questions. Two opportunities are open now to all faculty: first, courses offered through the OEI will be reviewed by peer faculty – you can apply to be a course reviewer – deadline Sept. 12. Second, the OEI is seeking input by Sept. 22 on the selection of a common course management system to be used for the OEI.

Program Review Support

As your department works on Program Review, please consider me a resource if you have questions about online education data and planning. In the portal, you may access the Online Education program review data packet if you wish to examine college-wide data on success and retention by course modality and student demographics. The Chancellor’s Office Datamart site can also be useful for queries if you’re interested in historical and/or statewide outcomes data for distance education.

Student Orientation to Online Learning

Over 130 students have attended one of these one-hour sessions this fall, adding to the more than 100 that attended earlier this year in spring and summer. If you are incentivizing student attendance, please contact me for a list.  Two more orientations will be held in October – see TASC’s site for details.

Online Student Supports

I find during the student orientation sessions that most students are not aware of (but get very excited about) MiraCosta’s free online tutoring, online writing support, and 24×7 Ask-A-Librarian (under Ask Us) services available to all students. Please direct your students to these great resources!

Captioning Support

MiraCosta’s Access Specialist, Robert Erichsen, coordinates support for captioning of audio/video materials via the DECT grant. Please contact him (rerichsen@miracosta.edu / 760.795.6684) by Sept. 12. Also, the CCC system’s new 3CMediaSolutions enables you to request captioning on videos you upload to the site for storage/streaming.

Professional Learning Opportunities

  • San Diego CCD invites your participation in three upcoming online education events: A Day with TechSmith on 9/19; Blackboard Symposium on 10/3; and a faculty-led Distance Learning Summit on 10/24. Let me know if you’re interested and I can provide more details.
  • Participate in webinars and courses this fall from @One or the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources; review an archived MiraCosta online ed.
  • ConnectedCourses is a free online community running throughout the fall exploring socially connected open education, facilitated by a stellar lineup including MiraCosta’s own Lisa M. Lane, and beginning on 9/15.
  • Univ. of Central Florida maintains the Teaching Online Pedagogical Repository. Browse it for ideas; attend a webinar on 9/17 at 11 am to learn more; even submit your own online teaching strategies.

Jim Julius, Ed.D.
Faculty Director, Online Education

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