Thursday, September 22, 2011

Usual support for local students taking distant education consortium shared courses: Tech/admin YES. Academic NO.


Common practice(?) in "Local Facilitation" [See example below Hudson Valley Educ. Consortium]
1. Staff from each participating institution and/or staff from the consortium enable students to register, pay, get academic credit recorded appropriately for online consortium courses almost as conveniently as for local classroom-based courses.
2. Students are responsible for attendance, participation, communication, transportation as needed.
3. Proctoring or other student identification/security measures for testing and related activities are provided by the consortium and/or participating institutions.
4. No academic support is provided for online consortium courses. Students may be eligible for academic support in general from the participating institution in which they are enrolled.


EXAMPLE: HUDSON VALLEY EDUCATIONAL CONSORTIUM
4 colleges share courses via 9 interactive video-equipped 20-student capacity classrooms. Technicians are present at each site during sessions only to provide technical support. Consortium prefers to have the technician set up, check, start the equipment then be available "on-call" for any tech problems during the session. Consortium also hopes to train instructors to operate the equipment [in addition to or instead of technicians?]

Hudson Valley Educational Consortium - History and Governance: " students may receive their degrees from their home institutions, are able to take all liberal arts courses from their home institution yet participate in credit and non-credit programs offered at Consortium member community colleges in other locations. "

Academic Programs: "Students participate in Consortium programs from their home college via the Interactive Television Training rooms. General Education courses will be taken through traditional means at the home college. A few programs also offer online courses."

Interactive Video:
"Consortium courses are distance learning programs that incorporate online interactive video technology and hands on training. Interactive television video (ITV) technology offers a versatile tool that enables television based distance learning via student participation in IV equipped classrooms. The Consortium classrooms enable students at distinct locations to experience real time instruction and simultaneously, the ability to interact with the instructor and students at all ITV equipped classrooms. . The Hudson Valley Educational Consortium has nine video training technology equipped classrooms at the four member Community College campuses. A technician is scheduled during all training sessions to ensure the quality of the video transmissions. The Interactive Video classrooms accommodate twenty students per site."

Prospective Students
"...Your Registrar will assist in answering your questions and support you through the application process. Please note that most but not all of the Consortium courses are available at all four colleges.

"Each of the colleges has taken a leadership role in developing new program curriculum for the Consortium. Students will achieve Associate of Applied Sciences degrees in all the Consortium programs. Students wishing to register in Consortium programs will participate from their home college, via the Interactive Television Training Rooms but will receive their degree from the college that has developed the A.A.S. degree program of their choice. General Education courses will be taken through traditional means at the home college."

IMAGE
Photo of "Whiteboard in Saint Werburgh's
The whiteboard is now happily at home in Saint Werburgh's community centre. It is being used for all sorts of things including being a party separator for muslim dinners, a backdrop for local video producers, and whoknowswhat" by Ed Mitchell, 2008/06/27
http://www.flickr.com/photos/edmittance/2616330896/sizes/m/in/photostream/
Some rights reserved by edmittance

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