What Can't Be Standardized in Higher Education?

Higher education is going through radical changes and struggling universities are moving online to increase their reach and balance their budgets. A number of studies have shown that standardization doesn't lessen educational quality and provides consistency in course instruction. Despite standardization there are two things that still need qualified faculty to complete effectively.

Grading papers and engaging in conversation require a guiding hand to fully function as intended. Both of these course activities are based in qualitative measurements that are very difficult for automated algorithms to calculate. It takes considerable experience and human insight to understand the student's current vantage point and propose new information to push their knowledge.

Each paper comes with a blend of course information, learned experience, thought processes and communication abilities. Professors must try and follow the train of thought and make judgments on the students understanding. For example, the understanding could be high and the writing skills low. The professor can make proper recommendations.

The same thing occurs in grading participation in discussion questions. The individual exists within an online conversation and it is beneficial to determine course understanding by assessing the student as an individual in a group discussion. This requires following complex group ideas and how those ideas build off of each other and create meaning for the student.

Professors ability to effectively grade and further knowledge among students is difficult to assess automatically. Someday this may not be the case yet as of now the qualitative assessments are too difficult for mechanical understanding. Professors skill in assessment and development of their courses is a learned skill that is enhanced over repeated focus and practice. Seasoned online professors are worth their weight in gold bring a human touch to the virtual learning world.

Online Education: How To Collect Data To Assess Needs and Student Outcomes

Tuesday, June 3, 3:00-4:30 (Eastern)
Type: Online Webinar

As the cost of education continues to increase and the availability of new and innovative technology tools expands online teaching and learning opportunities, keeping up with and increasing faculty skill sets proves challenging. Moreover, institutions are experiencing tighter budgets, making opportunities for professional development more difficult to fund.

This webinar will focus on how to collect, correlate, and use data to expand faculty capacity and assess outcomes. During this webinar, participants will learn how the University of the District of Columbia initiated an effort to provide professional development opportunities to faculty across three levels: track participation and outcomes, target specific training to faculty based upon skills, and move faculty along a continuum toward being certified to teach online. The presentation will also disclose how a simple correlation was used to map trained faculty and their online offerings to student outcomes and increased success.

Objectives
- Attain skills in designing, collecting data, and assessing professional development initiatives
- Learn how to correlate and map data to determine the needs of faculty
- Learn how to design and explore LMS use via a content analysis
- Learn how to use data to expand faculty capacity on an individual basis
- Discover how to begin to use these tools immediately and not need statistical expertise

Additional Information: http://www.innovativeeducators.org/product_p/2067.htm

Using Online Education Assessments to Foster Greater Learning

Education is an important component to personal and professional growth. Education has moved online and creates a strong platform to reach a wider group of people from a more diverse background. Perera-Diltz & Moe, J. (2014) discusses the use of formative and substantive assessments in online learning platforms and how these contribute to learning. For online professors they can use their knowledge to encourage development in geographically dispersed individuals and groups. 

All knowledge is constructed from previous knowledge and this continues to grow and develop over time as more complex information is added to existing frameworks that create even stronger and wider reaching frameworks. Construction comes from teacher-led learning (Frieire, 2000), collaborative construction between student and teacher (Collins, et. al, 1989), or situated learning framework (Lave & Wenger, 1991). 

Teachers can either lead information by pushing knowledge and retention or they can foster learning through the understandings of the student. Most learning doesn’t happen in isolation and often impacts a wider group of people that benefit from that learning. Group learning is common in classes as well as in society and requires challenging assumptions and reconstructing knowledge on a higher platform. 

Students come to the online course with as many needs as traditional students. They desire the flexibility to continue on with the daily needs and responsibilities of their lives while furthering their educational and career choices. Improvements in online communication tools afford a greater level of student interaction to foster higher levels of social and personal knowledge construction. 

Assessment of that learning is an important part of understanding how much people are learning. Assessments generally come in formative or summative types. Formative types include quizzes, tasks, and other types of course tools that ensure the student is building the necessary blocks that will lead to higher forms of learning. Summative assessments ensure that higher and more complex concepts have been discovered. 

Think of how we learn something new each day but need to find a stronger and wider framework to understand how this information fits within a wider world. Formative assessments are often based in the process of learning the individual parts to the greater conception. Beams and foundation to a finished house so to speak. The summative assessment tries to ensure that the house was actually built and how well that house was built. 

Online learning has been found to have widespread adoption within the U.S. but also offers a version of learning that can apply around the globe (Leppisaari, et. al., 2011). The authors found that online learning has many benefits for a wide variety of people and will continue to develop overtime becoming a primary source of educating people. The advantages of virtual communication being that quality education is not limited to the brick-n-mortar locations of the past but now can reach to anyone with a computer or cell phone.

Collins, A., et. al. (1989). Cognitive apprenticeship: Teaching the crafts of reading, writing, and mathematics. In L. B. Resnick (Ed.), Knowing, learning, and instruction: Essays in honor of Robert Glaser (pp. 453–494). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Freire, P. (1970/2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed. (30th Anniversary). (Trans. M. B. Ramos). New York, NY: Continuum.

Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge England, New York: Cambridge University Press.

Leppisaari, I., et. al. (2011). International e-benchmarking: Flexible peer development

of authentic learning principles in higher education. Educational Media International, 48(3), 179–191. DOI:10.1080/09523987.2011.607321

Perera-Diltz, D. & Moe, J. (2014). Formative and summative assessment in online education. Journal of Research in Innovative Teaching, 7 (1).

Webinar: Persistence Vs. Retention: Legislation And The Changing Paradigm Of Student Success

Wednesday, May 7, 2014  1:00-2:30 EDT
Venue: online webinar

Overview:  
Improving the retention and success rates of undergraduate students continues to be a major topic of discussion for higher education administrators and other stakeholders. Retention refers to an institution's ability to retain students from one performance period to the next. Persistence is the student's ability to continue enrollment from one term to subsequent terms. While postsecondary institutions have emphasized retention, the push for greater accountability by tying student completion outcomes to eligibility for federal student aid programs (Partnerships for Affordability and Student Success Act, S. 1874), requires postsecondary institutions to focus on strategies to increase student persistence to degree completion.

This interactive webinar will discuss the higher prioritization of persistence as a driver of student success to bolster retention. Participants will learn the importance of shifting priorities from a retention-based approach to a persistence-driven student success model.

Objectives:
*Examine the impact of proposed legislative changes on how student success is measured
*Explore student perspectives on the correlation between persistence, retention, graduation, and ultimately, successful student outcomes
*Infuse persistence into student success programming as part of the strategic plan
*Review cost-benefit analysis (return on investment or ROI) for persistence

Web address: http://www.innovativeeducators.org/product_p/2159.htm

Book Review: The Assessment of Doctoral Education

The book The Assessment of Doctoral Education by Peggy Maki and Nancy Borkowski offers insight into the modern Doctoral education and common methods of assessment and evaluation. The work moves into significant detail on a number of topics that include New Models of Assessment of Doctoral Programs and Emerging Assessment of Student Learning. Through this book, readers should come to understand the overall assessment process and growing trends in the modern educational process. 

The book lists the following trends administrators should expect:

-Increase in accountability through accreditation process, assessment and state money, and assessment responsibilities.

-Increase in diversification of education through assessment of individual students, core-competencies, and degree integrity.

-Student-centered learning that focuses on value-added, technology incorporation, and campus cultural assessments. 

The book indicates that there will be a number of difficulties associated with assessment and change. Some of the difficulties will be to change college culture. Many state universities have traditions, union rules, and other issues that may make it difficult to change people’s minds about assessment.  Changing culture can be difficult and requires a concerted effort from all of the parties involved. 

One of the largest criteria that universities will need to focus on is student readiness to take positions in their chosen fields. All of the assessments seem to focus in at least a tertiary way on this overall concept. How colleges do this is more of an open question. A broad education has its advantages in terms of opening students to new experiences and understandings while focused career education is more efficient but can leave students limited in their general knowledge for periods when a career change is needed. 

The book is well researched and comes with a host of citations and references. The work will provide a strong understanding of assessment processes and possible future trends. The work is a little occupationally focused and technical so it is not likely to be fun reading. Yet the typical person to buy this book is more interested in understanding the behind the scenes process of evaluting doctoral education. 

Maki, P & Borkowski, N. (2006). The Assessment of Doctoral Education. VA: Stylus Publishing ISBN: 978-1579221799

Pages: Approximately 260

Price: $24