Assessment of Online Course Quality at St. Petersburg College

• Goal:  To develop a plan and instruments for reviewing, evaluating and refining online courses.
• History:
• 3 Year course review was limited to face to face courses but the C & I committee requested that a system be developed for online courses as well.
• The face to face form was reviewed by the Project Eagle Action Committee (PEAC) and it was decided that a new set of instruments would be necessary.  Nancy Doolittle was assigned to research and develop a tool for this purpose.
• A variety of tools currently available on the WWW were reviewed. A rough draft was presented to the PEAC and refinements were made.
• The Instructional Technologists from SPC’s Web and Instructional Technology Department reviewed the second draft.  This draft was also posted in SPC’s Onliners Discussion area. This area is strictly for communication between SPC’s online instructors.  More refinements were suggested.
• The final draft was approved by PEAC and the Provosts Council. Access the 3 Year Course Review Form here.
•  Implementation:
• A list of all courses that are currently on the 3 year review list was used to identify online courses that were up for review in the 2004-2005 school year.
• That list of online courses, including section number and instructor, was provided to the Instructional Technologists.
• Each technologist was given X number of instructors to oversee and train for this process. A total of 152 courses were identified.
• Emails were sent to theses instructors, along with the Review Form.  Instructors were required to meet with the technologist.  A number of opportunities were provided for meeting with the technologists, either one on one or in group formats.
• For those instructors who were unable to meet in person, phone meetings were provided.
• All 152 instructors have been trained on how to review and update their courses.
• Results:
• Instructors have been encouraged to contact their technologist with questions on refinement and evaluation of their course.
• Instructors are required to meet one more time with each technologist in order to review the completed form. This meeting can be either in person or via telephone, based on the discretion of the technologist.
• The technologists report that a good percentage of the instructors have submitted their forms already.  It appears that the deadline will be met successfully.
• Future of the Project:
• This process will continue in it’s current form until otherwise directed by administration
• Although a new Learning Management System (ANGEL) is currently being implemented at SPC, the form was created to be platform independent and should not need refinement.
• The Web and Instructional Technology Department members are rewriting the online training program used to train new online instructors and developers.  This training is being created based on the content and flow of the 3 year course review form. 
• Signature Courses are being developed that will ultimately eliminate the need for large scale course reviews.  A Signature Course is a model online course, developed by a core of content experts, that will be used as the primary course for each course offered online.  In other words, when a course needs to be duplicated in order for a new instructor to teach it online, the Signature course will be the course that is cloned.  Instructors will have limited rights to changing course content and are primarily looked at as instructors and course facilitators, not course developers. 

Please email Nancy Doolittle at doolittle.nancy@spcollege.edu or call 727-791-2641 with questions or comments.