The soon-to-launch MSVCC Academy will provide an alternative for MSVCC faculty seeking professional development training, through short courses on podcasting to courses on best practices for online instruction.
The Academy is a “sunrise to sunset service”—faculty enroll, participate, graduate, and receive certification through a single process, all managed through a new enrollment system built by SBCJC’s Ive Burnett. The enrollment system will accommodate both Blackboard and Desire2Learn users.
Courses fall into one of three categories--the Teaching Effectively Online series, and two new categories: a Tools in Focus series and a Best Practices series.
The Tools in Focus courses drill down to the deepest level of a tool or technology. The Best Practices course offerings are meant to be organic and evolve over time through input from participants.
The Academy launches September 7 and will offer half a dozen courses, ranging from the six-week general orientation course, offered since 2007, to the newly built Wimba Voice Tools course and Blackboard Early Warning System course.
Faculty can begin registering for the free courses at the beginning of September.
Seats are provided on a first-come, first serve basis, and most courses will be capped at 15 or 20 participants.
Faculty can enroll in these courses through the SBCJC Enrollment Tool. Distance Learning Coordinators can also register their faculty for these courses through the ET. Registration instructions will be published on msvcc.org by August 24.
The enrollment system will provide colleges with the ability to track their faculty participation in these courses; contact hours are provided for each course. This should aid colleges in establishing a professional development program for their online faculty if they do not have one in place.
Faculty and staff from across the system serve as facilitators, and new courses with a pedagogical emphasis are peer reviewed by deans, instructional technologists, and distance learning coordinators prior to their launch, using the Quality Matters rubric.
Jennifer Leimer, Director of Distance Learning at MGCCC, and President of the DLC Association, is excited about the new program.
"Our instructors continually ask for training on emerging technologies. However, with such limited resources, we are often not able to meet their requests. The MSVCC Academy will help offer training that is desperately needed to enhance our instructors' skills so that they can provide top-of-the-line courses.
Recent Comments