February 25, 2008
UMBC Joins Two National, Online Learning Faculty Development Networks
On behalf of the UMBC community, the Office of Information Technology has recently joined QualityMatters and the Sloan-Consortium, two national, online learning networks that specialize in faculty development, online training and research-based "best practices." Membership in both organizations is made possible through a partnership with the University System of Maryland (USM).
Established in 2003 with a three-year, $500k grant from the Fund for Improvement to Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), QualityMatters is a nationally-recognized initiative by MarylandOnline that focuses on defining and evaluating best practices in quality online or hybrid course design--not instructor delivery.
Last year, OIT staff and selected faculty participated in several USM-sponsored course design and peer reviewer training workshops by QualityMatters, which is now an institutional subscription service supported by more than 100 colleges and universities in 31 states who have voluntarily adopted the QM course design and peer review standards. UMBC's own Alternate Delivery Program also adopted the QM standards as part of the Hybrid Course Design Workshop.
Now that UMBC is an institutional QM member, all faculty may access summary or annotated versions of the the highly regarded rubric (or "check list") of 40 course design characteristics that educational research literature identifies in good online courses. An interactive version of the rubric, as well as a form to request peer review by QM trained reviewers, is also available. Send email to John Fritz at fritz@umbc.edu to receive your userid & password for the interactive QM services.
Note: Two Education faculty members, Zane Berge and Greg Williams, are QM certified "peer reviewers," as are Jack Prostko, Director of the Faculty Development Center, and John Fritz and Bob Armstrong from OIT.
Known for its research-based course design rubric--which takes a lot of the guess work out of developing or evaluating online courses--QM does offer face-to-face and online training workshops, but also frequently partners with the Sloan-Consortium, which specializes in online faculty development in all aspects of online learning.
As 2008 institutional members in Sloan-C's "College Pass" program, UMBC has a total of 100 free "seats" to be used toward any online workshop (including how to use the QM rubric) and 50 additional "seats" in select workshops. UMBC also has ten (10) $50 registration discounts toward Sloan-C's highly regarded Conference on Asynchronous Learning Networks in Orlando, Florida (Nov. 5-7).
For now, OIT will manage the "College Pass" registration codes on a "first come, first served" basis. To receive a Sloan-C "College Pass" code, click here.
Finally, faculty are reminded that UMBC has also been a member of the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI) since 2006. While ELI does not focus exclusively on online learning, it provides excellent resources, including free webinars on timely topics, a very popular "Seven Things You Should Know About . . ." series, and the annual Horizon Report that looks at new and emerging technologies likely to be adopted in the next one to five years. The Horizon Report is also a partnership with the New Media Consortium, which UMBC also belongs to.
For more information about any of these opportunities, contact John Fritz at fritz@umbc.edu or 410.455.6596.
Posted by fritz at 11:24 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 14, 2008
3/10 Brown Bag Workshop: Digital Alternatives to Writing (and Drawing) on A Chalkboard
Tired of having to write or draw big so your students can see your notes, formulas or diagrams on the chalk or dry erase board? Then see how you can use digital alternatives that can be projected on a big screen--and even captured, narrated and replayed in Blackboard. This Teaching Learning and Technology (TLT) Brown Bag Workshop will be held on Monday, March 10, at noon in Lecture Hall 8.
Faculty-led demos will include:
- Hitachi Smart Board Input Screens (available in LH 7 & 8)
- Tablet PCs (like the IBM Lenovo X61 currently available in AV Services)
- Wacom Graphic Tablet (http://global.wacom.com/index2.cfm)
- Document Cameras (currently installed in all but two lecture halls: LH1 & LH3)
- AceCad Digimemo "Digital Paper" Pads (http://www.acecad.com)
With most of these options, if you have some kind of screen capture tool like Camtasia (www.techsmith.com/camtasia), you could also capture the screen movements and audio narration for later display in a password-protected space like Blackboard.
Light refreshments will be provided for registered participants. To register, visit www.umbc.edu/brownbag.
Posted by fritz at 1:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 7, 2007
Spring 2007 Software Workshops
In a partnership between Mathematics and Statistics' Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Consulting (CIRC) and OIT, CIRC is offering a number of short software workshops targeted at the academic community. Workshops are offered each Wednesday at Noon in Engineering room 122. The workshop topics include Matlab, S-Plus, SAS, Mathematica, and Microsoft Access. All are free.
For more information on the schedule please visit the url:
http://www.umbc.edu/circ/workshops/spring07.html
Posted by jack at 8:10 AM
June 6, 2006
Brown Bag on Redesign June 14
Join OIT's Portal and Web architects for a preview of the redesigned myUMBC portal and Web sites to be launched this summer. Give us your feedback, make suggestions and see where we're headed. We'll also answer your questions about Web design and support.
Be sure to sign up if you plan to attend.
Posted by jward at 8:51 PM
November 4, 2005
Hybrid/Online Course Design RFP (Deadline: 12/9)
The Office of Summer, Winter and Special Programs (OSWSP) is piloting a new program to increase the number of alternate delivery courses - specifically, hybrid and online courses - offered during special sessions (winter and summer terms) in 2006. The OSWSP invites proposals from UMBC full and part-time faculty to develop online or hybrid courses to be offered during the 2006 Summer Session. Course development funding (or a laptop computer), high speed Internet access, technical support, and the opportunity to participate in a faculty “learning community” are available through this program. The proposal deadline is December 9, 2005. More Information.
Posted by fritz at 10:12 PM
August 25, 2005
OIT Pilots Use of Blogs & Wikis in Blackboard
This year, OIT is piloting a third-party Blackboard extension (or "Building Block") that provides blogs (diary-like web journals) and wikis (group developed websites) contained in Blackboard courses or communities and only visible to enrolled members. Developed by a company called Learning Objects, their "Campus Pack" building block is a set of tools that are designed to foster greater communication between and among Blackboard users.
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| Bob Armstrong |
Journal LX enables users to create, share and comment on blogs within a Blackboard course or community. More Information.
Backpack LX is a dynamic blog and web site builder that permits students and instructors to create and showcase journals and web sites in a central location of the course or community.
OIT will be evaluating the Campus Pack suite of tools during the 2005-06 academic year, and invites instructors/managers and students/members of Blackboard sites to give us feedback on the product. For help or feedback, contact Bob Armstrong (rarmstro@umbc.edu or 410.455.3885). You may also want to see the Team LX and Journal LX help sheets on the UMBC Blackboard Help Tab.
FYI: To see how colleges and universities are using collaborative tools like blogs and wikis in the classroom, see the June 24, 2005 Chronicle of Higher Education special section "Ten Techniques to Change Your Teaching" (login required to view the issue online, or visit the New Media Learning & Development office in ECS 101). Sample articles include the following:
THESE LESSONS CLICK: Thanks to his students' remote-control devices, a biology instructor at the College of Lake County, Ill., can measure the class's comprehension instantly.
C3PO 4 EE101: Electrical engineering students at Montana State University have a lot of knowledge to navigate, and so do their robots.
PIXEL PERFECT: A University of Denver art-history professor exchanges the slide projector for more flexible digital technology.
CUT! Education students at the University of Texas at Austin are learning to tell stories through laptop-produced videos.
CRUDE BEHAVIOR: Computer simulation turns students at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School into oil executives in a tense negotiation.
AMERICAS ONLINE: Videoconferencing allows students at the University of Maryland and the Mexico City campus of the Monterrey Institute of Technology to model a joint business venture.
FACE TO FACE: Thanks to video over IP, the Virginia Community College System can affordably offer an education course team-taught in several linked locations.
A BUILDING TOOL: Three-dimensional software helps students at Carleton College design an environmentally friendly house.
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? Students in an online constitutional-law class from Concord University listen up and write back.
PEN IN HAND: Tablet PC's allow an English professor at CUNY's College of Staten Island to mark up papers the old-fashioned way -- but in a new-fashioned way.
Posted by fritz at 12:11 AM | Comments (0)
May 20, 2005
Online Tech Training for UMBC Faculty & Staff
Need to brush up on Excel? How about managing your time & projects? If you need to learn IT or business productivity skills, but don't have time or budget to attend in-class training, you can now learn online with SkillSoft. UMBC recently joined other USM schools using SkillSoft. With over 1,800 titles to choose from, SkillSoft is open to all UMBC faculty and staff. Use it on your own or setup a professional development plan between supervisor and employee. SkillSoft can even be used "off-line" and then synched up "on-line, and you can print certificates of completion. For more information, visit http://www.umbc.edu/skillsoft or http://www.umbc.edu/training (includes online demo). To login, use your full UMBC email address for userid & password (e.g., youruserid@umbc.edu). For more information or help, send email to training@umbc.edu.
Posted by fritz at 1:42 PM
April 25, 2005
Hybrid Courses and Faculty Development
In his column for Insights Online, UMBC Faculty Development Director Jack Prostko explores why and how faculty may want to explore using the hybrid course delivery format.
Posted by fritz at 2:06 PM
March 31, 2005
What it's Like to Teach an Online or Hybrid Course (4/6, 1 p.m.)
In light of the USM Board of Regents proposal for more online or hybrid (part online, part face-to-face) courses, what's it like to teach and learn this way? Faculty from UMBC's three online master's programs in Emergency Health Services (Maguire), Education (Oliva) and Information Systems (Seaman) will describe their experiences, and share their thoughts on what it would take to support this mode of delivery for UMBC's undergraduate curriculum. Wednesday, April 6, 1 p.m., ECS 023. To register, visit http://www.umbc.edu/brownbag.
Related Information:
Posted by fritz at 9:19 AM
College Park Teaching with Technology Conference (4/8)
The University of Maryland at College Park will hold its 12th annual Teaching with Technology Conference on Friday, April 8. There is a small fee for USM faculty & staff ($50) to cover parking and food. For more information, visit http://www.oit.umd.edu/twt/. Apologies for the late notice on this one. JF
Posted by fritz at 9:17 AM
Save the Date: Goucher College Conference on Academic Technology (5/17)
Goucher College will be hosting a Conference on Academic Technology on Tuesday, May 17. A conference website has not yet been established, but likely topics include the following:
For more information, visit Goucher's Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology or send email to ctlt@goucher.edu
Posted by fritz at 9:11 AM