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ELFH 686: The Two-Year College is a core course in the professional specialization of students enrolled in the Master of Arts in Higher Education and the Postsecondary Administration track in the Doctor of Philosophy in Educational Leadership offered at the University of Louisville. The course is offered in both online and face-to-face formats. The online course is an important part of the online degree of the Master of Arts in Higher Education.
The online course is oriented toward the professional practice of higher education administrators at two-year institutions or who are involved in some way with the administration or policy issues pertinent to associate degree-granting colleges. Using leadership theory and current research, the course addresses the contemporary issues confronting the governance and administration of two-year colleges, especially those pertaining to students, faculty, leadership, academics, workforce development, and community education. The course is structured in a writing-intensive format.
The didactic portion of the course is delivered through an introduction and a series of ten modules. In addition to readings supporting each module, instruction is delivered through a multimedia presentation that includes an audio-video of the instructor speaking to the student, audio, text and graphics. The multimedia portion of the course constitutes an integrated delivery mechanism that provides the instruction for each module. The multimedia presentation for each module also includes an articulated set of learning outcomes, required and recommended readings, and discussion questions.
To give students an initial face-to-face style contact, I recorded a video introduction to kick off the course. View the introduction module here.
I also have a faculty homepage students can visit to learn more about me.
Module One - The Social and Philosophical Foundations of the Two-Year College
Upon completion of the reading and viewing of the multimedia presentation, each module requires student participation in a discussion board. The instructor articulates the major policy and leadership issues that emerge from the module and each student is required to comment on them and respond to their colleagues. Each student must contribute a minimum of 200 words in order to insure that they provide sufficient depth and critical thinking about the topic. Students are required to “think in paragraphs” and focus their writing on the topic; chats on irrelevant or even peripheral topics do not count. Each student must start one discussion thread and respond to at least one discussion thread.
Example from the Discussion Board:
Some of you have taken on-line courses before; others of you have not. All of us, however, will have some expectations and perhaps some anxieties about taking a web-based, fully on-line course. In this folder, I would like for you to discuss any concerns, feelings or expectations you have about taking this course. For instance, what are your motivations for taking an on-line course? What do you expect to be different from or similar to face to face courses? What advantages and disadvantages do you expect in taking an on-line course?
Please post your contributions to this forum by January 17, 2006.
After the due date for each discussion board, the instructor writes an essay responding to the major themes or issues arising in the students’ discussion. The instructor’s essay is posted in the announcements in Blackboard. Thus, the interaction between faculty and student has a collective dimension, as it would in a physical class. In addition, the instructor responds to e-mails or comments in the discussion board that require an individualized response.
Sample of Announcement to Class on Module Two Discussion:
Bravo!! Once again, thank you for a very lively and informative discussion for Module Two. I believe that your discussion for this module is exemplearly engaged with the major ideas of the module and you were clearly learning from each other. Keep up the great work.
In the limited space and time I have to respond to your postings for this module, I thought that I would comment on a few issues that were discussed in the forum: (1) measurement and data on the success of student transfers, (2) recognition and marketing the successes of community colleges and other two-year institutions, and (3) the concern about the impact of enrollment growth on the capacity of institutions to serve students. I will respond to the other major issues in succeeding commentary.
I thought your discussion on student transfer issues was very perceptive and foreshadowed other issues and topics that we will address in more depth later in the semester. One of these concerns the measurement of succcess rates of students who transfer from community colleges to baccalaureate granting institutions. This has been an important and difficult issue for higher education at least since the 1960s. There has been considerable progress, but problems still remain and there is enough blame to be spread around pretty widely. One of the big problems that persists is that we do not have a common platform of information or observations about the reality of transfer and transfer problems to have a collective sense of exactly what and where the problems are ... and what needs to be done. My students and I have researched the issue pretty thoroughly and have discovered that vast amounts of data are collected by state higher education boards, such as the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education and the Utah Board of Regents, but it is typically not analyzed in any systematic way that would lead tochanges or initiatives in the policy environment. In short, the issues of data management and assessment must become priorities in the policy community if we are going to move forward on the transfer issue. The good news is that there is increasing recognition of the point that the policy problem resides at the state level; institutions need help from the state in order to effectively "track" student mobility and success. In addition, new software packages are enabling students to plan their curricula better by having access to how courese they take at the community college "counts" at the four-year institution. So, continued progress is dependent upon information systems and assessments that focus on the success of student transfers.
Please click here for the full announcement.
Each student is expected to develop a home page within the course website that includes person background and a digital picture.
There are two main venues for how reciprocity and cooperation are promoted among students. As indicated in 1 above, the course includes definite expectations for student participation and interaction in the discussion board that include rules regarding civility and cooperative learning. Students are advised that they are not competing with each other in the discussion board and that part of the expectations for their participation is that they contribute to each other’s learning.
In addition, students are graded on their participation in the discussion board using five standards or criteria:
Beyond the requirements for participation in the discussion board, the four writing assignments in the course are the culmination of active learning experiences. One of the assignments in the course has been selected as a “Hallmark Assessment” for the Master of Arts in Higher Education and the Postsecondary Administration track in the Doctor of Philosophy in Educational Leadership. This assessment requires students to research and analyze the governance, administration and organization of a community college system. For the Spring 2006 semester, Maricopa Community Colleges in Phoenix, Arizona has been selected as the unit of analysis. The assignment requires students to explore and discover several facets of the governance, administration and organization of Maricopa Community Colleges and write an eight-page essay on their discoveries. The assignment includes seven components that students must address. The assessment is also scored by a faculty committee using a rubric that includes the five standards described above: completion, clarity, appeal, organization and demonstrated learning. The instructor, of course, uses the same standards and is responsible for grading the assignment in the course.
The course includes similar active learning experiences (and grading rubrics) in the analysis of research on two-year colleges and the national and state organizations that govern or serve two-year colleges.
The instructor responds to all e-mails or queries within 24 hours as a matter of personal policy. In fact, the instructor recently received a “Faculty Favorite” Award from UofL. One of the qualities cited was his responsiveness to students.
The instructor responds to each of the discussion boards with an essay, as described above, within five days of their completion.
All papers are graded and evaluation forms returned to students within five days.
The course places a premium on time on task. The evidence supporting this point is found in the minimum number of contributions and responses student must post on each discussion board. The minimum number of words students must contribute to discussion board for each module and the number of expected pages in their four writing assignments.
There is no magic in establishing minimum expectations for student time on task. However, threshold criteria help students develop a “gestalt” of the expectations for assignments. They also have the consequence of forcing students to deepen and enrich their descriptions, understandings, and explanations in all of their analytical and writing assignments. This is especially important in the Hallmark Assessment, but it is characteristic of all assignments in the course.
Students are advised at the beginning of the course that the workload is challenging. The instructor has a deserved reputation for demanding high quality work.
The primary way in which the course communicates high expectations to students is through the course syllabus, which describes the assignments and establishes the criteria used to grade papers and score the Hallmark Assessment. The syllabus identifies the grading criteria and indicates that each paper must have an introduction that includes a clear purpose statement, an outline of what is to follow, and a hook that reflects the student’s passion for the topic and that generates interest on the part of the reader. Each of which is important in the communications of higher education administrators.
In addition, as part of the assessment process in the College of Education and Human Development, student work for the Hallmark Assessment are posted in an electronic portfolio that is available to students and reviews through the LiveText website.
Exemplary papers on other assignments are frequently posted on the course website, with student permission, as a way of recognizing outstanding performance and providing guidance, clarification, and encouragement to other students.
Arguably the most significant way in which high expectation are communicated is through the standards that have been articulated as grading criteria for all assignments and facets of the course. The standards were developed by the professor following a review of composition and critical thinking literature on how to promote and assess intellectual development in writing-intensive courses. The criteria are included on the evaluation forms for each assignment, as indicated in the rubric for the Hallmark Assessment. By the end of the semester, each student is acutely aware of the importance and value of the criteria for their work in the course and in their profession.
Academic programs that aim at the cultivation of effective and successful higher education administrators must recognize not only the diversity of learning styles among adults, but the important point that professional practice requires multiple talents and skills. The course aims to include not only the diversity of talent among its students, but to promote student development in as many administrative skills as possible.
While we have not implemented methods to integrate verbal communication skills in a web-based course (we are working on it!), the course emphasizes written communication skills appropriate for mid-level and senior higher education administrators in both formal (through papers) and less formal (the discussion board) venues. Some students are stronger on the discussion board than they are in their papers; others are just the opposite. Some are stronger in using web technologies. Others are stronger in research, analysis and critical thinking. Some are more creative than others. Some are more comfortable with change and innovation. The goal is to help each develop their own talents so that they can function effectively in administrative roles. This can only be achieved by triangulating learning experiences and course assessments to tap into divergent skills and encourage improvement in areas where they are needed. Hence, the course includes a variety of assignments and assessments within the framework of a writing-intensive experience.