Districtwide Distance Education Steering Committee (DDESC) Meeting Notes for September 14, 2015 12:00-1:30 p.m. Mesa College LRC 435

Attendees

Ailene Crakes, Gwyn Enright, Dave Giberson, Kats Gustafson, Mary Kingsley, Rechelle Mojica, Jeff Mills, Jane Newcomb, Katie Palacios, Sandra Pesce, Angela Romero, Claudia Tornsaufer and Jenny Wright

Meeting Notes

The Committee reviewed the meeting notes from the May 4 meeting. Notes were approved. All meeting notes are posted to http://www.sdccdonline.net/handbook/

Introduction

Kats welcomed the group to the first meeting of the year. All members introduced themselves and welcomed new member, Jenny Wright. Jenny is the Dean of Learning Resources and Academic Support for Mesa College.

Canvas

Kats solicited help from DDESC members to get the conversation started at their campuses about the possibility of changing our Learning Management System (LMS) to Canvas. Canvas is the chosen LMS for the State’s CCC Online Education Initiative (OEI.) The OEI is offering schools a Canvas license at no cost for the first four years. Right now the OEI is busy launching Canvas at the 8 OEI Pilot campuses for the OEI Course Exchange. It was reported that there are about forty other campuses waiting to convert to Canvas through the OEI. Kats reported that ’15-’16 is the third year of the District’s 3-year contract with Blackboard. Kats said that because the District is undergoing the ERP implementation that it is more likely that the District will extend the Blackboard license for at least one more year through ’16-’17. She added that Canvas does offer the possibility of running parallel systems. Kats wants to make sure that economics is not the only reason that the District switches to Canvas. Kats would like to have faculty be the driving force behind any LMS change. Claudia hopes for an LMS comparison before an educated decision is made. Kats has invited Blackboard Inc. to present to SDCCD a few weeks after the Summit. Rechelle questioned the initial decision on selecting Canvas. Kats reported that she was told that ‘Canvas suits student’s needs and is more intuitive and more user- friendly than Blackboard.’ All SDICCCA colleges are facing the same situation. Kats said that after discussing Canvas at the upcoming DE Summit she can start to have serious conversations with the campuses. Canvas does offer free sandbox course shells for educators hoping to try it out to compare.

OEI Pilots

Kats discussed the OEI’s Student Readiness Pilot. The OEI has a student orientation that hopes to achieve student readiness for online learning in order to achieve higher student success. Non-pilot schools are allowed access to the OEI’s student readiness tutorials. Dave has posted the tutorials to our website and Kats encouraged members to review. Gwyn wanted to know if there was any follow-up for students who did not achieve well in readiness assessment to provide them necessary resources. Kats replied that there are no follow up resources to date. Dave described that the SmarterMeasure tool is a better identifier of student strengths and weaknesses.

2015-2016 Goals

The group reviewed the goals set last year. Kats reported that at current SDOLP staffing levels the goals were unrealistic. After Kats met with the current VCI, she has knocked off five of the original goals. She has decided to focus on 1) Increase the number of faculty certifications; 2 Increase the number of faculty attending workshops; 3 Evaluate the certification program; 4) Revise student satisfaction survey; 5) Develop online student assistance modules; and 6) Develop a survey to assess the quality of online courses. Kats asked the group for volunteers to help develop a survey to assess the quality of online courses. Rechelle, Gwyn, Claudia, and Jenny Wright all offered to help.

Distance Education Handbook

Kats distributed the Draft SDCCD Online Learning Pathways 2015 ‘Distance Education Handbook.’ She asked DDESC members to review the handbook and provide feedback.

2015 Distance Learning Summit

SDOLP staff has been working hard to offer the regional 2015 Distance Learning Summit on Friday, October 9th, 8:30AM - 3:30PM, Continuing Ed. North City Center (NCC,) 8355 Aero Dr., San Diego, CA 92123, Multi-Purpose Room. Flex Credit is available. District Flex #84048 CE Flex #18077 Kats hopes to see all in attendance.

Meetings using Zoom

Kats surveyed the group about holding DDESC meetings online via Zoom. The group agreed that one meeting a semester will be held in person with all other meetings to be scheduled online. For ’15-’16 the September 14 and February 8 meetings will be held face-to-face.

Next Meeting: Virtual via Zoom, Monday, October 12, 12:00 - 1:30 p.m.

Respectfully submitted: Mary Kingsley