Online Learning in the News

This week, FYI, we offer a few links for you to browse: recent news or commentary about Online Learning in general. Please feel free to comment, or share any such links you’ve bookmarked, in the CCCOnline Community.

“Myths of Online Education” by Steve Kolowich (10/21/11)
“Educational technologists defend online education” at recent Educause conference (Inside Higher Ed):
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/10/21/educational-technologists-defend-online-education

“QuickWire: Online-Learning Growth Is Confirmed by Education Dept. Report” by Josh Fischman (10/5/11)
From The Chronicle’s “Wired Campus” blog:
http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/quickwire-online-learning-growth-is-confirmed-by-education-dept-report/33537

“The Digital Revolution and Higher Education” by Kim Parker, Amanda Lenhart and Kathleen Moore (8/28/11)
From the Pew Research Center:
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/08/28/the-digital-revolution-and-higher-education/1/

A series of posts from Frank Donoghue at The Chronicle’s “Innovations” blog:
“Online Learning: Good, Bad, Inevitable” (7/12/11)
http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/online-learning-good-bad-inevitable/29814
“The Strengths of Online Learning?” (7/18/11)
http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/the-strengths-of-online-learning/29849
“Another Look at the Weaknesses of Online Learning” (7/27/11)
http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/more-on-weaknesses-on-online-learning/29888
“Online Learning: Final Concerns” (8/1/11)
http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/online-learning-final-concerns/29947

Also from The Chronicle:
“Community-College Students Perform Worse Online Than Face to Face” by Ryan Brown (7/18/11)
http://chronicle.com/article/Community-College-Students/128281/

“Why Are So Many Students Still Failing Online?” by Rob Jenkins (5/22/11)
http://chronicle.com/article/Why-Are-So-Many-Students-Still/127584/?sid=gn

Links to The Sloan Consortium’s surveys. The most recent one is “Class Differences: Online Education in the United States, 2010.”
http://sloanconsortium.org/publications/survey/index.asp

Meet CCCOnline’s Liberal Arts & Communication Team

This week, we hope you enjoy getting to know your Liberal Arts & Communication team!

Karla Schorzman, Associate Dean of Liberal Arts & Communication
Karla joined the CCCOnline academic team this February, and formerly served as full time faculty and chair of the Brighton Center of Front Range Community College. A seasoned instructor, Karla has for seven years taught online and face-to-face English and Sociology classes at most community colleges from Colorado Springs to Loveland; she also taught at Metro State and one for-profit college.

Karla’s artistic talents are numerous. She is an avid writer and featured poet at the Colorado Poets Center. She also enjoys quilting and cross-stitch embroidery; one of her projects won a blue ribbon in a recent Adams County fair. As a Colorado native, she appreciates the state’s natural beauty while hiking and camping, and as a hot springs enthusiast, she aims to visit every hot springs area in the western US.

Daniel Metz, Arts and Humanities Program Chair
Daniel Metz has been involved with CCCOnline for eight years, serving as chair of the Arts and Humanities program, and as a philosophy and humanities instructor. Daniel also currently serves as the CCCS chair of philosophy. Prior to these endeavors, he taught philosophy, cultural studies and EFL in Japan, and retains an interest in Japanese philosophy and art.

Daniel considers teaching a privilege: “In my view, teaching is really about opening doors to different perspectives, and facilitating the learning process. This process involves each learner encountering new ideas and new ways of looking at the world, and developing critical thinking skills in order to better understand other perspectives, and in doing so, broadening one's own.”

Other activities that vie for his attention include hiking, viewing art, engaging in existential naval gazing, and enjoying musical performances, in particular, contemporary symphonic works. Daniel relates, “I am gratified for the opportunity to contribute to our collaborative effort to strive for the best quality of education in the online environment.”

Kyla Hammond, Composition and Writing Program Chair
Dr. Hammond has over 16 years' experience in education, serving as a faculty member, professional development coordinator, and higher education administrator. She holds a BA in Humanities, an MA in Communication, another MA in Curriculum and Instruction, and a Ph.D. in Literature. She began her career in K-12 education, teaching English and Speech at Air Academy High School and then serving as a Professional Development Coordinator.

For seven years, she was Executive Director of Extended Studies and Global Programs for the College of Education at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, overseeing enrollment management and extended studies, which include all online and international programs. Her areas of expertise are implementing entrepreneurial models in higher education, enrollment management, strategic planning, organizational leadership, and innovative programming. She lives in Colorado with her husband and twin 4-year-old girls, and enjoys traveling, reading, and yoga.

Jerilyn Heinicke, Language and Communication Program Chair
I'm Jerilyn Heinicke. I've moved around a good bit, but my roots are definitely from the triangle where one crosses so very easily from West Virginia into Pennsylvania across that narrow strip of Maryland. My studies did not take a straight path. I took a few extra years to complete my master's work so that I could help out at the family restaurant. After finishing my Ph.D. coursework, I needed to find employment while I wrote my dissertation. It was a blessing that I believed the Air Force recruiter when he said that serving my country would be a 9 to 5 operation, with plenty of time for writing. Although I didn't write a word on my dissertation for the five years that I was in the Air Force, I did have experiences that I wouldn't trade for anything in the world, from working with the Japanese Air Force in Sendai to deploying with the New River Marines.

After the five years, I moved to Germany, a hop, step and jump from the border with France. . . I found the time to raise my four military "brats," finish my dissertation, and resume teaching. I've taught English composition, literature, Humanities, French language and literature, and German language and literature, almost exclusively online.

In 2004, I joined CCCOnline. I have seen tremendous growth over the years. The first administrative position that I held was chair of a department that included Communications, English, Literature, and all the foreign languages. Today, I am chair for Languages and Communication, which has grown to nearly the same size.

In my spare time, I raise yaks, llamas, and colored angora goats -- all fiber animals. Throw in a horse, a few chickens, a couple of pigs, and guinea fowl (wonderful bug eaters), and my spare time is filled up.

Beth Davies-Stofka, Literature and Developmental Education Program Chair
I began teaching for FRCC in 1995 and for the University of Denver in 1996, but then I wandered off to Indiana to join the theology faculty at Valparaiso University. That led me to a fork in the road: to continue with full-time teaching, or to go do something which, in my mind at least, was more challenging. I chose the challenge and joined the Network Operations Center at Rhythms NetConnections in 1998. Few things could have been more challenging! Talk about lifelong learning! After working my way up to Network Management Engineer, running the fault and performance management of a busy Wide Area Network and providing Tier IV troubleshooting support to the NOC, I *finally* finished my dissertation in 2003, left telecommunications, and went on an amazing two-month solo road trip around the Great Lakes. Meanwhile, in 2001, FRCC had welcomed me back to teaching. In 2004, I stopped F2F teaching entirely, devoting myself fully to FRCC's online teaching.

I regard online learning as a potent force for the practical uses of emergent technology to educate a sophisticated, tech-savvy, and entrepreneurial citizenship. In my view, every student is on the precipice of success or failure, and it's our job as teachers to help all of them to succeed. They may not experience success while in our care, but the faith we have in them and the life lessons we share will stay with them their whole lives. We must never miss an opportunity to encourage.

2011 Conference Presentation Links Available!

Thanks to all our super CCCOnline instructors, staff, and sponsors who made this year’s Annual Conference a success. Here is a link to our Conference Archive page, where you’ll find copies of the presentations.

In the CCCOnline Community, please feel free to relate your conference experiences, comments, and anything you learned and would like to share.

National Information Literacy Month

Today, we have a message from Mary Cash, CCCOnline’s Instructional Online Librarian:

President Obama has declared October to be National Information Literacy Month. In our busy, technological world, we are inundated by information – thanks to the Internet, we can learn new information, share ideas and photos and communicate instantly. It’s very easy to become overwhelmed. According to President Obama, “Rather than merely possessing data, we must also learn the skills necessary to acquire, collate, and evaluate information for any situation. This new type of literacy also requires competency with communication technologies, including computers and mobile devices that can help in our day-to-day decision making. National Information Literacy Awareness Month highlights the need for all Americans to be adept in the skills necessary to effectively navigate the Information Age” (Presidential Proclamation).

What can we do to help our students gain the skills they need to navigate the busy world of information? We can offer them information and guidance so that they know when they need to seek out information, how to locate the specific information they need, and then what to do with it once they find it. We can create lessons and assignments so our students can practice those skills and become better consumers of information. Need some assistance or ideas on how to do this? As the instructional online librarian, information literacy is a huge interest of mine, and I’ll be glad to sit down and talk to you about little or even big things you can do in your course to help your students learn to manage the information in their worlds.

· Read the President’s Proclamation: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/presidential-proclamation-national-information-literacy-awareness-month/

· Visit the National Forum on Information Literacy’s website:
http://infolit.org/

-Mary Cash
Instructional Online Librarian
CCCOnline