OLC Accelerate 2021 Program

How can future-oriented institutions prepare graduates to handle as-yet-undefined expectations in the future? Through good teaching, educators can help learners develop their metacognition skills and growth mindsets. As a result, learners are able to plan, monitor, assess own learning, believe in their own ability to learn, and become self-motivated learners.

Computer simulations hold great utility in the area of teacher education; however, very few teacher education programs utilize them, despite excellent training outcomes and low cost. This session will provide attendees with a comprehensive and engaging overview of innovative games and simulations in the area of teacher training.

This session will help participants identify appropriate online instructional techniques to prepare small group leaders to lead effective in-person small-group learning experiences. The presenters will share examples from their own work and collaborate with participants to identify low-tech and high-tech tools that can be used in these efforts.

This session will cover a four-phase design-based research project to encourage mathematics faculty at a higher education institution to use, adapt, and create open educational resources (OER). This project reinforced differentiated instruction in college-level mathematics courses and saving students' educational costs without sacrificing the quality of instruction.

Conducting an LMS review can be daunting, but it's easier if you have clear guiding principles. In this session, learn how one institution centered their review on being open and transparent, inclusive, ethical and compliant, locally grounded, and future-proof. We'll also share examples to use in your own LMS review. 

We present cooperative research about how adaptive analytics combined with two variable domains improves the odds of student success in college algebra. We will show that demographic predictors such as grade point average can be used as mediators for metrics that respond well to instruction.  

Join representatives from online learning units from the Big Ten Academic Alliance member institutions and hear about recommended criteria for success to guide higher education in a post-pandemic landscape. This interactive session will provide opportunities for you to informally assess the state of your own organization and to explore ideas for growth.

The US Department of Education has approved a major overhaul of regulations relating to distance education that will go into effect July 1, 2021. This session will provide participants with an overview of the regulations related to regular and substantive interaction requirements for distance education.

Higher education needs to move towards a mentality of kindness in pedagogy and practice. The presenters will discuss how they implemented a process towards that through combination of active faculty course design collaborations and a focused discussion series on the different facets of the Pedagogy of Kindnes.

Student recruitment for hybrid graduate programs can pose a challenge due to a variety of factors.  Leaders can adopt the Community of Inquiry Framework to enhance student engagement in the educational experience.  This session will generate ideas to develop social, teacher, and cognitive presence during a virtual student onboarding plan.

Learning design is usually taught to faculty, but faculty are not usually the subjects of learning design. This presentation focuses on centering learning design on faculty using a variety of alternative subject matter experts to teach faculty how to operate an online course in times of crisis.

The post-inoculation phase of the pandemic has raised serious questions about right-sizing the mix of instructional modalities to meet student demand, faculty readiness, institutional capability, and regional needs while simultaneously preparing to offset future challenges to normal operations. Join us for a panel discussion with the authors of OLC’s new leadership playbook containing recommendations for institutional efficacy, strategy, and student success in the post-Pandemic digital, blended, and online learning world.

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Teaching in an online setting requires appropriately setting up and facilitating an environment that maintains the same rigor and support students receive in a face-to-face setting. With minimal funding and subsequent lack of support, teachers need to develop systems and resources on their own to ensure students remain engaged and motivated in their learning. This presentation will discuss tips, strategies, and tools that teachers can use and implement right away to provide a meaningful learning experience.

By applying an effective course quality review process to assess instructional strategies, design teams can impact student outcomes, alignment, and student satisfaction in competency-based education.  In this presentation, we will provide evidence of improved student outcomes based on applying rigorous course quality review processes in our design and development.  
 

Amid disruption and hardship, faculty reached students this past year in new and creative ways, to help them engage and keep learning. This panel will discuss how professional development in effective teaching practices empowered them through new skills and knowledge.

Join us for this presentation about the value of SARA, including cost savings that participating institutions realize. We will summarize the findings of a recent national cost savings study completed by NCHEMS, demonstrate a cost savings calculator, and share the additional benefits of SARA for states, institutions, and students.

We will share student survey results during the pandemic, and how we responded. Our University is a HSI, and also serves students from tribal communities facing health disparities. This presentation details instructional modifications and student supports, and follow-up survey results. Participants will gain ideas to support students during difficult times.

Online learning affords many benefits for students and faculty but also poses a multitude of challenges, including a lack of student motivation, engagement, and communication. This session discusses strategies for faculty to enhance student motivation, engagement, and communication with the goal of fostering a high-quality learning experience and thriving online culture for all.

With students becoming more familiar with traditional online learning tools, there is a need to create novel and innovative learning environments. The current speakers have created one such environment with an immersive, game-based activity. Weaving together concepts of problem-based learning and multimedia learning, the case-based activity allows students to self-pace through the learning experience, granting them autonomy in the learning process, and also provides compelling multimedia content that fully engages the student in the knowledge taught.

Aren’t you tired of repeating strategies and instruction to students in specialized classes?  The repetitiveness of teaching specialized concepts to students consumes the time of faculty.  Maximizing the use of time in an instructional and a coaching capacity is the most practical strategy to ensure the same information and techniques are shared with multiple students who may ask questions individually in an online forum.  In this session, learn how to recapture your time by developing interactive videos using Adobe Captivate in real-time.  Learn how to strategically share innovative content with students to reduce repetitive instruction, mentoring, and coaching time.

Confidence. Courage. Curiosity. Comfort. Community. Adult, degree-completion students who start with the Cornerstone experience better outcomes in their first course and beyond. This session examines the implementation, five Cs design, and impact of the Cornerstone and provides key takeaways for creating an online first-year experience seminar.

There are core principles that apply to the infrastructure of online learning environments.  When placed in a scenario where institutions rapidly adopt online learning, these principles are put to the test.  This session will share a case study of two very different institutions grappling with online learning environments in K-12 and Higher Education. 

A new, fully online method of delivering team-based learning (TBL) creates new training opportunities for the growing tech-savvy population of physician assistant (PA) students. This first-of-its-kind study compared the scores from physical, blended, and virtual environments. The absence of significant score differences in individual learners provides confidence in the equity of online system vs. traditional classroom settings. The presence of differences in team scores reinforces that confidence and is consistent with constructivism and TBL literature.

This presentation will enable participants to: a) apply a framework for connecting online and in-person learning; b) create a plan for engaging students throughout live class sessions; and c) utilize strategies for engaging students during live class sessions.       

Online learning presents challenges for interaction, and engaging new strategies can replicate and even improve upon classroom-level interaction. In this presentation we provide practical solutions for instructional design with small group approaches along with social media engagement, increasing interactivity while sustaining student learning outcomes.

This presentation will describe research which explores the use of indicators of empathy, regard, genuineness, and unconditionality in feedback to online students and their capacity to enhance the instructor-student relationship.  It will introduce participants to Carl Rogers' notion of person-centered learning and will include coding instruction and practice.  

The WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies (WCET) and the OLC partnered during Summer of 2021 to study how institutions effectively orient and support online adjunct faculty. The purpose of the study was to highlight hiring practices, expectations, and policies to support online adjunct faculty. This session will highlight the findings of the study and provide research-based recommendations for institutional leaders about effective practices for developing and supporting online adjunct faculty.

This study examined the factors that contributed to students with disabilities’ positive and challenging experiences transitioning to remote learning in the spring 2020 semester due to the COVID-19 pandemic at a small, two-year community college located in the mid-western United States.

Given the rapid shift to online learning, the Planning Instructional Variety for Online Teaching (PIVOT) program helped faculty better prepare for a long-term commitment to virtual instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn how PIVOT successfully incorporated faculty peer mentors to support instructors during their course design and online teaching journey.

Universal design (UD) has emerged as a paradigm for addressing diversity and equity issues in the design of a broad range of applications in education. Learn about aspects of a UD framework that you can flesh out to develop more inclusive future online learning practices at your institution.

Explore strategies on how to overcome variability and lead with versatility in current and future adaptive learning projects. Identify techniques to build strong collaboration and partnership among instructional designers and adaptive learning vendor teams.  

During Summer 2020, Northeastern University designed eighteen asynchronous “global challenge” courses, based on faculty research and using a project-based learning model centered on collaborative problem-solving. This session explains how the Canvas learning environment was leveraged to support PBL’s inductive learning approach and engage remote, first-year students in inquiry and teamwork. 

The online learning community needs to repair the public's perception of online learning in the context of the past year of emergency remote instruction. This will be a panel discussion moderated by Thomas Cavanagh where panelists will share their impressions of how to repair the reputation of online learning post-COVID.

Instructional designers (IDs) will engage in discussion about their experiences with faculty during the pandemic and the transformative changes those experiences inspired. Participants will actively engage in scenario-based activities as they reflect on ID perspectives based on three emerging themes: 

1. Redefining ID roles

2. Cultivating design thinking mindsets

3. Sustaining future partnerships

During a time when students have searched for a greater sense of belonging, Fort Hays State University intentionally created a space where students could build authentic connections. In this session, Dr. Andrew Feldstein will discuss how the community gap was identified and the impact of virtual communities.

Are you helping or creating stress for your students of color?  The difference between Equity vs Equality and its impact on teaching and learning plays a significant factor in the classroom. We MUST find ways to help our students succeed!

While traditional online program revisions rely on the calendar, learning analytics provide more precise metrics to inform priorities. During this session, presenters will share a robust framework to support using learning analytics in an instructional design unit, including ethical, privacy, and security considerations and practical strategies for operationalizing analytics.

The past year has created unprecedented workload demands for instructional designers. Simultaneously administrators require quality online courses. This presentation is a case study of what one institution did to scale and provide a model of course development both during COVID and beyond.

Instructional designers, department chairs, and faculty are invited to a tour and discussion of the Best Practices in Teaching (BPiT) curriculum. These three-week, online, discussion-based courses promote connections and relationships across disciplines and departments. Topics include inclusive pedagogy, critical thinking, student motivation, creating assignments, learning outcomes, and more.

During this presentation, an explanation of the backwards design process will be explored. Educators will learn to design comprehensive and effective courses and curriculum, that benefit the diverse needs of the learners in their classrooms. Participants will leave with practical strategies to use immediately to develop comprehensive courses and curriculum.

During the Pandemic, many activities pivoted online. Now that we can return to face-to-face, what should we keep doing virtually?  This session will share decision making matrices and qualitative considerations when planning and communicating about what should stay, what should go, and what should be revised in the new normal.

 “Postphenomenology” isn’t just the biggest word at the conference; it’s also one of the most useful tools for understanding the deep and complex web of relationships between instructors, designers, students, content, and technology. If you’ve felt like something’s missing in designing online learning, this just may be it.

In this Education Session, presenters will share their process of developing a Faculty Teaching Guide when their program moved to synchronous/asynchronous/blended.  They will provide participants with an overview of their activities, a Teaching Guide template, and an opportunity to explore how to write a guide and what content to include.

Relationships matter for successful collaborative work. Our session will feature an interactive strategy for developing collaborative relationships between faculty and instructional designers based on curiosity, enthusiasm, and mutual respect. Attendees will learn how to cultivate the kinds of successful design team relationships that create online learning environments for student success. 

The andragogy approach to instruction is to allow students to make a connection between what we are teaching, and how to apply it outside of the classroom. I will discuss how different generations of students learn, and how we can help them make that connection. 

In 2019 and 2020, we presented several recipes for adding zest to online discussions at the OLC Innovate Conferences. In this session, we’ll look closer at one recipe to see if it really works - do we have the key ingredients for a meaningful discussion in this online course? We will present our qualitative research on the efficacy of the role-play discussion strategy used in an asynchronous biology course to foster critical thinking and student engagement.  A reflection and discussion with attendees will follow the presentation to look closer at the key ingredients that are needed to design a meaningful online asynchronous discussion.

Describe your favorite Zoom session. Describe the best asynchronous discussion you've ever had. If these prompts seem almost nonsensical, it may be because online interactions are reflexively compared to what they are not rather than what they are. This session will recommend strategies for effective learner interaction in online environments.

Using Carman's five constructs of blended learning (live events, online content, collaboration, assessment, reference materials), this interactive workshop explores the use of a blended skills lab model for teaching practice skills to online students. The model will be used as a case study, offering implications for others to consider. 

Since March 2020, many instructional designers who had assisted faculty in designing in-person classes have been required to move to the remote class format. As a result of these changes in the process and class formats, we must now think – what’s next in designing for the classroom?

Realistic clinical cases, presented within the teaching platform, aim to increase realism in practical learning (meeting a variety of counseling scenarios). Topics of investigation to include creative acquisition of counseling skills in an online synchronous environment and foreseeable challenges in teaching psychology coursework in a virtual environment.

This presentation will enable participants to: a) understand the difference in instructor roles in learner-centered and learner-driven courses; b) evaluate course assignments to identify opportunities to make them more learner-driven; and c) utilize a framework to create learner-driven course activities.

The current environment within academic education and the rush during the pandemic to create remote learning has developed learner distrust of digital education. This presentation demonstrates a model of success in applying OLC standards within a quality framework at a course and curriculum level.  Unique application of data collection with learners at mid- and end-of-term provide feedback for improvement is discussed.  Speakers discuss the learning analytics in combination with data collected in areas of course design, faculty engagement, student engagement, and development of a community of learning. Data provides faculty and instructional designers with actionable information to modify learning activities.  Consolidation of data provides program leaders with the ability to easily evaluate curriculum and apply effective quality improvement and change practices. This presentation provides an overview of a school-wide quality model adapted to assure the high quality of courses while allowing faculty in higher education the freedom to develop new and innovative learning strategies and activities.

Online learning can and should be an engaging and informative experience for faculty and students. A Community of Inquiry is accomplished through the use of tools designed to facilitate interactions and best practices that enhance learning through lived experiences.  The result is a personal and more connected online course experience.

What are the current trends in online education? This 7th annual report presents insights from 366 administrators and 1,800 students, providing a look at the current challenges of remote and online education and the impact of COVID-19 on students and programs as they plan for the future.    

How do you support your campus heroes on their educational journeys? Join us in exploring a sustainable tech support model for LMS integrated tools! You will leave the session with a different approach on supporting your students, faculty, and staff to take back to your institution.

Are you an instructor looking to optimize your online or blended teaching? Maybe an instructional designer looking for ideas and tools to frame consultations and instructional development sessions with your faculty to prepare them for online or blended teaching? Or a leader working with your institution to prepare for accreditation and larger quality conversations? If so, mark your calendar for this session to learn from our panel of experts! 

We developed student-focused planning tools that provide insight into each student's needs, preparation, and preferences, as well as a system to alert faculty to student needs at key touchpoints to deepen our commitment to personalized faculty support for students. Implementation of these tools has improved student persistence and faculty efficiency.

This session explains the need for creating faculty personas by university administrators and faculty development staff using a Design Thinking Project Management Approach. It guides on how to create faculty personas by analyzing their univesity faculty at department/program/academic discipline level and then how to apply these depending on project initiatives at their university. 

The principles of feminist pedagogy can lead to learning environments that are equitable, inclusive, and engaging which are necessary elements for learning.  In this interactive session, participants will consider how to apply feminist pedagogy to their own online teaching and will workshop one assignment according to feminist pedagogical principles. Participants will also be introduced to the open-access guide, Feminist Pedagogy for Teaching Online. 

When students sense alignment between curriculum and assessment, the flow of learning can become euphoric. Immersing learners in the same platform to teach real-world skills through formative practice and to assess those skills invigorates that alignment. This presentation explores technology integrations improving alignment and online student outcomes and satisfaction.

Honorlock and the University of North Alabama partnered to conduct a detailed study on test anxiety and online proctoring. Learn about student test anxiety drivers, how we can mitigate their impact and help promote student success.

Much like gymnastics, instructors in a Blended/Flipped classroom can feel like they are competing in the floor exercise, high bar, and balance beam.  Faculty must ensure classrooms are achieving rigor and integrating student care through learner-centered instruction.  Join this workshop to score a perfect 10 on each classroom event. 

Study guides and post-exam reflections make it easy to integrate academic success tools into courses. Using the Depth of Knowledge framework, participants will discover how to revise study guides and create exam wrappers that help students better prepare for assessments.

This session will share our exploration of creative teaching practices aimed at implementing a mentoring approach, while also striving at maintaining appropriate academic rigor, in a standardized large-enrollment gen ed course. Attendees will learn how creative approaches despite standardization may lead to more positive student outcomes, such as increasing student engagement and persistence and engage in discussion to consider mentoring approaches to teaching.  

The Chairs of English and Math were tasked with developing an early alert system that was user-friendly, created in-house, and cost-effective. Using traffic signals to indicate students’ progress, Academics worked alongside IT and Tutoring. This effort increased communication, recordkeeping, faculty participation, and success.

For many students, the idea of learning math online is anxiety-filled, daunting and often insurmountable.  Given that, what could be done in an online math course to instead calm, motivate and possibly even excite those students?  Accelerate with us to see if YOU can win a BADGE!

This workshop explores 'friction' as experienced by Learning Centers when serving online degree programs. All tutoring perspectives will be examined (students, tutors, administrators). We will also discuss how Dooley's 2019 publication, Friction: The Untapped Force That Can Be Your Most Powerful Advantage, informs our work.

This session describes how pockets of faculty-led pedagogical experimentations were instrumental to the successful scaling of remote teaching and blended learning across the institution. Discover faculty development strategies for iterative and agile implementation to realize evidence-informed practices despite the absence of a unified definition of blended learning at the beginning.

Emergency remote learning vs. online learning. COVID-19 turned the education world upside down, forcing faculty members to quickly transition their courses to an online format using Learning Management Systems (LMS) and web conferencing. Now that these new teaching habits are formed, how do we ensure students receive a quality education using synchronous sessions and best online learning practices? In this session, we will discuss these misconceptions and brainstorm alternative teaching strategies. 

Can students communicate effectively about their learning experiences and levels of workforce skill development to propel them to succeed as new professionals?  This education session provides insights into one of the key findings of a workforce skills development study conducted through a partnership between the OLC and HP.  The findings highlighted the potential for learning analytics and teaching students to communicate their learning experiences and levels of workforce skill development to foster career and personal success.

This panel explores moves toward online instruction focused on relationship-building and social interactions. Sharing our ongoing work to rejuvenate online courses through the inclusion of relational focused small groups, rather than commonly-used, transactional formats of discussion, we name how this work can expand accessibility and opportunity for equity. 

Discussion boards, used to facilitate engagement in online courses, are often ineffective. How can we structure these to facilitate true engagement? We will present effective strategies and resources in bringing real discourse into asynchronous discussion, as well as engage the audience at large as to what worked for their institutions.

Let’s face it: Faculty development programs are in serious need of revitalization. Inject new life into them by thinking outside the workshop. Join us to learn how we reconceptualized the program at our institution by designing experiences such as a Virtual Community of Practice, a Best Practices showcase, a mentoring program, and interactive mini courses. Leave the session with tools and resources to inject new life into your own faculty development program!

This presentation will pull together resources and techniques across the field of film production, marketing, and technology to create a decision-making framework and an instructor’s toolbox of techniques to develop high quality video-based instruction.  Participants will engage in discussion and quick practice about recommendations and techniques outlined in this presentation.  As a result of this work, instructors will be better positioned to make choices about how best to translate their content into engaging materials for students.  Participants will be able to: 1) examine recommendations across research and practice that can be applied to designing video-based instruction, 2) apply content creation techniques to their own video-based instruction, and 3) utilize a choice framework for content creation that suites their purpose, skill set, time, and audience.

Restorative practice is a relationship strategy about caring and empathy to help faculty manage power imbalances more effectively in digital learning. We will present a restorative practice learning model, including resilience and student grit. Participants apply the restorative practice in scenarios using six restorative questions to influence student success.

Federal regulations, Federal laws to serve Veterans, reciprocity requirements, and state laws require notifications when institutions offer professional programs face-to-face and by distance education.  Participants will leave this session understanding the varying requirements for notifications and will brainstorm practical steps to ensure compliance and serve students with transparency.

Most teachers have limited experience with digital games when it comes to integrating them into the classroom. This session covers the implementation and evaluation of an online professional development on gamification for K-12 teachers.The course content and the evaluation findings will be shared. 

It is often said "technology shouldn’t determine pedagogy." While in general a technology should not limit an instructor's practices, this session will discuss how technology should indeed challenge instructors to reconsider "habits" that are just assumed to be "best practice." Perceived limitations may actually be invitations to digital transformation.