Back in February I gave a presentation on virtual services at the Instructional Technology Council Annual eLearn 2012 Conference in Long Beach, California (www.itcnetwork.org). You can view the presentation HERE.
I am currently coordinating the maintenance and college-wide rollout of the following virtual student support services, as well as marketing strategies, and was recently invited to present at faculty colloquium in January 2013 on the virtual services developed from the work of the Title III grant.
■ Virtual Front Door
A one-stop point of access was needed to all services necessary for student success at Tri-C, and the Title III grant initiated the design and development of the Virtual Front Door (VFD). On this initiative I served as the Project Manager, grant Activity Director and VFD Committee Member due to my background in marketing and website design and development.
The process began with an analysis of the type of content that students would find useful in their higher education experience, as well as an inventory of available online student services. Once the data was evaluated, a student focus group was organized and determined that the content for the Virtual Front Door should replace the current college credit and degree page. A design firm was contracted to develop the site, which would ultimately serve as a model for the entire college website. Faculty, staff and student usability studies were completed during development.
The site was launched in July 2009, and there are currently over 300,000 page views per month. You can experience the Virtual Front Door at www.tri-c.edu/credit/Pages/default.aspx.
■ Online Orientations at Tri-C
The online eLearning and New Student Orientations initiatives are examples of a cross-collaboration and partnership between Student Affairs, Enrollment Management, Counseling Directors, Counseling Faculty, Instructional Faculty, ITS Desktop Support/EAS/Help Desk, Marketing, Campus TLCs including LAN support, eLearning & Innovation and various consultants who all worked in conjunction to develop tools that would prepare and guide our students for a successful experience at Tri-C.
As the acting Project Manager I was the liaison to various departments and the vendor developing the orientations. I also provided the bulk of testing regarding development while fulfilling the role of course developer. When the New Student Orientation system went live, I served as help desk support and managed the college-wide Communication Strategy in support of the rollout.
eLearning Orientation (eLearn) contains interactive content to help students succeed in an online environment. Topics include time management, computer and internet technology and using Blackboard through video tutorials. This rich, interactive environment provides students with the skills they need as digital learners—and particularly for online and blended courses. The eLearn orientation can be accessed with a student number or by guests at https://portal2.tri-c.edu/OnlineOrientation/Home/LoginEliO
When the orientation is accessed with a student number we can track individual outcomes and course progression. This data helps us understand if those using the orientation perform better or progress to degree completion. The system will also keep track of the content accessed by the student so that returning students know what they have already reviewed at a glance.
Another e-student service is the newly re-designed Online New Student Orientation (O-NSO) which is accessible via mobile devices and contains ‘check your understanding’ quiz functionality. Engaging videos feature information on financial aid, counseling, the enrollment center, campus police and other College resources. Students will receive step-by-step tutorials on using My Tri-C Space, how to search, register and pay for classes, and order books online.
The O-NSO was designed to be a resource for the entire college community of students, faculty and staff, and can be accessed with mobile devices. You can view the interactive, content-rich information about student life at Tri-C at https://portal2.tri-c.edu/OnlineOrientation/Home/nsointro.
When accessed with a student number we can track their outcomes, and upon the completion of the orientation the student’s registration hold will be lifted so that they can immediately register for classes. Previously, students had to bring a printed proof of completion and administrative staff had to go into the student information system and lift the hold on registration. This enhancement to the orientation has saved many man hours and also allows for immediate registration by the student in a time where every registration matters.
Both orientations can be accessed at https://portal2.tri-c.edu/OnlineOrientation and I hope you will spend time reviewing these new student resources.
■ eAdvising (online Academic Advising)
Noting that our students cannot always visit the campus for advising services, it was determined that we needed to provide Academic Advising via the web. In June 2009, eAdvising services were made available via the completion of a web form which then generated an email to a public folder. In the beginning, emails were answered by a single counselor and by 2011 there were seven responding counselors. My role as Project Manager included Activity Director for the grant and eAdvising Committee Member.
Because public email was not sustainable (manually counting of inquiries) and lacked integration of the eAdvising content into the student notes (available to all counselors), we set out to overhaul the system. In 2011, I coordinated the work of a sub-set of the eAdvising Committee to access the business and system processes necessary for a large-scale system, and a online Scheduling system was implemented as a result. Information Technology Services realized that the new system could be developed to integrate the eAdvising system identified in the business/systems analysis and in 2012, and a new system was established and launched. In that time I acted as the liaison between ITS, the scheduling systems vendor, the Directors of Counseling and the Counselors providing the eAdvising services.
The new system made the process considerably less time consuming, which the Counselors recognized immediately. You can access the student portion of eAdvising at http://www.tri-c.edu/counseling/Pages/E-AdvisingRequestInformation.aspx. Begin by clicking the ‘I Agree button’ and create a guest account.
■ Online Tutoring
Since not all of our students can be tutored on campus, the college launched online tutoring using Smarthinking services (www.smarthinking.com). The Smarthinking online tutoring services were made available in June 2009 and by the end of October 2012 we had over 7,500 tutoring sessions totaling over 4,000 hours.
My role was as Project Manager and Activity Director, providing guidance to the Online Tutoring Committee on the implementation of the tutoring services and acting as liaison with the Smarthinking vendor. I was also an active member of the Online Tutoring Committee, helping them to pilot online tutoring with Tri-C tutors. Tri-C is now piloting online tutoring with an Ohio eTutoring Consortium and an analysis will be conducted in 2013 to understand what types of online tutoring services will be sustained when the Title III funds are no longer available for Smarthinking.