Mission Critical e-Learning: How Blackboard is Meeting the Tailored Needs of Community College Campuses

Slide 1: Mission Critical e-Learning: How Blackboard is Meeting the Tailored Needs of Community College Campuses 30th International Conference on Teaching and Leadership Excellence May 25-28th, 2008 Austin, Texas Eric Kunnen ekunnen@grcc.edu Coordinator of Instructional Technologies Grand Rapids Community College Matt Davis mdavis@blackboard.com Senior Solutions Engineer Blackboard 1

Slide 2: Agenda • Introductions and purpose of this session • About GRCC • Issues, Challenges, Needs, and Goals • Blackboard @ GRCC • Enhancing Courses and Teaching Practice • Building Communication and Connection • Providing Online Student Services • Extending and Expanding the Platform • Questions & Comments 2

Slide 3: Purpose  Explain how GRCC is meeting 3 critical challenges – Building a strong sense of community for students – Providing the right help, at the right time, for the right student – Building a rich ‘academically oriented’ experience that entices and engages students  This will help explain how GRCC meets 3 critical challenges • Student Retention • Student ‘turn at the door’ • Student Remediation – When we are finished, you will have had clear examples of how this could work on your campus 3

Slide 4: Backdrop: This session is….  Not about a course management systems  Not about purely distance learning programs  Not about putting a course syllabus up  Is about solving the really challenging problems  Is about the strategic use of a platform to meet those challenges  It about elements you can begin to use immediately following this conference 4

Slide 6: About Grand Rapids Community College  Established in 1914  One of 28 Community Colleges in Michigan  Main Downtown Campus in Grand Rapids  2 Technical Education Centers  15,000+ Students per semester in Full and Part-time Studies  10,000+ Students in Non-credit Courses 6

Slide 8: Issues, Challenges, Needs, and Goals  Improve student retention by meeting the changing needs of today’s totally wired students  Getting help to students when and where they need it, in a format that is flexible and responsive  Building a strong sense of community to keep students engaged  Building an environment that draws students in to a rich, academically oriented social experience 8

Slide 9: Everything we do with the Blackboard platform at GRCC is designed to meet these challenges. Let’s see how we do it… 9

Slide 11: Enhancing Courses and Teaching Practice Online, Hybrid, Web Enhancement/Engagement, New Capabilities  Online Courses – Bb is the Classroom  Hybrid Courses – Reduced Seat Time  Traditional Courses – Enhancement and Engagement  Faculty and Staff Professional Development  Assessment of General Learner Outcomes  Service Learning 11

Slide 12: Building Communication and Connection Personalization, Role Based Information, Connection The MODULES  – Campus Announcements – Faculty Absences – Chronicle Wired Campus – Inside Higher Ed – Raider Grill Specials – Quick Polls – What’s New The TABS  – Student E-mail – Library – Scholar – Student Center – Community Tab – RaiderCard – eMarketplace 12

Slide 13: Building Communication and Connection Student Organizations, Departments, Teams, & Committees  Secure Content/Document & Idea Sharing  Communication  Easy-to-use Web Publishing  Tracking  Off Campus Access to Information & Documents  A Few Examples – Student Senate – Academic Senate & AGC – Strategy Team – Nursing Department – FIPSE and AT&T Grant – Registrar – Training Materials and Reference – Business Department – sharing materials, ideas, activities – Tutoring – training, communication, sharing 13

Slide 14: Building Communication and Connection Crisis and Course Messaging, Community Discussion Boards, IM  Crisis and Course TXT Messaging with clearTXT  Instant Messaging with Wimba Pronto  Open Discussion Forums  Bb Scholar Bookmark Sharing 14

Slide 15: Providing Online Student Services Student ID, Door Access, eCommerce, Orientation, Student Support Tutoring (Online Communication and Tracking)  Student Employee Communication   Student Orientation Student Support Services   RaiderCard eMarketplace  Door Access   Vending Parking   Food Service 15

Slide 16: Extending and Expanding the Platform Blackboard Building Blocks  Advanced Group Management  Open source Podcast Tool  Blackboard Scholar  Blackboard SafeAssign  Wimba Voice Tools  Wimba Pronto  clearTXT – Text Messaging  Learning Objects Blogs and Wikis  GRCC Photo Roster  And more… 16

Slide 17: Into the Future… The Next Generation Reporting and CMS metrics  Portfolios for students and faculty  Web-based file sharing  Building and sharing Quality & Exemplary courses  Enhancing YouTube and iTunes U course content  Extending communication to Mobile Devices  Investigating Assessment potential via Outcomes  Leveraging academic social networking via Blackboard Sync, etc.  Eric 17

Slide 18: Matt 18

Slide 19: In conclusion  We’ve seen examples of how you can effectively solve some key, very strategic issues. – Student Retention – Student Remediation – Turn at the Door Rates  Using a platform from Blackboard that is cost effective, easy to use and in many cases, already in place. 19

Slide 21: Thank You!  Questions, Discussion, and Comments Eric Kunnen ekunnen@grcc.edu Coordinator of Instructional Technologies Grand Rapids Community College Matt Davis mdavis@blackboard.com Senoir Solutions Engineer Blackboard 21

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