National Distance Learning Week to Celebrate Online Growth and Accomplishments

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The University of Arkansas will celebrate National Distance Learning Week, Nov. 10-14, by sharing the stories of successful online students and recognizing the campuswide effort to enhance and expand distance education.

The celebration week, sponsored by the United States Distance Learning Association, seeks to promote and celebrate the tremendous growth and accomplishments occurring in distance learning programs offered by schools, businesses and governmental departments.

“What stands out at University of Arkansas is the campuswide commitment to enhance online education,” said Javier Reyes, vice provost for distance education and head of the Global Campus. “The academic departments and support units across campus are working together to provide more students access to our top-tier public research university, its support services, and its high-quality programs and courses.”

Later this week, stories on Newswire will spotlight successful students who study or studied online at the University of Arkansas. Students will share what online education means to them and their careers.

Students now have more online learning options at the university than ever before, Reyes said. The university is stewarding its efforts and resources in such a way that faculty expertise, academic reputation and technology are combined to develop and deliver faculty-driven, high-quality online, distance and workforce education programs and courses.

In fiscal year 2014, the University of Arkansas received state approval to launch five new online programs – including the bachelor’s degree in general business from the Sam M. Walton College of Business and the master’s degree in agricultural and food law from the School of Law.

A full list of the university’s online programs and offerings are showcased on the University of Arkansas ONLINE website.

Growth of Online Learning

The university can celebrate its online enrollment growth. In fall 2014, Suzanne McCray, vice provost for enrollment, announced that 7,444 students are enrolled in at least one online class. The number represents a 21.6 percent increase over last year and a 506 percent increase since 2008.

About 1,550 students are studying solely online in fall 2014. This number is expected to climb as more prospective students discover they can enroll in new online degree programs, such as the bachelor’s degree in general business.

The Global Campus promotes the university’s online programs through paid digital and print advertising on state and national platforms, including an Internet marketing campaign now underway. Its recruiting team travels across the state and into contiguous regions to meet prospective students at career fairs, conferences, two-year institutions and employer sites. These marketing and recruitment efforts are intended to complement efforts by the individual academic colleges and schools.

The increase in online enrollment is a national trend. Data from the Online Learning Consortium, formerly known as SloanC, shows that 7.1 million higher education students now take at least one online course, and the number of online learners is expected to double in the next five years.

Many faculty members across the U of A campus have taken steps to enhance their professional knowledge about online and distance learning techniques, as identified through research and best practices. In fiscal year 2014, 179 faculty and staff participated in workshops that covered topics such as quality, accessibility and interactive design.

To date, 19 U of A faculty and staff are certified Quality Matters peer reviewers, and 53 have completed the “Applying the Quality Matters Rubric” workshop, brought to Fayetteville by the Global Campus.

Quality Matters, a non-profit program of Maryland Online Inc., is a leader in quality assurance for online education in the United States. This faculty-centered program is nationally recognized for its continuous contributions to the improvement of online education.

U of A faculty and instructors worked with instructional designers at the Global Campus to develop 87 new online courses during fiscal year 2014, and 26 more courses are being developed so far in fall 2014.

Campuswide Support

The University of Arkansas recognized the growing need to enhance and expand online and distance education programs and ramped up efforts in 2012 by realigning the Global Campus to better support campuswide online and distance education efforts, based on different units’ academic strategic plans.

During National Distance Learning Week, faculty and staff from across the campus can join a series of online discussions presented by the Online Learning Consortium on key distance learning topics via live Google Hangouts. On-demand videos will be available afterward.

Below are the topics, dates, times and links to join the Hangout discussions.

• Community College Best Practices, 2 p.m. Monday, Nov. 10, join (link)
• Leading Online, 12:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 12, join (link)
• Competency Based Learning, 11 a.m. Friday, Nov. 14, join (link)

Faculty and staff also can participate in two free webinars via the consortium.

• Beyond the Headlines: A Decision-Making Rubric for the Next Phase of Online Program Growth, sponsored by Pearson, noon Wednesday, Nov. 12, join (link)
• Designing and Facilitating Successful MOOCs, sponsored by Canvas by Instructure, 1 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 13, join (link)