Distance Education Committee

April 24, 2006

Members Present: Pamela Atkinson (City), Linda Delzeit (Trade), Eric Ichon (West), David Jordan (Mission), Mark Lampert (Valley),Calvin Matlock (District), Kerrin McMahan (ELAC), Paul McKenna (ITV), Harv Siegel (LAHC)

ETUDES Train the Trainer Workshop

Committee members provided the names of additional participants for the Train the Trainer Workshop which will be held at LACC from May 15 – 18th from 9 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. Franklin Hall, Room 106. A complete list of participants is attached. We need another Mac volunteer. Kerrin agreed to email Vivian Sinou on behalf of the Committee to ensure that our expectations regarding successful completion of the workshop are met. Success participants will need to be certified as fully qualified NG trainers with the ability to request NG training sites and to certify their own trainees as eligible for actual NG course sites.

Online Student Orientation

We watched part of the CVC’s Online Orientation: How to be a Successful Online Student. Although we found the content useful it was agreed that a web-based orientation is preferable as many of our students use dial up access and will have difficulty with streaming video. The Online Orientation Sub-Committee will review the content and make a recommendation about what should be included in an online student orientation for the District and what needs to be added.

Admissions and Records Update

Paul McKenna reported that the District is moving forward with an online application that will be good for all colleges. Pierce College is already using it and the other Colleges should do so by June 2006. Dr. McKenna also noted that Pierce offers their entire orientation online although they do continue to offer on-campus orientations as well.

Student ID Conversion Project

Calvin Matlock reported that new student identification numbers will be implemented on July 24, 2006. New numbers, starting with 88, will be assigned to all students in the LACCD database going back to 1972. Only active students will be notified, but any student can use the Student Information System to access their new number by inputting their SSN. It was agreed that we would use SSNs for the summer sessions and cut off adds by July 21st when the cross reference file will be produced. LAMC with a July 22nd start date, LATT with a July 15ht start date and LAVC with a July 17th start date may have to add students manually. It is also important to inform instructors that the student ID numbers on their original rosters will not match those on their grade rosters. Eric Ichon, who was recently appointed to the Student ID Conversion Task Force, will bring any related concerns too the Task Force and keep members information. The Distance Education Coordinators from LATT, LAMC and LAVC are also invited to participate since their second summer session start dates are the greatest concern. Eric Ichon noted that he will be out of the country from May 9th – 13th and suggested that Linda Delzeit represent the Committee if the Task Force meets during that time.

http://LAcolleges.net

It was agreed that it would be beneficial if the LAcolleges.net website included comprehensive information regarding certificates and degrees that can be completed entirely online along with links to the specific online courses offer by individual colleges. Kerrin McMahan has already put together a prototype but we need to get approval to have the page hosted and kept up to date by the District. Pamela Atkinson pointed out that since all online classes have to be “flagged” as such there should be a way for District to identify the online classes offered each semester so the website can be kept up to date. The Committee agreed to add this issue to the agenda for our next meeting.

Moodle Update

Linda Delzeit announced that LATT has contracted to use Moodle for six months allow time for the possible implementation of a District contract. It was agreed that although the Committee previously recommended that ETUDES Classic/NG be adopted as the standard course management system for the District individual colleges are still free to use other course management systems. This is seen as an advantage to ensure that institutions providing these services remain competitive. Linda Delzeit was encouraged to invite Chris DeYoung and Joe Perret to the May 25th meeting to discuss Moodle further.

Linda Delzeit also noted that LATT plans to offer more hybrid courses to promote enrollment by high school students, and students interested in alternative education and life long learning. Eric Ichon noted that WLAC also plans to develop more hybrid courses.

Our next meeting will be May 25th at 10 a.m. at LACC in Franklin Hall, Room 106. Agenda topics:

Moodle Update

Online Orientation Update

LAcolleges.net

District Distance Education Committee Mission Statement