Wednesday, September 15, 2010

FREE WEBINAR

"The New (and Old) Ways Students Cheat:
What You Can Do About It"

Featured Presenter: Scott L. Howell, Ph.D.

In collaboration with the Academic Success Center, the Office of Distance Education is offering an online Webinar on how to combat cheating in distance education.


Abo
ut this Webinar:
When it comes to academic cheating, we've come a long
way from the days of writing on one's palm. Technology makes it possible for students – distance-ed students in particular – to cheat in myriad new ways. That's "progress" of a very depressing sort. What can be done about it? How can we maintain academic integrity in systems where, by their own admission, 95% of students cheat? There are ways to control cheating in the online classroom, and Scott Howell of Brigham Young University will share some of the best with you in a new online seminar coming October 13. In The New (And Old) Ways Students Cheat: What You Can Do About It, Dr. Howell, of BYU's continuing-education department, will look at the ways students cheat and the tools institutions can use to thwart them. In a content-rich, 75-minute presentation, he'll survey both hightech and low-tech cheating methods. This is essential information ... not just to promote academic honesty and personal integrity, but to help ensure that you meet Department of Education requirements and protect your accreditation.

Date:
Wednesday, 13 October 2010
Time:
10:30 am - 12:30 pm
Where:
Student Services Complex (SSC) Room 254C

See you there!

To E-Pack or not to E-pack, that is the question. . .

The semester starts in two weeks and your Department Chair calls you in to say that you will be teaching your class fully online. Of course, you say “yes” right away and leave your department chair’s office with a big smile, when in fact, you are thinking, “How am I going to do this?"

As you return to your office, you remember a conversation with a publisher's sales rep who mentioned e-packs to you: “Have I got a deal for you. We have online content specifically for your book. Content that can make your students’ online experience the best you’ve ever seen. And guess what, it’s all built. You don’t have to do a thing.”

What should you do?

Well, before you make the choice to use e-packs, the Distance Education instructional designers encourage you to consider their pros and cons.

Pros:

• The content, according to the publisher, is built.

• The content, according to the publisher, matches the book.

• The content, according to the publisher, will match your course’s goals and objectives perfectly with little or no effort on your part.

Cons:

•Publishers are disseminators of content, not facilitators of knowledge.

• My students spend more time trying to get to the content then actually interacting with said content.

• My students have to pay more for my class then other class they are taking through DE. Students pay an extra fee between 60 and 125 dollars per e-pack.

• My students don’t get the one-on-one support from UNLV for these resources. OIT and DE can’t help with e-packs because they are a third-party resource. I become the tech support for students.

• My students are confused as to why they don’t have instant access to the publisher’s content, after all, they’ve logged into WebCampus. They need to leave the course in WebCampus, log in to the publisher's website and navigate to however the publisher organized the content.

• My students find the presentation / organization of the content confusing. I have to write emails explaining where to find the pertinent information. The way the content is presented is causing students to focus more on the presentation and less on the actual content being presented.

• My students don’t have access to the content after the class ends.

• My students are finding differences between my presentation of content and that of the e-pack. I have found I have to spend more time correcting the misinformation.

• My students are complaining about disconnect between the content provided and my assessments. The content doesn’t match my goals and objectives to for the class.

• My students aren’t challenged enough to pass my evaluation at the end of each module. Activities in the publisher resources only focus on low level (in Bloom's Taxonomy) remembering and understanding tasks, and not on higher-order, thinking skills.

• Distance Education does not pay development monies for courses where the primary means of instruction is through an e-pack.

So now that we've identified the systemic problems associated with e-packs — additional cost for students, lack of UNLV tech support, and inability to organize content for ease of navigation and conceptual clarity — let's consider what Distance Education can do for you.

DE's staff of instructional designers, technologists, artists, and interactive designers can help you create the educational experience you desire for your students. Because this work is done in house:

• Your students’ DE fees already pay for this. It’s always DE’s goal to help you and them get their money’s worth.

• The content resides within our learning management system (WebCampus) and not that of another company’s.

• There is no question of copyright. The content belongs to you and to the University.

• Students get the one-on-one support they need when they need it from OIT and DE.

• Your content is current and *accurate. It is unique to your class and meets your instructional needs.

• The activities are developed according to your specifications, allowing you to create learning experiences that ask the student to apply, synthesize, and create a new idea based on the information provided.

You have a better option than using an e-pack.

_____________________________

*Accuracy depends on the accuracy of the content provided by the instructor. The Instructional Designer for the project and the Design and Development team member will not make any changes, edits, or corrections to the content provided without the expressed consent of the instructor.

Monday, September 06, 2010

How did I get this extra new version of my document?

Ever wonder how that doppelganger of an extra Word document with the "0" attached showed up in the WebCampus course you are teaching? How about the multiple versions that you don't ever recall placing in your File Manager, yet they somehow accumulated?

The basic reason is that you used a location other than the [Designer Tools] File Manager to upload a revision to an existing file.

View the YouTube presentation for an explanation, followed by the prescribed course of action.




Summary:
If a file already exists in your WebCampus course and you wish to replace the existing document (PDF, PPT, DOC/DOCX, XLS, etc.) so that all related references are updated in one fell swoop, always and only use the File Manager.

Thursday, September 02, 2010

SmarThinking - The Online Tutoring Service for Students


Help when UNLV students need it: 24 hours a day!

UNLV subscribes to SmarThinking online tutoring services. It is available anytime, anywhere for your students when you activate it in your WebCampus course. Make your course even more valuable by activating today! Contact your Instructional Designer.

Place this session on your calendar!

Online SmarThinking Q&A session
Wednesday, September 15, 2010 10:00 to 11:00am Pacific time

Connect to this session about 5 minutes prior to start time:
  1. Connect online: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/join/129488960 and
  2. Telephone toll-free (877) 492-8992 and enter participant code 624531
Math Bilingual Math Introductory Anatomy & Physiology Biology Chemistry Organic Chemistry Physics Economics Finance Accounting Statistics Spanish Writing

Questions? Contact Distance Education

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Regional Accreditation Commission Commends....

"First the good news: the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU) has reaffirmed UNLV’s accreditation based on the Spring 2010 Comprehensive Evaluation. Now for the even better news: the NWCCU has commended the Division of Educational Outreach for its successful restructuring and embracing of the role as a revenue center for UNLV." read more

Monday, August 30, 2010

Fall Enrollments are UP

We are past the first, hectic week of the fall semester and, hopefully, everyone had a good start. We have faced some new challenges, but all is going well....

Distance Education is growing at a rapid rate! This semester we have 13,047 enrollments in DE courses. That is a 35% increase over Fall 2009. Kudos and thank you to all the excellent faculty and staff contributing to this incredible accomplishment.

The instructional designers will continue to offer support on evenings and weekends so we can carry the momentum of this success throughout the semester and into Spring.

Monday, August 23, 2010

Welcome to Fall


It is here! Fall semester has officially opened and the campus is teeming with students and faculty again. With the new semester comes some important dates to add to your calendar:

August 27: Final day to drop/add classes with 100% refund
September 3: Final day to submit graduation paperwork for fall commencement without a late fee
September 6: Labor Day

The instructional designers will continue to be available on evenings and weekends to serve all faculty with WebCampus questions. This is for all courses, not just distance education. Please take advantage of the service! Upcoming dates are:

September 8: Lied Library Eureka Room 5-8 PM
September 11: Lied Library Eureka Room 10 AM - 1 PM
September 23: Lied Library Eureka Room 5-8 PM
September 25: Lied Library Eureka Room 10 AM - 1 PM

We look forward to helping you with a successful fall 2010 semester.