Overview
Description
Goals and Objectives
Evaluator
Department of Education Required Statement for Publications
Beyond the Administrative
Core: Creating Web-based Student Services for Online Learners
is a Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnerships (LAAP) project,
funded by the U.S. Department of Education's Fund for the Improvement
of Postsecondary Education. It is a three-year project (January
2000 to December 2002) involving three institutional partners,
Kansas State University, Kapi'olani Community College and Regis
University and one corporate partner, SCT. Each institutional partner
is developing a Web-based student service to meet campus needs as
well as capturing the "story" of institutional change
involved in moving the student service to the online environment.
The development and implementation process defined and refined by
the partners will inform a set of guidelines
for other institutions to follow.
Students participating in distance education academic programs
must have access to student support services. However, one of the
biggest gaps in online education is institutions' inability to provide
time- and location-independent access to a complete array of student
support services. In the rush to get courses and programs online,
institutions often neglect student services as a whole. When student
services are considered, the most common services that are incorporated
into a time- and location-independent format are those within the
"administrative core" (admissions, financial aid, registration,
etc.).
Like traditional campus-based students, online learners need to
access other support services such as tutoring, academic advising,
personal counseling, career counseling, and library services. It
is unrealistic to expect that those students who do not come to
campus for their education will, in fact, be able to come to campus
to access student services.
Higher education institutions and other providers must take advantage
of technology to deliver student services to online learners in
a way that effectively meets their unique needs. This project is
supporting three institutions as they plan, develop, implement and
test different student services online.
Proposal Goals and Objectives
Goals
- Recognize online learners' needs for student support services,
defined broadly, and in a variety of contexts.
- Use this knowledge of needs in guiding the development of commercial
and "home-grown" Web-based products adaptable to online
learners needs in a variety of contexts.
- Develop a variety of customizable service modules based on individual
student profiles and including the usually neglected services.
- Develop basic guidelines and Web templates for institutions
interested in creating a comprehensive Web-based array of student
services for online learners.
- Track the processes involved in "re-engineering" student
services in the partner institutions.
- Produce comprehensive case studies of these processes.
- Disseminate widely both at the end of the project and beyond
the lessons and products of this project, including the software
package, student services guidelines, and case studies.
Objectives
- WCET and partners design and initiate processes to foster a
process for exchanging information and ideas.
- SCT develops commercially available software package with modules
focused on the neglected student services.
- Partner institutions develop Web-based student service modules.
- Partner institutions implement changes in staff roles resulting
from new approach.
- WCET and partner institutions track institutional change processes
throughout the project.
- WCET and all partners produce guidelines and standards for Web-based
services.
- All products are reviewed for compliance with Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines developed through W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative.
- WCET and all partners disseminate project results both during
the project and after its completion.
Evaluator
The National Center
for Higher Education Management Systems (NCHEMS) is serving
as the external evaluator of the project. LAAP projects are evaluated
based on their ability to address the following performance issues:
access, impact on learning, quality, flexible education design and
delivery, collaboration, workforce impact, and dissemination/distribution.
Department of Education Required Statement for
Publications
The contents of this website were developed under a grant from
the Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnerships (LAAP), a program of
the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE),
U.S. Department of Education. However, these contents do not necessarily
represent the policy of the Department of Education, and you should
not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.
Updated
12/10/2002
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