2003 - 2004 Online Education Report
www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/report2003-2004.htm

Jim Flowers, Director of Online Education, jcflowers1@bsu.edu, 765-285-2879, AT 130A
Department of Industry & Technology, College of Applied Sciences & Technology
Ball State University, Muncie, IN, USA 47306

June 4, 2004

Current Status | Initiatives
Appendices: MA in TE | MA in CTE | Development Schedule | Survey of Majors | Faculty Survey

Preface

This is the third annual report of the online education initiatives from the Department of Industry and Technology at Ball State University. Previous report may be seen at: www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/report2002-2003.htm and at www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/report2001-2002.htm. Recommendations contained within this report are those the Director. For more information, visit the online programs' Website at www.bsu.edu/iandt. As of this date, all fifteen courses slated to be taught online have been developed and implemented.

The Department of Industry and Technology (I&T) of Ball State University offers two graduate degrees over the Internet: the Master of Arts in Technology Education, and the Master of Arts in Career and Technical Education. Except for a pilot course going online in the Fall of 2000, these programs officially became available online in the Summer and Fall of 2002, respectively. The purpose of this report is it provide a description and an internal review after the first year of online implementation.

The Master of Arts in Technology Education (TE) is intended to meet the needs of technology teachers and others interested in general education in technology. Technology Education is the field that evolved from Industrial Arts, and this master's caters to the needs of teachers in this field who typically teach grades six through twelve. However, community college faculty, elementary teachers, and others can find this program fitting.

The Department also offers a Master of Arts in Career and Technical Education (CATE) (having changed its name from Master of Arts in Industrial Vocational / Technical Education on August 25th, 2003, in keeping with national trends.) This degree is intended to meet the needs of vocational, or career and technical educators, who typically work at high school level vocational programs with specializations in industry and technology. However, community college faculty, industrial trainers, and others wishing an advanced degree can find this master's very appropriate to their needs.

As indicated in the Schedule of Course Development, the final courses necessary in each degree program were made available online in the 2003-2004 academic year, replacing face-to-face (F2F) sections. Required face-to-face graduate courses have been discontinued.

Unlike similar programs at some other institutions, the admission requirements do not specify the undergraduate degree areas for applicants, nor do they list a teaching license as an admissions requirement. Thus, these programs are better suited in attracting students who may have had completed a baccalaureate degree in a different field.

As with other masters from Ball State, applicants must have an earned baccalaureate degree from an accredited institution with an undergraduate grade point average of 2.75 (on a 4.0 scale), or with an undergraduate GPA of 3.0 in the latter half of their undergraduate work. Those who do not meet these GPA requirements may be able to enter as probationary students and must achieve a 3.0 minimum average in 9 semester hours of graduate work approved by the Department Chair and the Dean of the Graduate School, and must score in the top two-thirds on each section of the general Graduate Record Examination. There are no additional departmental or program admission requirements.

Each degree program can be completed 100% online without a single trip to the campus or a satellite site. Each master's program requires 30 graduate hours, 9 of which may be transferred in from another institution subject to advisor approval, and only if these were graduate hours from an accredited institution wherein the student earned at least a B. Transfer hours are also subject to the Ball State requirement that all masters coursework be completed within a six-year timeframe. A thesis is optional in each program. Each program has a separate core of courses, a required research course, a required course in education outside the Department of Industry and Technology, and electives. Please see the Appendices listing the Program of Study for the MA in Technology Education and the Program of Study for the MA in Career and Technical Education.

Course Enrollment

Figure 1. Enrollment for each graduate course offered in Industry and Technology from Fall 2000 through Summer I 2004. (Source: ADMAC, except for Fall 2000 BSU@work data)

Placing these masters degrees online has resulted in a dramatic increase in course and program enrollment. To date, 25 online graduate classes have been offered since Fall 2000, and the average enrollment was 17.7; considering the maximum set by the Program Committee at 20 for a graduate class, this is impressive. (It should be noted that both the minimum and maximum were broken in some instances, and that on-campus online enrollments were combined for sections "taught with" off-campus online sections; furthermore, this is the course enrollment, not a section enrollment.) In comparison, during this time there were 16 face-to-face classes offered on-campus and being phased out, with an average enrollment of 5.8 students, a low number in light of the minimum set at 6 for a graduate class.

These enrollment trends, illustrated below in Figure 1 and Table 1, confirm the wisdom of phasing out face-to-face graduate classes. The last face-to-face graduate class was taught in the Spring of 2003; only online graduate classes that are planned for future semesters.

Program Headcount

As shown in Figures 2, 3, and 4, program headcounts show an increase at the Fall 2002 period, when the program began to be delivered online.

Figure 2. Program Headcounts for the MA in Technology Education, extracted from BSU@work historical data for Fall and Spring semesters.

There was a change in the CIP codes associated with the MA in TE program. Data in Figure 2 represents sums of the headcounts for the following codes:

• 102M004MA (all)
• 102T004MA (to Spring 2003)
• 102T006MA (from Fall 2003)

The healthy growth of the MA in Technology Education (Figure 2) has been a great success for the Department, the College of Applied Sciences and Technology, and the School of Extended Education. This growth is expected to peak in the near future at a level that can be sustained by the Department faculty. Marketing needs may be impacted by this growth, and with little competition, there may be less need to aggressively market this program. A similar curve is seen in the program headcounts for the MA in Career and Technical Education from the point of online implementation (Figure 3).

Figure 3 . Program Headcounts for the MA in Career and Technical Education (previously called the MA in Industrial Vocational / Technical Education), extracted from BSU@work historical data for Fall and Spring semesters.

There was a change in the CIP codes associated with the MA in CTE program. Data in Figure 3 represents sums of the headcounts for the following codes:

• 102M005MA (all)
• 102T004MA (from Fall 2003)
• 102T005MA (all)

Prior to online implementation, the Master of Arts in Industrial Vocational / Technical Education had died due to low enrollment, although it was still listed as a degree program. With the online implementation, the program (now called the Master of Arts in Career & Technical Education) is growing. However, it should be noted that there are increasing numbers of non-degree seeking students enrolled in courses within this program, and that most of the core courses in the program are taught on a two-year cycle. The result is enrollments in some CATE courses that exceed the limits. (The single Spring 2004 and Summer 2004 offering had enrollments of 22 and 23, exceeding the limit of 20 established by the Department Graduate Program Committee.) Thus, the courses within this program should be seen as servicing significant numbers of non-degree-seeking students, and the ability of the program to sustain much higher levels of program enrollment with the existing faculty and schedule of offerings is of question. The enrollment goal, then, is less than for the MA in Technology Education.

Combining data from the Department's two online Master's degrees again shows the marked increase at the point of online implementation (Summer & Fall, 2002), as seen in Figure 4.

Figure 4. Program Headcounts for the MA in Technology Education and the MA in Career & Technical Education combined, from historical BSU@Work data for Fall and Spring semesters.

The program headcounts from historical BSU@Work data is not identical to current program enrollment by CIP code using BSU@Work. Table 2 shows higher numbers in both Master's programs, as well as a significant number of graduate students in Industry & Technology classified as non-degree-seeking.

When analyzing program headcounts for each program, it should be noted that there are increasing numbers of students who take single courses either for licensure, continuing education, or as part of a different degree program. The result of combined enrollments has taxed the ability of the Department to staff classes where the enrollment often results in multiple sections of a course and a faculty member must teach this as an overload. Furthermore, the retirement of Dr. James Kirkwood results in the need for the remaining faculty to cover the two online courses he was assigned to teach. (The position advertised as Dr. Kirkwood's replacement is for a contract faculty member, and it is doubtful that this could attract an individual capable of achieving graduate faculty status and of teaching the two online courses Dr. Kirkwood has taught.)

Course Enrollment Maximum

Quality issues are raised as the number of students increases. The Department Graduate Program Committee has established a course section enrollment maximum of 20 students. However, students are typically overloaded into online courses, which can result in as many as 25 students for a single course load for the instructor. The nature of graduate education in Ball State's TE and CATE programs requires significant personal attention to graduate students, and it is recommended by the Director that the maximum enrollment be changed to 15 per section to maintain quality. This would result in enrollment overloads that could reach 20 before the 21st student causes a second section of the course (and a second load for the instructor.) In this way, 20 again becomes the true maximum, although 15 would be the maximum listed, and only 5 overloads would be permitted before the creation of a second section.

Faculty

The online program faculty have not changed since the 2002/2003 year. However, in June 2004, Dr. James J. Kirkwood will retire. His decades of service to the university community are greatly appreciated. Specifically, Dr. Kirkwood developed ITEDU 564, Practicum in Technology Education for the Elementary Grades, for online delivery, and has taught it during the Summer I session since 2002. When a fellow faculty was unable to develop a course on the History and Philosophy of Technology Education (ITEDU 690), Dr. Kirkwood took on the challenge with rather short notice, and implemented a valuable graduate course. His energy, creativity, concern for the needs of the individual, and sharp mind will be sorely missed. Thank you, Dr. Kirkwood, for touching so many lives.

Dr. Ray Shackelford is scheduled to be on sabbatical leave for Fall 2004. He plans to serve as a public school teacher during this time, rejuvenating his ability to provide for the needs of new and developing teachers in the teacher education programs at Ball State. Decisions regarding Fall 2004 staffing of ITEDU 690 and 691 will be made by the Chair.

It is recommended by the Director that additional faculty be hired to support the online Master's programs. This is especially critical in the MA in CTE, where Dr. Sam Cotton is currently assigned to teach six of the core courses. Graduate program vitality is affected by the variety of instructors, philosophies, and approaches students encounter in the core of their program. Greater diversity is needed if any instructor is responsible for so much of the program core, regardless of the abilities of that instructor.

Staff

Mr. Abraham George who had served as a Graduate Assistant in 2002/2003 has graduated. Mr. Kalyan Narra worked as a 10 hour / week graduate assistant during the Fall 2003 semester. Upon Mr. Narra's graduation in December 2003, there has been no graduate or undergraduate student working in the Department's Office of Online Education. A description of the requirements for Graduate Assistants assigned as Online Education Assistants can be seen at: www.bsu.edu/web/iandt/official/staffdescription.htm More staffing is needed year round. The Director's current job description can be seen at the following location, the responsibilities therein are in excess of the one-course release time received in the Fall and Spring Semesters: www.bsu.edu/web/iandt/official/directordescription.htm

It is recommended that a full-time, 12-month staff position be created to work for the Department with major assignment in the online programs and Website maintenance.

When courses first went online, the Chair and Director decided to apply the same loading structure used in on-campus courses to online courses. Because there is still a number of on-campus students (typically taking advantage of on-campus graduate assistantships), a need was felt to maintain the on-campus sections of online classes. Most online offerings therefore include both an on-campus section (typically Section 001) and an off-campus section (typically Section 800C) taught together to accommodate both on- and off- campus students, the structure is as follows:

If the combined enrollment in the on-campus and off-campus sections taught together is at least the minimum (6 in a graduate class), the course is permitted to run and the instructor receives one course load. If the individual enrollments in each the on- and off-campus sections meets the minimum enrollment (6), the instructor receives load for two courses, which would typically result in pay for an overload of one course. Each section has a maximum of 20 students set by the Department's Graduate Program Committee, although student enrollments over the maximum have occurred.

However, there are some inequities with this structure. Consider Instructor A who teaches 6 on- and 6 off-campus students, for a combined class of 12 graduate students, and a load of two courses. Compare that to Instructor B who teaches 20 on-campus students combined with 5 off-campus students, for a total of 25 students and a load of only one course.

At the heart of this problem is the inability of graduate assistantship tuition waivers to cover tuition for distance education courses. It is recommended that this be enabled. This would permit all sections of online graduate courses to be run exclusively through the School of Extended Education.

Furthermore, as noted elsewhere, classes overloaded to 25 are believed to be a significant threat to the quality of online graduate education from Industry and Technology. Therefore, it is recommended that the graduate course section enrollment maximum be changed to fifteen students, with overloads possible up to and including the twentieth student, but where a twenty-first student results in two sections and two loads. In order to maximize the educational benefit, the numbers of students in such sections should be equalized; for example, a total enrollment of 26 should be partitioned into two sections of 13 rather than one of 20 and one of 6.

Faculty continued to work on the development, implementation, and revision of online courses, as outlined in the Course Development Schedule. As per the agreement with the School of Extended Education, Teleplex, and the College of Applied Sciences and Technology, faculty were provided with two "developmental" semesters prior to initial online implementation. During each developmental semester, a faculty member could elect to receive a $1500 stipend from Teleplex monies, or they could elect one stipend and one "assigned time," which would reduce the course load by one course in one of those semesters; the latter is only possible by an additional $500 per assigned time from CAST funds. The option of an assigned time during initial online delivery is strongly recommended to those teaching their first online class.

In some instances, the second developmental semester occurred during the semester of initial online implementation. This was found to be advantageous, especially in courses where the design of the course reflects issues that would not be uncovered until initial implementation. The development time was used very effectively by some faculty members.

Faculty Use of Support

During course development, faculty developers were provided with assistance from the Director, in addition to services from the Office of Teaching and Learning Advancement and other units at Ball State University. Resources on online education were shared with faculty. In some instances, faculty were paid to take an online course. Meetings were held in the Fall and Spring of 2003/2004 to review courses, which allowed allow faculty to share their ideas, questions, plans, and materials. During meetings and at other times, a number of faculty freely shared comments, questions, and suggestions in an attempt to help another faculty member. In these instances, it be came evident that a meaningful dialog among committed instructors related to online education was of great value.

A "Blackboard XT Community" that had been created for online collaboration among the Department's online faculty was not significantly used. This seems due to a lack of interest by select faculty to the need for online collaboration and support of online education. If not used by all online faculty, program-wide collaboration with this XT Community would not be possible, and those who chose not to participate have abandoned a powerful tool that could facilitate the improvement of program and course quality and increased program unity.

Course Review Instruments and Procedures

The review of online courses includes the following:

• Informal peer review at the end of the first developmental semester
• Informal peer review at the end of the second developmental semester
• Student evaluation of course and instructor during initial implementation (for promotion, tenure, and merit consideration)
• [Optional course improvement survey]
• Formal peer review in the semester following initial implementation
• Formal review by the Director in the semester following initial implementation

The program faculty collaborated to develop an instrument and set of procedures to aid in the formal review of courses during the semester following their initial online implementation. In addition, the Director has developed and used a somewhat more detailed form. These are available at the following locations.

The Peer Evaluation Instrument and Procedure for implemented online course review was developed through program faculty collaboration, and can be seen as Word and Acrobat documents at:

www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/courseevaluation.doc
www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/courseevaluation.pdf 

Suggestions for presenters during this review can be seen at:

www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/coursereviewsug.htm

The course assessment instrument used by the Director can be seen here:

www.bsu.edu/iandt/official/directorsassessment.xls

Formal course evaluations occurred for

• ITEDU 698 (Seminar in Technology Education, J. Flowers)
• ITEDU 635 (Implementing Technology Education, R. Seymour)
• ITEDU 569 (Organization and Coordination of Career and Technical Education, S. Cotton)
• ITEDU 550 (Career & Technical Student Organizations S. Cotton.)
• ITEDU 699 (Research in Industrial Education, A. Rose)

These reviews also included live presentations of the course during a review session open to all. Exceptions to the protocol were as follows:

• For the review of ITEDU 698 Dr. Ray Shackelford performed a substitute Director's Review, since the Director was also the course developer; unfortunately, Dr. Shackelford chose to not use the specified form and procedure.
• For the review of ITEDU 699, Dr. Jack Wescott performed a substitute Director's Review to alleviate a possible conflict of interest if the review had been performed by Jim Flowers, who is the course developer's husband.
• Course Improvement Plans have not been submitted by Drs. Seymour and Shackelford (from a previous course revision agreement).

End-of-Course Course Improvement Surveys

In order to furnish feedback needed for course improvement, the Director developed a course improvement survey instrument with feedback from Fall 2003 online instructors, with the exception of one faculty member who refused to participate in the course improvement feedback initiative. In the Fall of 2003, five of the Department's six online classes used this survey. In the Spring of 2004, all four online courses had end-of-course course improvement surveys. Results were furnished to instructors after grades had been posted. These surveys were identical to the one seen here, except for course-specific identification and a customized question requested by Dr. James Kirkwood for his course: http://www.bsu.edu/inqsit/inqsit.cgi/flowers2/online?510f03imp; this survey was voluntary and anonymous on the part of the student.

"P&T" Surveys of Students

As outlined in the Department's Promotion and Tenure guidelines, an evaluation of course and instructor by students occurs for all Fall and Spring courses during the 12th week. In the Fall of 2003, the standard 12th-week student evaluation of course and instructor was successfully implemented using Gradebook, and under the administration of Dr. James A. Jones. However, during the Spring of 2004, this same student evaluation of course and instructor yielded no results from ITEDU 635 and ITEDU 694. This was due to two instructors not following directions for informing students about this evaluation. When the problem was spotted by Dr. Jones, the four online Spring instructors and the Department Chair agreed to open all course evaluations for an additional week (April 20th through April 28th, 2004), and Dr. Jones assisted in this effort. This problem can be seen as a one-time event that is typical of any new venture, though it also points to a larger issue a tendency of some online instructors to ignore protocols, communications, and requests from the Director of Online Education.

Survey of Majors

As done in the previous year, near the end of the Spring 2004 semester, all graduate students majoring in the Department's programs were sent a request to take an anonymous online survey to provide feedback on the online program. The results from the survey of majors are contained in an appendix in this document.

Survey of Faculty

As done in the previous year, near the end of the Spring 2004 semester, a survey was distributed to the seven faculty assigned to teach online in the department, excluding the Chair and the Director of Online Education. Results for the faculty survey can be seen as an appendix.

Additional Program Review

Four graduate students from Western Illinois University, Jason Hlavacs, Helen MacDermott, Addie Seabarkrob, Bernie Taus, worked under the guidance Dr. Seung-Won Yoon in a class from their Instructional Technology and Communications Department to perform an analysis of Ball State's online MA in Technology Education. Their informative and valuable report can be seen at:  http://www.wiu.edu/users/mubmt1/ITT%20515%20HE%20Group_FinalProject.doc.

Advising

An advising site has been created on the Blackboard system for all graduate advisees. Dr. Wescott has used this to hose documents of interest to graduate students, and to make announcements. Greater use of this site is anticipated in the coming year, with initiatives planned to improve its value to students.

Streaming Media: Colloquium Series

On the previous year's survey of majors, students asked for more streaming media. Stored media streams or videos have been placed online for students, but this has been minimal. In addition, through the help of Mr. Mike Dalton, AT 214 has been set up to accommodate video streaming. Additional audio/video equipment has been purchased by the department for this. Initially, the department's Colloquium Series is being streamed live. This typically occurs one Wednesday a month at 3 pm, and those at a distance can see and hear the broadcast over any broadband Internet connection. Questions and discussion with distance participants is facilitated with a chat room established in the Blackboard site for graduate advisees, and with the Email address: onlinetech@bsu.edu. To date, participation and interest have been low, but this first year is being used largely for technical shakedown purposes, as new equipment has been added in each of the first two streamed sessions. To date, three sessions have been streamed. In the survey of majors, two respondents indicated having participated in at least one of these video streams.

Extending Protocols to Include Distance Students

Many procedures occur without special efforts taken to include students-at-a-distance. However, the Department is striving to overcome this. For example, an effort was made to include online students in the department community was in the solicitation of outstanding teaching awards. On March 11th, the announcement that had previously online been circulated on campus was sent to the 102 online graduate students who took courses from in Summer I 2003, Fall 2003, or Spring 2004.

Website Testing & Revision

One of the most critical marketing tools is the program Website at www.bsu.edu/iandt which is different from the departmental Website at www.bsu.edu/cast/itech/ . Thanks to the expertise of Abraham George, the Graduate Assistant assigned to online education, the iandt website has been greatly improved. Initial conversations with Nancy Prater, BSU Web Specialist, led to cosmetic, content, navigational improvements.

In April, 2003, Nancy Prater conducted a formal usability assessment test of the www.bsu.edu/iandt Website. Her report can be seen here:
 www.bsu.edu//iandt/official/IandT_Summary.doc

While some of her recommendations have been implemented, others require implementation from different units within the University, and still others will require more time than is currently available from the existing Departmental Online Education staff.

Ball State University is transitioning to the Vignette Content Suite software for official Webpage development. This represents an enormous shift and will require the individual unitization and input of many "articles" and illustrations, and will result in a more limited ability to format content. However, because the University is transitioning to this system, the Director is pursuing its use. He has attended training and received a password for the creation of a draft site.

The move to the Vignette system allows for a change in the URL, or the Website name. The choice of "www.bsu.edu/iandt" was not ideal, in retrospect, due to the misunderstandings common when one hears "I and T," confusing it with "I&T" "INT" "I and T" and other variants. Because the target population is so familiar with the term, Tech Ed, the Vignette administrator was asked to create a new site that replaces iandt with teched. After it is online, visitors to the old site will be redirected to the new site.

A draft of the iandt Website was created on the Vignette system by Kalyan Narra in the Fall of 2003. However, the final implementation of this in place of the existing Website is not scheduled to occur until staff has been allocated and assigned to Departmental Website administration and maintenance. It is recommended that the Department of Industry and Technology Website at http://www.bsu.edu/cast/itech/ be completely redesigned using the Vignette system, and that the existing iandt site be incorporated as a subset within this design.

Web-Based Email Response System

Thanks to the expertise of Graduate Assistant Abraham George, a Web-based system is used for Website visitors to request information. Their requests generate an Email sent to onlinetech@bsu.edu (which is a blanket Email account used by online education staff), and adds the information they submit to a secure database. Responses to this are facilitated when the Director visits www.bsu.edu/andt/admin/viewmessage.asp then pastes and customizes a response, sending it to the recipient as well as copying it to the database. This has greatly reduced the Email organizational requirements. Between June 1 2003 and May 31, 2004, over 225 requests for information have been received and responded to through this system.

Promotional Items

The Director manufactured laser-cut acrylic gears (based on his previous design) containing program contact information. In the past, these have been found to be of interest to those involved with technical subject matter. These gears were distributed during on-campus visits, in mailed materials, and at conferences. The gear pictured to the right in now used to market both online masters degrees, and contains a shorter URL and a program Email address, unlike earlier designs.

Email Marketing

The Email marketing that occurred in previous years was halted for 2003/2004 due to the global proliferation of spam and viruses.

Brochures

New brochures have been designed for the MA in TE and the MA in CTE. These are under final departmental review prior to printing at the time of this report.

Website Listings & Banner Advertisement

A banner advertisement was again placed at the ITEA Website on their "Where to Get a Degree" page: www.iteawww.org/J4.html. This links users directly to the Main Technology Education Page: www.bsu.edu/web/iandt/te.htm. The banner is an animated graphic consisting of two frames:

In addition, links were submitted to other Webpages. For example, the Association of Career and Technical Education placed a link to Ball State University on the "School Links" website at http://www.acteonline.org/resource_center/school.cfm in response to a request. In some instances, Webmasters of other sites posted a link to the program's Website (www.bsu.edu/iandt) as a service to those who might be interested:

• http://masstec.nstemp.com/new.html (listed by the Massachusetts Technology Education Engineering Collaborative)
• wvteched.k12.wv.us/calendar/index.php (listed by the Technology Education Director of West Virginia)
• http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/workforce/ (listed by the University of the State of New York, State Education Department)
• http://www.firn.edu/doe/programs/pdf/flash_147.pdf & http://www.ftea.com/Flash_156.pdf (listed by the Florida Technology Education Association)
• http://www.nde.state.ne.us/cte/Newsletters/April03.htm (listed by the Nebraska Department of Education, Career & Technical Education)
• http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/dpi/dlsis/let/doc/te022503.doc (listed by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Technology Education Program)
• http://www.atte.org/FYI2.html (listed by the Association of Texas Technology Education)

In addition, a letter from Jim Flowers asking for assistance to get the word out about the Ball State's Online Masters has been published online at:

• http://www.indianaacte.org/bBoard.shtml (The Indiana Association of Career and Technical Education)
• http://www.k12.wa.us/CareerTechEd/BulletinBoard/Mar03.aspx (Washington State, Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, Career and Technical Education)
• http://www.msstate.edu/listarchives/tech-discovery/200302/msg00009.html (Mississippi State University, listserv archive)

Scholarly Publications

Articles and other publications have served to position Ball State University and program faculty as innovative practitioners of distance education and increased name recognition, and more are planned.

• Flowers, J., & Cotton, S. (2003). Master of Arts in Career and Technical Education: Now 100% online. Tech Directions, 63(2), 22-23.
• Flowers, J., (2003). Under review - Handbook of Distance Education. Journal of Industrial Teacher Education, 40(4), 64-72. (Appeared January, 2004) retrieved from http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JITE/v40n4/flowers.html
• Rose, M. A., & Flowers, J. (2003). Assigning learning roles to promote critical discussions during problem-based learning. Paper presented at the 19th Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning, Madison, WI. Conference proceeding retrieved from http://www.uwex.edu/disted/conference/Resource_library/proceedings/03_73.pdf
• Hodson Carlton, K. E., Sitkberg, L. L., Flowers, J. & Scheibel, P. (2003). Overview of distance education in nursing: Where are we now and where are we going? In M. H. Oermann & K. T. Heinrich (Eds.), Annual Review of Nursing Education: Vol. 1 (pp. 165-189). New York: Springer.
• Rose, M.A. (In Press). Comparing productive online dialogue in two group styles: Cooperative and collaborative. The American Journal of Distance Education, 18(2), ___.
• Ali, N. S., Hodson-Carlton, K., Ryan, M., Flowers, J., Rose, M. A., and Wayda, V. (In Press). Online education: Needs assessment for faculty development. Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing.

Presentations

Presentations at conferences and elsewhere have marketed the online programs. Some of these presentations were on related topics, but there was mention of the programs for interested parties.

• Flowers, J. (2004). "The effect of online delivery on enrollment in a master's in technology education," International Technology Education Association Conference, Albuquerque, NM.
• Shackelford, R., and Seymour, R. (2004). "Preparing Master's Level Courses for On-line Delivery," International Technology Education Association Conference, Albuquerque, NM.
• Flowers, J., & Cotton, S. (2003). "Three tools of online career and technical education." Association for Career and Technical Education Annual Convention, December 13, 2003, Orlando, FL.
• Flowers, J. (2003). "Two online masters: Lessons learned." Association for Career and Technical Education Annual Convention, December 11, 2003, Orlando, FL.
• Rose, M. A., and Flowers, J. (2003). "Assigning Learning Roles to Promote Critical Discussions During Problem-Based Learning," Distance Teaching and Learning 2003 Conference, Madison, WI.

Grants and Research Related to Online Education

• Faculty ROLE. Six faculty in the College of Applied Science and Technology, partnering with other units at Ball State, received a $10,000 grant from the George and Frances Ball Fund for Academic Excellence to conduct a workshop during May and June, 2003. The workshop was called "Faculty Researching OnLine Education" or "Faculty ROLE," and it was an initiative aimed at encouraging online faculty in CAST to conduct needed research in online education, or to apply research results to their online instruction. The investigators on this project were Nagia Ali, Jim Flowers, Kay Hodson-Carlton, Annette Rose, Marilyn Ryan, and Valerie Wayda, and partnerships were obtained from the Office of Teaching and Learning Advancement, the School of Extended Education, University Libraries, University Teleplex, and the Office of Academic Research and Sponsored Programs. Department faculty scheduled to participate include Sam Cotton, James Kirkwood, Dick Ertle, and Tom Tyberg. The proposal, agenda, and final report can be seen here:

• jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /projects/21Cent2003/FacultyROLEproposal.htm
• jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /projects/21Cent2003/role_program.pdf
• jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /projects/21Cent2003/facultyROLEreport.htm

• Jim Flowers finished work on a grant from the Indiana Higher Education Telecommunications System to create an online learning module comprised of reusable html learning objects, with the purpose of teaching others how to create such modules ($22,321). The proposal, Website, and report can be seen here:
  • http://jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /projects/IHETS/ihetsflowers.pdf
  • http://jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /mod/rlo.htm
  • http://jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu /mod/rloreport1.htm
     
• Jim Flowers received funding ($1200) from the 2003 BSU Office of Academic Assessment and Institutional Research Summer Assessment Grant Program to provide information on "Distance Education Enrollment in Industry and Technology." The final report can be seen at:
  • http://www.bsu.edu/web/iandt/official/enrollment2003.htm
     
• Sam Cotton and Jim Flowers received approval from the BSU Institutional Review Board to conduct research on "The effect of self-categorization of cognitive dialogue on online student discussions." This is currently underway in their Summer I 2004 classes.

• Jim Flowers worked on a chapter for an upcoming yearbook of the Council on Technology Teacher Education. The theme of the yearbook is "distance education," and Dr. Flower's chapter is on student and faculty perceptions.
• In the Fall of 2003, Dr. Frank Sabatine, Dean of the BSU School of Extended Education, requested that Jim Flowers assemble a group of six faculty, campus wide, to give him faculty input regarded faculty support for the development of online courses. This SEE Faculty Input Group has reported on this topic to Dr. Sabatine. It was then charged with developing distance education course development guidelines to recommend for adoption by the School of Extended Education.
• A joint project was undertaken among the units within the College of Applied Sciences and Technology to provide a Faculty OnLine Introduction and Orientation (FOLIO). Representatives from each unit, along with chairs, new faculty, and mentors, participated in a Blackboard site aimed at improving the orientation for on-campus faculty and at providing it for those who are off-campus.
• Dr. Bizhan Nasseh of Information Technology at Ball State University convened the IT Environmental Scanning Committee during the 2003 - 2004 year. This included a subcommittee on Distance Education, which included a representative from the Department of Industry and Technology. A final report and presentation was made to the Information Technology Advisory Group in the Spring of 2004 regarding distance education at Ball State University.

The following subset of the courses listed in the Graduate Catalog are scheduled to be placed online:

Total Hours Required: 30 Professional Core (15 hrs required)

• ITEDU 635 Implementing Technology Education (3)
• ITEDU 690 History and Philosophy of Technology Education (3)
• ITEDU 691 Strategies & Materials for Teaching Technology Education (3)
• ITEDU 694 Curriculum Development in Technology Education (3)
• ITEDU 698 Seminar in Technology Education (3)

Research Requirements (3 hrs required, 3 - 9 hrs possible)

• ITEDU 699 Research in Industrial Education (3)
• THES 698 Thesis (1-6) (optional)

Professional Education (3 hrs required)

• EDTEC 550 Curriculum Integration of Learning Technology (3)
• (other "professional education" courses that may come online)

Electives (3 to 9 hrs, to achieve 30 total program hrs)

• ITEDU 510 Technology: Use and Assessment (3)
• ITEDU 564 Practicum in Technology Education for Elementary Grades (3)
• EDPSY 640 Methodology of Educational & Psychological Research (3)
• ITEDU 550 Career and Technical Student Organizations (renamed) (3)
• (other electives or transfer credits approved by the program advisor)

The following subset of the courses listed in the Graduate Catalog are online or are scheduled to be placed online:

Total Hours Required: 30

The following schedule for online course development support, developed by the Director and Mr. Dan Lutz of University Teleplex was informed by the schedule of classes offerings suggested by the Chair and the Program Committee and individual faculty decisions to teach online. Please note that ITEDU 510 is the pilot course, and its development was covered under a previous agreement. Also note that EDTEC 550 and EDPSY 640 do not appear on this list, even though they may be taken by majors, because this list represents departmental offerings only.