Creating Master Course Shells Owens Community College & Cengage - A Partnership that Worked

The Presenters  Lisa Fidler, Custom Digital Project Manager, Cengage Learning Custom Solutions  Cy Keiffer, Associate Professor Owens Community College Information Systems School of Business and Information Technologies

About Owens Community College  Located in Toledo, Ohio  Between our two campuses in Toledo and Findlay, Owens serves over 45,000 credit and non-credit students annually, yet our average class size is just 15 students.  The Owens Community College Toledo-area campus covers more than 280 acres and is located near downtown Toledo. The new 60-acre Findlay-area campus is located at 3200 Bright Road on Findlay's northeast side.

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The Courses  IST100 - Fundamentals of Computing – 1 hour  IST131 – Computer Concepts & Applications – 4 hours  These 2 courses comprise our “service” courses. IST100 for non-majors, IST131 for majors and non-majors.  The IST 100 class covers Computer Concepts, Word, File Management, Internet Basics, Blackboard Basics, and Basics.  The IST131 expands on the IST100 course by covering all of Microsoft Office software including Word, Excel, Access and PowerPoint.  There are almost 100 sections offered between these 2 courses in a regular semester.

Owens & Blackboard  At Owens, a blank Blackboard course shell is generated for all courses and all sections each semester.  Many faculty still do not make use of these shells.

The Issues  With only 8 full time faculty and over 40 adjunct faculty, consistent course content and delivery are hugely challenging.  Student outcomes for these 2 courses have been very difficult to measure.  Student experiences vary wildly.  A variety of testing tools / methods have been employed.  Publisher content, while rich, is not in one place or easy for faculty or student to access.

Our First Step - SAM In 2007 we adopted SAM as the tool to capture student learning outcomes for these 2 courses  SAM’s flexibility in combining traditional testing for Computer Concepts and using Projects to test software abilities made measuring student outcomes a real possibility, for the first time, in a way that makes sense.  The ability to integrate training as a prescriptive approach as- well-as for remediation was a welcome addition.

In 2009 We Made the Next Logical Step – Master Shells With the release of the Enhanced Video Content editions of the texts, the release of the Hot Technologies DVD, and our successful use of SAM for IST100 and IST131 we saw an opportunity to pull it all together in one place: A Master Course Shell.

The Master Shell

Our Results – Success!  Close to standard Content.  Standard Outcomes Tests.  Easier for Adjunct Faculty – content provided!  Students love video content, and all content available in one place.