Wednesday, April 26, 2000

San Diego State's Senate Creates a Detailed Policy for Distance Courses By DAN CARNEVALE The San Diego State University Senate has adopted a distance-education policy that attempts to balance faculty rights with course quality. University officials believe it is one of the most detailed policies on distance learning yet developed. Among the policy's requirements: Professors must exercise oversight over distance courses in their field. Students must have "substantial, personal, and timely" interaction with faculty members and with other students. Faculty members and the university must agree who owns the content of a course before it begins. Students must be assured of access to appropriate resources and services when taking a course from a distance. Full-time faculty members must not be replaced by part-time distance-education instructors. The policy, adopted this month, is intended to guide San Diego State as it creates more online courses. Treacy Lau, the university's principal coordinator for distributed learning, says the policy isn't a rebuke for anything the university has done, but is rather a response to stories of faculty members at other universities losing control of Web-based courses, and of professors' roles being downgraded. Ms. Lau says faculty members were already concerned about distance education when David F. Noble, a professor of history at York University in Toronto who has been an outspoken critic of online education, visited the campus last spring. Mr. Noble relayed his fears about the dangers of courses offered over the Internet, strengthening faculty members' resolve to establish guidelines for their institution's offerings, she says. The Senate, which is made up of faculty and staff members and administrators, approved the five-page, 11-principle policy on April 6. Observers say the document addresses both administrative and faculty concerns and requires distance-education courses to be treated the same way traditional courses are. Ideas for the policy came from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, the accrediting body for the university, and from collective-bargaining agreements. "A distance-learning course should not be treated separately," says Ms. Lau. "It shouldn't be lighter, nor should it be asked to go through some extra hoops." Faculty members were worried that online courses were being created without the same oversight given to traditional courses, says Eve Kornfeld, a professor of history at the university who is chairwoman of the academic policy and planning committee, which created the policy. "We were mainly concerned with maintaining the rigor of our academic programs," she says. Nancy A. Marlin, the university's provost, agrees that the policy is necessary to make sure that the quality of distance education matches that of traditional education. She says she's confident that the policy will satisfy faculty members concerned about potential problems surrounding online education. Some faculty members, like Andrew Feenberg, who is a professor of philosophy at the university, were also worried that distance education would be used to save money, not enhance education. "A lot of the impulse with distance learning has to do with lowering the cost of education," he says. Mr. Feenberg has taught courses online, so he's not worried about the technology. But he says he is worried that as for-profit universities using distance education expand, San Diego State and other traditional institutions might be tempted to seek revenue at the expense of education. Members of the Senate were choosy with the wording of the policy, says Pat Huckle, who is the presiding officer. For example, the definition of "interaction" caused concern. Some faculty members wanted to limit it to describing real-time verbal exchanges. But others wanted to leave open the option of using asynchronous discussions through e-mail or other means. In the end, the Senate agreed not to define interaction precisely, but to specify that it be "substantial, personal, and timely" so that students aren't left with working solely with a computer program. The senate debated about six hours before passing the policy, Ms. Huckle says. "I've been here 25 years, and this has got to be one of the hottest topics I've ever seen," she says. "It's pushed a lot of buttons with people." The policy is designed to protect academic quality while encouraging faculty members to experiment with online education, Ms. Huckle says. Background articles from The Chronicle: David Noble's Battle to Defend the 'Sacred Space' of the Classroom (3/31/2000) Who Owns On-Line Courses? Colleges and Professors Start to Sort It Out (12/17/1999) Rethinking the Role of the Professor in an Age of High-Tech Tools (10/3/1997) Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

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