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We are discussing the possibility of REQUIRING our faculty to use Blackboard. Are there any institutions that are doing this now? Any insight into how this was accomplished, including pros/cons would be greatly appreciated.
Annette
We are discussing the possibility of REQUIRING our faculty to use Blackboard. Are there any institutions that are doing this now? Any insight into how this was accomplished, including pros/cons would be greatly appreciated.
Annette
Hi, Annette!! (& thanks, Carey, for pointing her question to me!) --
The initiative Carey mentioned above, the Blackboard Presence Initiative, was something I was a part of prior to my joining Blackboard. To give you the "Reader's Digest" version, we were asked by our CAO to identify the percentage of our faculty who were using Blackboard. We were sorely disappointed when we saw it was about 8% of our faculty (for a 900k chunk of our budget line). Needless to say, he was less than pleased with his 'return on investment' there. So, we discussed, and he approved and mandated, a Blackboard Presence for all full-time (and then also adjunct) faculty. In a semester, our percentage went from 8 to 80, so it did work, but not without some obstacles (of course!) and it certainly wasn't all smooth sailing, as you may be anticipating!
The "Presence" consisted of three items: instructor information, syllabus and posting of midterm/final grades. My department proactively prepared for this by recording short 5-minute 'training' videos that showed faculty how to do those three requirements that they could watch at any time. We thankfully discovered that many faculty then gained more interest in using the LMS on a deeper level once they overcame their fears and realized, 'Hey! This isn't so hard after all!'
I'd be happy to have a more in-depth conversation with you about this if you'd like - my email address is lisa.clark@blackboard.com --
Thanks and have a great weekend!
Lisa Clark
Hi Lisa:
That sounds really interesting. I really like the wording of "presence" in Blackboard as well. We had a discussion about this issue during a faculty driven technology meeting. It sounds like we could end up having to negotiate it into the contract for our faculty if we want to require it.
Annette
Our case my not apply well to this question
We have had an over 80% adoption rate for the last 5 years.
This year we announced it would be mandatory (grades only) due to an SIS integration for grade transfer that will go live Summer 2018 and was received with mixed feedback. Mostly from those who hate technology in any form.
At this point the administration asked that we use Bb as our primary form of communication between staff over email. So we created Orgs for divisions, groups, and committees that way everyone was using it. Those who initially resisted this began to warm up to it as Bb provided a great place to organize and communicate all of the data they were receiving in meetings and through research. I honestly feel this was the best thing to happen to our adoption issues as people began attending more training/asking for training.
Once we had everyone using it this year in some form it was announced that by the end of 2018 every faculty member will be required to attend training and become "certified" by us to use Bb at our school. Their courses can be submitted for evaluation to "test out" if they feel they meet the requirements we have put forth. I'll be honest though when I say those who are resisting this the most are the faculty who have been here for years. Our younger faculty are welcoming the challenge and the opportunity for the most part to prove themselves.
So how are we doing all of this?... Propaganda, positive reinforcement, lots of training, and some support from the Administration.
I have attended a number of presentations by schools that "require" every course to have a Blackboard assignment or quiz the first week(?) of classes. This data is then harvested from the database to determine which students have "actively participated" in the class. If they have participated in all their courses, their grants (and loans?) are released to them. If they have not participated, adjustments are made and/or further investigation is done. Note that this applies to face-to-face classes as well as on-line classes. The institutions have set this up as their safeguard against being liable for repaying funds that they have inappropriately distributed. I don't have any direct experience with this, but it seems like it could (1) protect the institution from financial risk and (2) get a number of people using Blackboard that haven't used it before. Just a thought.
We have never required faculty to use Blackboard. Over time, our usage grew organically (See Trends in Blackboard Tool Usage at NIU). Most semesters, we average about 90% faculty use, which we have been quite pleased with. The biggest reason we saw such growth was student demand. As more faculty used it, students asked other faculty to use it. In the meantime, we made it easy for faculty to learn about using Blackboard, and provided extensive support. It wasn't as quick as Lisa Clark's initiative, but it has worked for us.
The only courses for which Blackboard is required at my institution are those in our completely online degree programs. Required Blackboard use was submitted to our College Council (our governing body) and approved. There was very little pushback on it, but where we (the online ed team) did receive opposition was on requiring faculty training and on instructional design review for courses. We're still fighting those battles. However, the faculty union has made identified online platform choice as a contract proposal for the next round of collective bargaining, so things may get interesting at CUNY.
When we first started with Blackboard (CourseInfo 4) we created a 'learning site' for every unit taught at the University. That was in 1999/2000. There was a groundswell from the academic community that was related to concerns about workload and the union got involved. Over a relatively short period of time, this dissipated and now it is required that every unit taught at SCU has some interaction with Blackboard, whether taught online or face to face (f2f). This includes, at a minimum, a welcome announcement and contact details, the Unit Information Guide and assessment details for every learning site on the system every teaching period. The UIG is automatically populated from the Course and Unit Management System, as is the assessment overview, also pulled from the UIG, which resides on our CMS.
Now days, most f2f students submit their assignments via Blackboard and receive their marks there. All that are online have done so for many years.
We no longer run training sessions and have not done so for several years now. Instead, we use Eesysoft Support Centre (which is fantastic) in combination with a Teaching and Learning website for instructions on how to use Blackboard and its tools, as well as a community site called Blackboard Support for Staff users, which is populated with every staff member, academic and professional. We support individuals who require help via phone or email and by running a weekly 'Friday Free for All' Collaborate session every Friday at noon. At the beginning of each teaching period, we use targeted sessions about specific tools in Blackboard, like Turnitin, online grading, tests, etc. during this weekly open, drop-in session.
Lisa Clark - care to weigh in for Annette re: your Blackboard presence initiative?