I would like to lead a grassroots initiative to investigate, create and implement a college-wide hybrid course alternative for Sinclair.

Background

I have been doing the groundwork for such an initiative for four years.

In 1997 I created the first on-line course at Sinclair Community College, followed by a second course in 1998 (I still teach both on-line courses). When I developed my courses -- by hand, from scratch -- there were few models of on-line courses. For years, Columbia Graduate School of Education used my original course as a case study for critique in their distance education class.

In 1998, seeing the advantages of blending the in-person and on-line methodologies, I began using in-class course sections for experiments such as posting group projects on-line and using e-mail discussion lists [see www.psychbites.com/psy208/projgrps.htm]. Occasionally, class members were dispersed to various Sinclair labs and experimented with the concept of live chat. In 1998 I began developing Web sites to support every class that I taught, and I have continued to create Web sites for every class since [see www.sanebrain.com/psy/ for psychology courses and www.sanebrain.com/flashclass for Macromedia Flash courses in the CIS department]. A year and a half ago, at the end of a Macromedia Flash course, I realized that the class had accidentally gone 100% paperless -- not one piece of paper had exchanged hands between me and students; everything had been done electronically: syllabus and all class information posted on a Web site, all student work submitted via the Web using on-line storage space, a constantly changing Web gallery of student work, student class evaluations, etc.

In 1999 I began experimenting with an occasional "virtual class." [for a later example of an introduction to a virtual class see www.sanebrain.com/psy/vc-oct500.htm ] At that time, about a third of the class would admit they had never touched the Internet, so I would arrange for students to help each other and I would work with them individually when necessary.

By Fall of 2000 I had worked my way up to an experiment where all of my classes "went virtual" for a two week period [see www.sanebrain.com/psy/virtual]. On-line student evaluations of the process were collected and posted (on the Web) regularly. This experiment comprised the content for one of my presentations for the League Conference on Information Technology, 2000.

Current Situation That Shows Promise for Faculty, Students, and the College

This quarter, Fall, 2001, I have reached a "pinnacle of hybridity." I have two in-class Psy 208 classes that are running in a truly hybrid manner. After consulting with students and achieving buy-in from them, we arranged to meet in person every Tuesday and on-line every Thursday [see www.sanebrain.com/psy/psy208]. I have created my own comprehensive on-line discussion forums to support the class [see www.billstruhar.com/forum]. Initial accountability data from the course is available at www.sanebrain.com/psy/psy208/fall01/data-start.htm and additional data will be collected mid-quarter and at the end of the courses. This is not the end of the experiment -- I have yet to see what the optimum ratio of in-class to on-line is. (I am sure this ratio will vary for types of course and differences in instructors.)

At this point in the experiments, it is clear that hybrid courses could yield significant paybacks for faculty, students, and the college. Buy-in for such systems should be assured if all participants see benefits.

Other Comments:

As I proceeded with these experiments, I established the goal of using technology to make my life better/easier and to assure that student learning was not shortchanged. It is now also apparent that this process could help with the "elbow room" issue at Sinclair.

The payback for faculty does depend on some extra effort up front, but there is an eventual payback. I understand the process of moving from all-in-person to hybrid classes -- a proven process based on a history of success and data collection for accountability purposes. I have made numerous presentations on the processes and results at national conferences.

It is important that faculty members work toward successful implementation systematically, over time.

Ongoing faculty development would be strategically built into the process. Faculty members must develop/learn (both technologically and pedagogically) in order to begin the migration, and by creating and improving hybrid processes, faculty members will be assured of continual development.

The project can be done at any level of organizational commitment -- with little or no support (release time, budget) from the college we can accomplish a lot -- or some support and we accomplish more, faster -- or make this a major college initiative and we can really set sail. We can start with little or no support until we prove ourselves and then work up to greater support. We don't need project leadership from the administration. We can lead ourselves, but the degree to which the college chooses to support the project would impact the scope of implementation.

I would make this initiative a comprehensive endeavor with a Web site as home base, a discussion list, our own marketing of the concept to colleagues. We would use technology throughout the initiative with a minimum of physical meetings. In-person and on-line training sessions are likely.

I am thinking of an implementation that starts small, achieves buy-in, grows to something big over time..

I am pretty sure that no one else at Sinclair has my level of educational technology expertise, experience with distance learning, experience with hybrid classes, leadership ability based on respect from colleagues, understanding of community colleges, experience with organizational change, applied creativity....etc....to work on an initiative like this one.

I would like to spend considerable time and energy working on this project from now through June, 2001. And when I retire at the end of this academic year, I would like to continue working on this project as my supplemental retirement service for the next three years.

What is a hybrid course?