Quality Assurance for blended and online courses

2021-2022 — CSU East Bay— Establishing a Culture of Quality

Proposal Summary: Cal State East Bay proposed to increase the number of faculty trained in QA and the number of QM certified courses. Implementation of this proposal involved one-on-one Instructional Designer-Faculty relationships and a concentrated effort to provide training. After the proposal for the Academic 2021 - 2022 year was submitted, we were informed that we are adopting Canvas as our new Learning Management System. As a result, we had to expand our training offerings to prepare for the Canvas migration. 

Campus QA Goals

Campus Goal for Quality Assurance

The main focus of our proposal:

  • Certify ten online and/or hybrid courses through the 2021-2022 CO QA initiative.
  • To have at least 150 faculty members attend some type of QA training.

We met and went above our proposal goals in the following ways:

  • 25 courses received QM certification with 4 more currently in progress. 
  • 61 faculty and staff attended QM QA training (APPQMR, DYOC and IYOC).
  • 194 faculty and staff attended some type of QA training and submitted their deliverables.

  CSU East Bay QA Canvas Faculty Training (selected example), Jun 17 2022.  

Quality Assurance Leads

  • Jessica Weiss, PhD, Director of Faculty Development

  • Roger Wen, PhD, Senior Director of the Online Campus

Supporting Campus Partners

  • Provost and Associate Provost, Academic Affairs
  • The Online Campus Instructional Designer, eLearning Specialists, and LMS Administrators/User Support Consultants
  • Office of Faculty Development/Faculty Center for Excellence in Teaching

Campus Commitment Toward Sustainability of QA Efforts

  • CSUEB continues to prioritize quality as a culture on campus. We have supported 17 cohorts going through various QA initiatives. As a result, over 550 faculty received some type of QA training and over 176 courses were QA certified since 2015. 
  • In the beginning of January this year, CSUEB had to focus on the Canvas migration. We developed a Canvas faculty training which incorporates Quality Matters standards, while it might not be Quality Matter certified trainings, it does incorporate Quality Matters standards to meet our goals and help our campus get trained on Canvas so that we are ready for the Canvas migration.

Summary of Previous QA  Accomplishments

Since Fall 2015, Cal State East Bay has engaged in a number of efforts focused on QLT, QM and Quality Assurance programming, training, and support that contributed to the success of our 2020-2021 efforts. Prior Accomplishments include:

  • Total 176 courses (25 certified in 21-22) certified as high quality courses by QM and QLT.
  • The Online Campus received the 2019 Quality Matters National "Making a Difference for Students" Higher Education recognition for our prior QA efforts.
  • Assessment results: The combined 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 efforts are paid off. When we compared courses taught by QA-participating faculty between Summer 2014 and Summer 2017, the percentage of DWFs in online courses taught by faculty who participated in QA activities [9.60%] is significantly lower than that in courses taught by faculty who have not participated in QA activities [10.47%]. [F(1, 3261)=4.162, p=.041]. We anticipate that the courses taught by participating faculty in the remainder of 2017-2018 as well as 2018-2019 will show similar declines;
  • 2021-2022 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2020-2021 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2018-2019 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2017-2018 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2016-2017 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2015-2016 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2015-2016 Revising Your Online Courses for Semester Conversion Faculty Learning Community;
  • 2014-2015 Online and Hybrid Course Quality Transformation Grant Program (QA);
  • 2014-2015 Teaching with Technology Faculty Learning Community;
  • 2014: Summer Institute: Journey to Excellence in Online Education (QOLT introduced);
  • 2015-2016 QOLT Campus Nominee, Kevin Kaatz, Department of History;
  • 2015 College Coordinators for Quality Assurance Faculty Learning Community (QM-based);
  • 2014-2015 QOLT Awardee, Kevin Kaatz, Department of History

Dissemination of QA Efforts— Conferences 

  • UPCEA 2021 Regions Week Conference, Cheryl Saelee, Attendee

Quality Assurance Results

Training Completions

The following table summarizes all Cal State East Bay faculty and staff that have taken QA training during the 2021-2022 academic year. 

Training
Number of Completions
Accelerated Designing Your Online Course Online Facilitator Certification
1
Accelerated Designing Your Online Course F2F Facilitator Certification
1
Applying the QM Rubric Online Facilitator Certification
2
Applying the QM Rubric Face to Face Facilitator Certification
2
Course Review Manager Certification
2
QM Coordinator Training
2
Peer Reviewer Course
2
Master Reviewer Certification
1
Applying the QM Rubric
10
Designing Your Online Course
49
Improving Your Online Course
2
QM Certified Online Facilitator Canvas Training
5
QA Canvas faculty training
133

Course Peer Review and Course Certifications

Each faculty member is paired with an eLearning Specialist/Instructional Designer and they work together to get the course ready for review. The eLearning Specialist/Instructional Designer conducts a self-review of all courses before they are submitted to QM.

At Cal State East Bay, there are currently 15 eligible QM Peer and Master Reviewers:

  1. Amy June Rowley
  2. Andrew Wong
  3. Cheryl Saelee
  4. Chinglih Jan
  5. Erick Kong
  6. Georgie Ziff
  7. Isaiah Lankham
  8. James Mitchell
  9. Kimberly Kim
  10. Michelle Rippy
  11. Roger Wen
  12. James Thomas (Master Reviewer)
  13. Keelin Jardin (Master Reviewer)
  14. Kevin Kaatz (Master Reviewer)
  15. Santos Torres (Master Reviewer)

The table below shows the 25 Quality Matters Certified courses for 2021-2022 Academic Year.



Course IDCourse Name Instructor
BIO 271Human Anatomy and Physiology II (6/2021)
Tess Freidenburg
ACCT 210Introduction to Financial Accounting (6/2021)
Chinglih Jan
OTL 673Supervising and Evaluating Online Teaching (7/2021)
David Dodick
OTL 601Introduction to Online Teaching and Learning (8/2021)
Meg Taggart
ENGL 342Environmental Literature (9/2021)
Ryan Heryford
SLHS 300
Communicative and Cognitive Development Across the Lifespan (9/2021)
Elena Dukhovny
HDEV 381
Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Lifespan Human Development (9/2021)
Jiansheng Guo    
OTL 604
Designing Curriculum for Online Instruction (10/2021)
Cheryl Saelee
ENGL 346
Literature and Health Care (10/2021)
Christine Gottlieb
KIN 300
Critical Inquiry in Kinesiology (12/2021)
E. Missy Wright
REC 200
Serving Diverse Populations (1/2022)
Keelin Jardin    
SOC 435
Social Psychology (1/2022)
Amara Miller
MGMT 499
Strategic Business Management (3/2022)
Alex Makarevich
HIST 388
U.S. and California Environmental History (4/2022)  
Gregory Brueck
OTL 606
Research in Online Teaching and Learning (4/2022)
Melanie Shaw
REC 359
Therapeutic Environmental Recreation (4/2022)
Erick Kong
MLL 352
Japanese Folktale and Culture (4/2022)
Shiori Hoke
EPSY 683
Crisis in Schools and Mental Health Settings (4/2022)
May Nguyen
HDEV 322
Adult Development and Aging (4/2022)
Lisa Handwerker
KIN 461
Exercise and Well-Being (5/2022)
Mandi Dupain
CRJ 430
Victimology & Crime Victims (5/2022)
Christopher Palmore
TED 693
Implementing and Analyzing Research in Preschool – Grade 12 (5/2022)
Tonja Byrom
ENGL 200
College Writing II (5/2022)
SuJin Lee
KIN 162
Nutrition and Performance (6/2022)
Andrea Johnson
MLL 161Elementary Mandarin I (6/2022)Hui-tzu Lu

Development of Campus QA Resources

List of Resources Developed

An Overview Video on how to Get Started with the CSU East Bay Canvas Master Course Template 

CSU East Bay Canvas Faculty Training  in Canvas, Summer 2022.


Accessibility/UDL Efforts

  • Online Campus staff took Designing with Accessibility in Mind training offered by the Online Learning Consortium.
  • Offered accessibility training workshops to faculty.
  • Continued to train student assistants on using ABBYY.
  • Purchased ALLY licenses for Canvas so we can maintain the same level of service. 
  • Continued to use ALLY in all Blackboard courses and train faculty on using ALLY to improve the accessibility of their course content.

Next Steps for QA Efforts 

  • Continue to train new faculty on QA Training, currently 6 training sessions are planned which will lead to another 180 faculty to get trained.
  • Continue to recruit and support more faculty members attend some type of QA training that includes Canvas faculty training, APPQMR, DYOC and IYOC.
  • Identify and certify 10 more online or hybrid courses in 2021- 2022.
  • Seek additional funding to elevate progress.