An Update on Dual and Concurrent Enrollment

August 9, 2018.Reading time 15 minutes.

Many conversations in Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee meeting on the reauthorization of the Higher Ed Act focused on dual or concurrent enrollment. Concurrent enrollment was also in the news in the past few years when The Higher Learning Commission clarified that instructors of dual-credit courses (within the HLC’s region) are required to […]

A DETA Update

July 26, 2018.Reading time 11 minutes.

It’s a DETA Update! Today we welcome Tanya Joosten, Director of Digital Learning Research and Development and Co-Director, National Research Center for Distance Education (DETA) and Technological Advancements at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, to give us an update on DETA. DETA was established with funding from the U.S. Department of Education Fund for the Improvement […]

Shifting Campus Culture through Mentoring

May 10, 2018.Reading time 16 minutes.

United States map indicates the geographic distribution of the mentors and mentees. Mentor states: RI, NC, FL, TX, CA. Mentee states: WA, NV, UT, AZ, NM, CO, OK, IL, MI, OH, KY, GA, VA, HY, MA

Today’s post is an important example of how a campus culture can impact student success. WCET is happy to share this post from Sarah Torres Lugo, Research Assistant with NCHEMS and the Foundation for Student Success. Sarah is here to discuss a Foundation for Student Success project which connects model (mentor) institutions with other institutions […]

Count All Students! Outcome Measures for Community Colleges

April 17, 2018.Reading time 23 minutes.

Should we count all students when analyzing higher education, or only some of them? We think all students should be included….and community colleges are often misrepresented by not doing so. This third post in a series of posts on the IPEDS Outcome Measures data (released by the U.S. Department of Education late in 2017), we […]

Rigor, Meet Reality

April 5, 2018.Reading time 15 minutes.

text box which reads: …Faculty members must plan collaboratively beyond the courses they teach to design program-level strategies to demonstrate rigor.

How do you define academic rigor? I know when I was completing my undergraduate and graduate coursework, I could tell the difference between a rigorous course and one that would be a little less time consuming. I also understood, especially in graduate school, that the more rigorous a course was, the more I “got out […]

OLC and WCET Need Feedback on Accessibility

March 22, 2018.Reading time 5 minutes.

Even a gazillion dollar industry like the National Football League can be blind to accessibility needs, at times. Perhaps, even, color blind. If you have not seen it, be sure to look at this video of the game in which they had the two teams wear special jerseys all of one color… While we […]

Higher Education Act – Innovations, Definitions, and State Authorization

March 15, 2018.Reading time 18 minutes.

When passed in 1965, the Higher Education Act (HEA) was intended to “to strengthen the educational resources of our colleges and universities and to provide financial assistance for students in postsecondary and higher education.” Updated or “reauthorized” several times since then, the Act has historically housed most of federal resources and regulations for higher education […]

Distance Education Enrollment Growth—Major Differences Persist Among Sectors

March 1, 2018.Reading time 14 minutes.

Chart showing 2016 total sector enrollment. 1,218,646 Private, For profit; 4,199,850 Private, Non Profit; 14,664,481 Public.

The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) recently released its 2016 distance education data. This report shows course enrollment for distance education programs in the United States. Today, we welcome Terri Taylor-Straut, Senior Research Analyst for WCET, to WCET Frontiers. Terri joins us to review some of the trends in the recently released information and […]

Open Textbooks and OER in Colorado: Lots of Interest and Great Promise

February 9, 2018.Reading time 12 minutes.

image of quote: {“Use of OER is a very clear strategy to speak to two very important concerns/barriers to education for today's learner populations: cost and convenience. Judiciously applying OER to these two critical decision-making issues can lower the barriers for a wide variety of students.” Mike Abbiatti, Exec Director of WCET

This week on WCET Frontiers Blog, Tanya Spilovoy, Ed. D., Director of Open Policy for WCET, discusses the outcomes of the Colorado Open Educational Resources (OER) Council recent work in open textbook initiatives, her research and consulting role with WCET, and how OER can be leveraged to meet state higher education goals. WCET is thrilled […]

Distance Ed Growth – Access is a Big Motivator, But It’s Complicated

February 1, 2018.Reading time 23 minutes.

Graph of answers to question "growth in stduents studying completely at a distance." Expense of F2F enrollments (33.3%), does not affect F2F enrollments as distance students do not come to campus (45.8%), is primarily focused on + funding over serving new students (19.3%), is primarily focused on serving new students over + funding (27.1%), is leading to more blended/hybrid options (64.6%)

Distance education enrollment data continue to show growth. But, we wondered why. Is the motivation to serve more students, to make money, both, neither, or a complex set of other issues? We had heard many theories, often delivered with absolute certainty, but little proof. One of the reasons I wanted to ask these questions was […]