5650 - Thoughts on Bottom-up Design of Online Programs

This week's reading is from an article by faculty at the University of Florida (UF). I was especially interested in this article because I am working with Richard Ferdig and Cathy Cavanaugh of UF on writing a book chapter that they are publishing through NACOL. The book focuses on high school implementation of online courses. I will be meeting Richard Ferdig at the end of October at the NACOL VSS in Phoenix.

Although the article is about online programs at the university level, I tried to make some connections to my work at the high school level. First, I noticed that the rationale for offering online courses is much the same between the two levels. "University globalization, new pedagogical opportunities and strategies, research in online education, increasing student numbers, reaching diverse audiences and meeting students at their own time and place were all reasons the need for an online program could no longer be ignored" (Ferdig and Dawson, p. 28).

Marketing is another topic in the article that resonates with me. The idea of marketing online courses is a bit of a new idea to me. I have been thinking about it a lot over the past week as I just returned from a week-long road trip of face to face marketing with the schools we serve. In education, marketing is a bit of a foreign concept. As a teacher, I don't remember ever marketing my courses. I have never formally learned about marketing. It certainly wasn't a course requirement or focus of a degree in education. So I'm finding this to be a challenging, but critical component of the work I do. Just as the authors say, the "'build it and they will come' model will not work" (p. 31). Our organizational approach right now is to exhibit at key conferences, to present at these conferences when appropriate, and to make road trips and personal visits with key school personnel. We are also in the process of facilitating regional workshops on online teaching and learning throughout the state. Stay tuned to see if they help us.