December Faculty Newsletter

December | 2016

FACULTY SPOTLIGHT

Gerald Beavers

Adjunct Professor, Professor Emeritus
Department of Public Management and Criminal Justice

College of Behavioral and Health Sciences

"Our job is to develop courses that meet the needs of our students, with or without handicaps or impediments. By making my courses fully ADA compliant, I am perhaps aiding those who need the compliance steps, but while doing so it does not interfere with those who do not need the changes. In other words, our courses should meet the needs and requirements of our students no matter who they are or how they may take the course.

I was able to make my 3000 level course compliant in one afternoon. While this required just a bit more effort on my part, I feel the results are far in excess of those efforts. When I first heard of the requirement to make our syllabus ADA compliant, I feared that it was going to require extensive extra work on my part. Once I understood the process, however, I found the extra work was minimal compared to the expected benefits."

FACULTY DEVELOPMENT

The fall semester is coming to a close, but there is still time to attend a faculty development session to improve your skills. From learning how to create an instructional video to creating an accessible syllabus, Distance Education would love to teach you!

Below you will find the Faculty Development sessions scheduled for December. Be sure to register in advance for any session you plan to attend. If you have questions or need course assistance, contact the D2L Help Desk at (931) 221-6625

D2L I: Dropbox, Grade Book, and Turnitin

Monday, December 5, 11:00 AM- Noon

D2L I: Managing Content in D2L

Tuesday, December 6, 1-2 PM

D2L I: Discussions and Calendars

Tuesday, December 6, 2-3 PM

Multimedia: My Media

Wednesday, December 7, 9-10 AM

Multimedia: Camtasia Basic

Wednesday, December 7, 10-11:30 AM

Accessible Syllabus

Thursday, December 8, 1-2 PM

Making Your Online Course ADA Compliant

Thursday, December 8, 2-3 PM

Creating Accessible Documents and Media

Thursday, December 8, 3-4 PM

Assessing the Value of Educational Resources

Monday, December 12, 9-10 AM

Using Copyrighted Materials in Your Online Course

Wednesday, December 14, 1-2 PM

Multimedia: Camtasia Advanced

Wednesday, December 14, 2-3:30 PM

DISTANCE EDUCATION SERVICES

We are here to help you and your department! Please check out many of our services below. We are happy to help you enhance your courses! You can visit the APSU Distance Education website for more information!

Course development
Closed captioning services
D2L Help Desk technical support
Faculty development training
Innovative approaches to content delivery
Multimedia resources
One-on-one D2L help sessions
Online student assistance
Online proctoring services
Technology integration into online courses

VISIT OUR WEBSITE

WINTER TERM

Do you have a student who needs to enroll in a general education course but it does not fit into their spring schedule? How about a student who needs to repeat a course or raise their GPA? Winter Term could be their solution with over 50 different course offerings. Help your students jump start the spring semester by taking a Winter Term course. All courses are completely online and students can complete the course in five weeks. Please visit the Winter Term website for more information!

DEPARTMENT-WIDE TRAINING

Distance Education is excited to announce that we now offer department wide training sessions! We can come to you, or you can come to us. We offer training in many different subjects including accessible syllabus. D2L, ePortfolio, and more. Check out our faculty development calendar to see what training your department needs!

FACULTY TRAVEL STIPEND

To encourage the exploration of distance, online, blended or hybrid education and instructional strategies at APSU, travel stipends are available through Distance Education (DE).

Travel stipends up to $500 can be requested by faculty wH o present research at national or international conferences related to innovative teaching practices and technologies for improving online/hybrid learning environments. Please visit the Distance Education Travel Stipend site, to read the requirements and apply!

*Funds are limited and stipends will not be awarded once they are exhausted for the fiscal year.

VIRTUAL PROCTORING

APSU Distance Education has partnered with SmarterProctoring for virtual proctoring services. Your students can access and schedule proctored exams from within D2L. Please visit the pages below for more information, including video and PDF tutorials!

ON-GROUND PROCTORING

Effective Spring 2017, Distance Education will only be providing scheduled on-ground proctoring sessions for TN eCampus courses. During the Fall 2016 semester we will continue to provide limited on-ground proctoring sessions.

We highly encourage APSU online faculty to use our virtual proctoring services for midterms and finals if you are unable to proctor exams. Distance Education will be offering training workshops for faculty and students to learn how to use virtual proctoring services. Please visit our website regarding On-Ground proctoring for more details on this change.

www.apsu.edu/online