Quality Course Design Rubric Instructions

Overview

The Department of Instructional Innovation and Design defines the word quality in the context of learning experiences as the provision of educational experiences that benefit our community. We define, create, deliver, and help our faculty evaluate quality learning experiences for the benefit of our learners, our instructors, and our College.

Using the Quality Course Design Rubric

The Quality Course Design rubric contains four sheets:

1. Course Information: links to these instructions and contains course information and summary findings.

2. Primary Review: The results from this sheet create the overall results for the review. 

3. Secondary Review (Optional): This is an optional space for a potential second reviewer. Results from the secondary review are not included in the final results. 

4. Notes from Reviewers: A side-by-side view of the notes from the primary and secondary reviews. 

Course Information 

Enter the basic information for your course. Some evidence will automatically be assigned the level of "N/A" for certain course modalities. The overall results for each standard will automatically populate on this page after each piece of evidence for that standard is assessed. 

Course Modality Form Logic

By selecting their course modality on the Quality Course Design Rubric, users  may see specific evidence and standards default to N/A (not applicable). Instructors may override these settings by accessing the Primary Review tab and unchecking the box in the N/A column on any evidence they wish to have included in their course design review. 

The DIID team welcomes suggestions for improvements to the logic, shown below.

1. Z-Degree - all standards and evidence are included by default

2. CBE - all standards included by default, excluding Evidence 1.5 (system-level dates)

3. Online - all standards and evidence are included by default

4. Online Synch - all standards and evidence are included by default

5. Hybrid - all standards and evidence are included by default

6. F2F / Video Conference - Standard 2 (regular & substantive interaction), Standard 5 (instruction & assessment), and Standard 7 (copyright) are excluded by default. Evidence 1.3 (instructor welcome), 1.4, (titling & descriptions) 8.1 (course materials), 8.2 (instructor communication), and 8.3 ( course links) also excluded by default.

7. Web Enhanced - all standards and evidence are included by default

8. Practical Exp. - all standards and evidence are included by default

Requesting an Instructional Designer Course Review

Faculty can initiate a course review at any time by sending an email requesting a quality course review to online@nicc.edu. You will receive a confirmation and a designer will contact you. 

Self-Review

The faculty member should review using the Secondary Review sheet. The assigned Instructional Designer will then complete their review using the Primary Review sheet (sheets can be added if you'd like additional reviewers). Once all parties have reviewed the course, the instructional designer will schedule a conference with the instructor to discuss the review and next steps.

Scoring with the Rubric

Assessment of Individual Evidence

• Proficient: The course exhibits all components of the evidence.

• Developing: The course exhibits most components of the evidence.

• Beginning: The course exhibits few components of the evidence.

• No Evidence: The course does not exhibit any components of the evidence.

• Not Applicable (N/A): The evidence does not apply to this particular course.

Levels of Evidence

The Quality Course Design Rubric is designed to identify areas of course design that may benefit from course improvements. There are twenty pieces of evidence reviewers consider, categorized into eight unique quality course standards. Each piece of evidence is weighted equally toward a standard's level assignment. No overall course score or grade is provided  by the rubric.

• • • Proficient: 5/5 

    • Developing: 3/5 

    • Beginning: 1/5 

    • No Evidence: 0 /5

    • Not Applicable (N/A): Is excluded from level calculation.

Assessment of Standards

The following level assignments are based on an average of the results of all evidence for a given standard.

• Proficient: 85%+ proficiency on the standard; minimal improvements recommended.

• Developing: 60%-84% proficiency on the standard; improvements are needed to meet the standard.

• Beginning: <60% proficiency on the standard; major improvements needed to meet the standard.

• No Evidence: 0% proficiency; course does not attempt to meet the standard.

• Not Applicable (N/A); the evidence does not apply to this particular course.