Northeast Alabama Community College

QEP Committee Minutes

April 9, 2024

Meeting: The QEP Committee held a meeting on Tuesday, April 9, 2024, in MT224 at 1 p.m.

Present: Kelly DeAngelis, Co-Chair, Emily Bailey, Secretary, Associate Dean Barbara Kilgore, and Rebecca Cloud

I.    Call to Order: General Announcements and Informational Items

Ms. Kelly DeAngelis opened the meeting by greeting everyone. The committee members then worked together on a brainstorming activity to plan and prepare for the general scope of the QEP topic.

A.     Breakout Topics included:

• Board-based support expressed by the institutional constituencies.

• Possible QEP Goals

o   Initiation

o   Implementation

o   Completion

• Assessment

B.      Board-based Support expressed by the institutional constituencies.

The QEP survey summaries for Faculty, Staff, and Students expressed the following bullet points.

• More online offerings - When discussed by the committee, this topic was an outlier and was thought to possibly not fit into the direction in which the QEP was headed at this time.

• Variety of Content (interactive, engaging, live, and recorded) - When the committee members discussed this topic, the solution/support fell into several different subcategories.

o   Instructional Design (Rubric)

o   Professional Development

o   Technology Solutions 

• Structure guidelines (enforced) - When the committee discussed this topic, the solution/support fell under the subcategory of Instructional Design. The solution proposed was to use the new Distance Education Rubric. 

• Professional development for online instructors - When discussed by the committee, the solution/support for this topic fell under professional development. One solution discussed was creating and requiring an instructor Canvas Orientation or “Cadet Course.” 

• Training for online students - The committee discussed solutions/support for this topic under Student Development. One solution discussed was creating and requiring a Canvas Orientation for all students.

• Flexible dates, open assignments, 2 weeks minimum - When discussed, the solution/support for this topic fell under Instructional Design. The solution proposed was to use the new Distance Education Rubric.

C.      Possible QEP Goals

1. Decrease the number of online courses that fall below the 70% threshold by seven percentage points. (Goal: under 10%).

The Committee discussed the possibility of further dividing this goal into two separate goals. One goal could be directed at student success, while the other would be directed at instructor support or professional development.

2. Increase the number of general education learning outcomes attainment rate online courses to 1 or 2 percentage points of the traditional method of delivery. (Goal: 93%)

From these goals, the committee agreed that our general education courses should be the first cohort of courses to be supported and evaluated. This list includes only fully online sections of ENG 100 and 101, SPH 107, MTH 100 and 116, CIS 146, and BIO 103 and 201. 

The committee discussed when to start the professional development process, the evaluation cycle, and the resources for support and professional development. The two major categories that arose from this discussion were technology and people.

• How will we initiate the process?

The distance education rubric was discussed as a way to initiate the course evaluation process. However, it was pointed out that instructors would need training on how to use the new rubric. This posed the question of who would be in charge of this training and what that training would look like.

The idea of an instructional designer was voiced, as was the suggestion that this training could be provided by an outside party.

It was also suggested that the rubric could not be introduced until all Module Learning Outcomes (MLOs) were aligned with the state-mandated Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs).

• How will we implement the process?

The committee discussed the involvement of the distanced education committee. It was suggested that this portion of the process would be where instructors possibly received feedback from the distance education committee and then had professional development workshops to fix the committee’s findings.

• How will we complete the process?

The committee agreed that this process would easily take a full year to complete one cohort cycle.

D.     Assessment

The committee discussed what the assessment end of this process would look like and agreed that we would table this item for the next meeting when the director of planning and assessment was available to attend.

II.    Action Items, Deadlines, & Takeaways:

A.     Committee members:

• Review the College’s previous QEP.

• Review the PowerPoint presentation given to the leadership team from November 2023.

• Research other QEPs involving online learning.

• Submit suggestions for possible lead QEP evaluators.

B.      Anticipated timeline for our next meeting: April 16, 2024, at 1 p.m.

Respectfully submitted by Emily Bailey (committee secretary)

Northeast Alabama Community College

QEP Committee Minutes

April 23, 2024

Meeting: The QEP Committee held a meeting on Tuesday, April 23, 2024, in MT224 at 1 p.m.

Present: Kelly DeAngelis, Co-Chair, Emily Bailey, Secretary, Rebecca Cloud, Olivia Dodd, Dean Chad Gorham, Associate Dean Barbara Kilgore, Bryon Miller, Jody Ragsdale, Joan Reeves, and Juliah Sanford

I.    Call to Order: General Announcements and Informational Items

Ms. Olivia Dodd opened the meeting. She walked the committee through the QEP framework and informed the committee of some SACSCOC updates. One of those updates was that one of the people we reached out to about being a QEP evaluator responded with interest and availability.

Ms. Joan Reeves reminded the committee that it was important to ensure that the evaluator we suggest to the SACSCOC has the right credentials and is willing to put in the work. Ms. Reeves was also curious if this evaluator had previously been a SACSCOC evaluator. She said there are pros and cons to using someone who has never been through the SACSCOC process.

Ms. Dodd said that she would reach out to our VP for other evaluator suggestions who have previously experienced the SACSCOC process. She then turned the meeting over to the Co-Chairs.

Ms. Kelly DeAngelis summarized the previous meetings and explained how the committee had arrived at the proposed QEP plan for the large group. She then opened the floor  

A.     Proposed Plan:

Students

• The committee wondered if the first student cohort should be those registered in developmental courses.

Ms. Dodd confirmed that this group could and would make a good group to assess.

The committee discussed several ideas for expanding the student cohort, including the idea of a one-credit-hour freshman/new student course dedicated to online learning. The fees required for that class would then be applied toward the student's graduation fees.

Faculty

• The committee agreed that more PD needed to be directed toward online learning, but not everyone agreed with the finer details of the proposed plan regarding faculty.

• People were confused why we had two different cohorts one dedicated to blueprints and one dedicated to individual courses.

• Some argued that the cohort number (20 instructors) was far too large for an individual to administer detailed feedback, and facilitate a well-developed training program.

These differing opinions left the committee with more areas to research. The committee agreed to reconvene on May 7th with their findings.

New Personnel 

• The committee did agree that this QEP would require a new position dedicated to overseeing this program.

II.    Action Items, Deadlines, & Takeaways:

A.     Committee members:

• Research solutions for areas of concern in the QEP plan. 

B.      Anticipated timeline for our next meeting: April 30, 2024, at 1 p.m.

Respectfully submitted by Emily Bailey (committee secretary)

Northeast Alabama Community College

QEP Committee Minutes

May 7, 2024

Meeting: The QEP Committee held a meeting on Tuesday, May 7, 2024, in MT224 at 1 p.m.

Present: Kelly DeAngelis, Co-Chair, Emily Bailey, Secretary, Rebecca Cloud, Dean Chad Gorham, Associate Dean Barbara Kilgore, Bryon Miller, Joan Reeves, and Juliah Sanford

I.    Call to Order: General Announcements and Informational Items

Ms. Kelly DeAngelis opened the meeting. She provided every present member with an agenda. The agenda had every committee member's new assignments and a tentative timeline. The timeline covered everything due for every meeting until the end of August.

Ms. DeAngelis explained that the small groups would meet on their own next Tuesday, May 14, to discuss their new assignments. She also stated that the big group would meet on Tuesday, May 28, and each small group would provide a show-and-tell presentation.

Ms. Barbara Kilgore asked for clarification on the difference between Course Support and Instructor Support.

Ms. DeAnglis explained that the Course Support group would use the NACC Rubric as the end goal for the instructor professional development course but break it up into phases. For example, phase one could be about communication expectations in an online learning environment.

Ms. Joan Reeves clarified that each group should be pulling articles and researching for their assigned category.

The Committee also discussed the idea of possibly having shell courses for both the student support and the instructor support element as examples for the QEP Presentation in October.

Ms. DeAnglis ended the meeting by reminding everyone to be thinking about names for the QEP Plan.

II.    Action Items, Deadlines, & Takeaways:

A.     Committee members:

• Research ideas and best practices for new assignments.

• Pull supplemental materials

• Name suggestions for QEP

B.      Anticipated timeline for our next meeting: May 28, 2024, at 1 p.m.

Respectfully submitted by Emily Bailey (committee secretary)