Redesigning an online executive Master s class for a large number of students

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1 Paper ID #9231 Redesigning an online executive Master s class for a large number of students Dr. Malini Natarajarathinam, Texas A&M University Malini Natarajarathinam is an Associate professor with the Department of Engineering Technology and Industrial Distribution in the Dwight Look College of Engineering at Texas A&M University. Dr. Natarajarathinam s teaching activities surround classes in purchasing, distribution networks and strategic relationships. She strives to make learning fun, relevant and perpetual to her students. The students of the Industrial Distribution Program presented her the Award of Distinction in Dr. Natarajarathinam s research interests include coordinated decision making in stochastic supply chains, handling supply chains during times of crisis and optimizing global supply chains. Her research articles have won best paper awards at Association of Collegiate Marketing Educators Conference and Society of Marketing Advances Conference. She currently serves on the Editorial advisory board for International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management. Dr. Natarajarathinam has worked on several research projects funded by government agencies and industry. She has a strong passion for student development. She is the founding faculty of the Society of Women in Industrial Distribution (SWID). c American Society for Engineering Education, 2014

2 Redesigning an online executive Master s class for a large number of students I. Introduction Designing an online class especially for a large number of executives and working professionals is a challenge. The focus of the class moves more towards learning from teaching i. The class should be designed not only to have a high impact on the learning but also to be mindful of the availability of the students. Common online education tools such as discussion boards and one-on-one conference calls become very cumbersome to manage given the number of the students and the availability of the students. Grading and giving feedback at timely fashion is still very important as this helps the students to learn from the feedback they receive. All these pose a challenge to designing the learning and assessment activities effectively in the class. The course should be made personal to all students ii such that they can reap the maximum benefit from higher education. In any online class, the teacher is expected more to be a mentor and facilitator. In a formal classroom setting, it is relatively easier for the teacher to get the students involved, engaged and active iii. It is very important to engage students in an online class and make them accountable for the learning. These two tasks become more challenging when the number of students is large and there are no formal contact hours. In Fall 2013, the class on Strategic distributor relationships for the online Executive Masters program was redesigned to accommodate the incoming class of 60 students. The class was originally designed and taught with students for several years. The class was redesigned to include better learning assessment methods and student engagement techniques. This article will talk about how the class was redesigned to keep the students engaged but also make the class personal and useful to each student s expectations and career growth. II. Challenges and Changes The main challenges that occur in a formal large student classroom are managing a flood of questions from students, managing grading, presenting material effectively, keeping students engaged, holding students accountable and building good team-based assignments iv. All these challenges occur in an online class and tackling these becomes a little bit harder with no face-to-face contact time with the teacher. The changes made helped overcome the challenges and provided a wholesome experience to the students. The content of the course remained unchanged; it was the delivery that had to be modified. The major changes were in the changes in the assessment of learning and the communication with the students. These changes are discussed in detail.

3 A. Changes in Assessment of Learning Fall 2012 Fall 2013 Assignments 80 2 assignments - 40 points each online quizzes 20 points each Midterm Exam 200 Short answer questions 250 Mix of MCQs and short answer/ essay questions Final Exam 200 Essay questions 250 Mix of MCQs and short answer/ essay questions Forum Discussions (6) points for leader week and 15 for other weeks points for Mandatory Week/ 20 points for others Case Studies (2) points each - Group Project Simulation Game 200 Total Table 1: Changes in Assessment of Learning from Fall 2012 to Fall Assignments: In Fall 2012, the students worked on 2 qualitative assignments each worth 40 points. The students had to write 2 pages-reports on a topic provided for each assignment. In Fall 2013, a major revision was made to the assignments to accommodate the large class. Weekly online multiple choice question (MCQ) quizzes were administered. There were 10 quizzes during the 14 weeks long semester. Each quiz covered the readings assigned for the week. There were 10 MCQs on the quiz each worth 2 points each. The quizzes were timed and the students had 30 minutes to take the quiz. During Fall 2012 with less than 20 students in the class, it was easier to keep the students engaged and check if they were keeping up with their weekly reading through one-on-one discussions. Also, performance on weekly assignment submissions indicating levels of engagement with the class was easily assessed. Students who appeared to be having challenges could be easily identified and were involved in conversations with the faculty to see how they could come back on track. This became extremely challenging to do with 60 students in a class. Hence, an easy way to assess if the students were keeping up with the readings and the class was to create online quizzes. The online quizzes were not hard or tricky. The questions were mainly meant to get the students attention to the important concepts and topics in their assigned readings v. Moving away from the long answer type of questions helped with time to grade and providing timely feedback.

4 The quizzes were set up to draw random questions from a question bank. So, students could talk to their friends/ group mates and compare questions. The correct answers with the explanation were also automatically provided after they completed the quiz. This helped the students to focus on the important topics and get explanation on why the concept was important. As the semester went on and the students got used to taking the quizzes. They would the faculty saying that they were proud that they were able to complete it within minutes and go a perfect score. This showed that they started enjoying the excitement of getting all the answers correct in the shortest amount of time. 2. Exams: There were 2 exams scheduled in both Fall of 2012 and However, the exams were given more weight in This is because the format of the exam was changed. In Fall 2012 and the semesters before, the midterm exam comprised of 20 short answer questions and the final exam comprised of 4 essay questions. However in Fall 2013, both the midterm and the final exams had an online MCQ quiz for 150 points and a written part with 10 short answer questions and a case study. The MCQ part was included to test their understanding of the key concepts. Also, students have gotten used to getting tested with MCQs and this MCQ part on the exam provided a method that they were used to and comfortable with to test their rote learning. The written part which included short answer and essay questions was used to assess their critical and analytical knowledge on topics provided in class. This also helped to reduce grading time and effort for the faculty while not compromising on the quality of assessment or feedback to the students. 3. Forum Discussions: Redesigning the forums discussions (discussion boards) was the most challenging task. In the past, the students were given 6 topics throughout the semester. Each topic was discussed by the students for a week. For each week, 2-3 students were chosen to be discussion board leaders. The discussion board topic was made available on Monday morning at 8 AM. The discussion board leaders had until Wednesday night to make their initial posts. This helped to break the ice for discussion among the other students. Once the initial posts were made, the other students along with the discussion board leaders posted on the topic until Sunday night. The students who have taken this class in the previous years have found the discussion boards to be the most valuable learning tool. The discussion board helped them learn best practices related to the topic from their peers. The students would post how challenging issues are handled in their organization and that made for very interesting discussion topics. Participation on the discussion boards was mandatory for all students for all weeks. The grade for participating as a discussion board leader was much more than the other weeks. This was due to the fact that the discussion board leader had the task of getting the discussions off to

5 the right start and then keeping the discussion going on for the entire week. This is almost impossible in this same format with 60 students in a class. If the same format was followed, the discussion board would become too long with too many students. Then students will not be reading the posts to gain valuable knowledge from them. Instead they would be just posting to get grades. Also, the topic of discussion could become watered down with so many people posting about it. To avoid this, the discussion board participation and grading was redesigned. There were 10 students assigned to each discussion board. Participation in only one discussion board was mandatory. However, with 10 students discussing, the discussions were still very rich in content. There were no discussion board leaders. 80 points was allotted to the week of their mandatory participation on the forum discussions. However, students who were not assigned to the mandatory discussion, if they had something valuable or interesting to say regarding the topic of discussion had to be encouraged. In order to encourage that, 20 points was given for discussion on the other discussion topics. These 20 points were not dependent of the number of posts; but on the content of the posts. By adopting this change, students are able to share best practices and learn from each other. At the same time, the number of posts was at a manageable level so students could still be engaged actively reading or posting. 4. Case studies In Fall 2012 and in the previous semesters, the students worked on 2 case studies. The case study reports were turned in individually. In the redesigned format, smaller case studies were used in the midterm and final exam. Hence, the case studies were removed from the regular submissions list. 5. Group Project In Fall 2012, the students worked on class projects in groups of 2 or 3. The students picked a strategic relationship related problem that was happening in one of their organizations and came up with a solution to the issue. The project was broken into various milestones. With 60 students, there would possibly be projects. A single faculty supervising projects while teaching the class will affect the quality of mentoring that can be provided with the projects. If the number of projects needs to be reduced, the team size has to be increased. This will lead to some students in a group contributing and others not. The decision was made to drop the group projects from the class and come up with another group activity that will involve all the students better. Having students work in groups is very important in this online executive Masters class as it helps the students develop a network that they can work with when they are in school and also rely on once they graduate. 6. Simulation Game

6 In an effort to create a group activity involving students better and also to provide a practical and fun way to apply concepts that they learnt in classes, a simulation game was played in class. This idea stemmed from feedback from students who took this class in the past. They wanted an opportunity to apply the knowledge gained from class to real life situation in a more fun way than doing a class project. The simulation was a better way to have students acquire learning by applying than by doing a group project. With the simulation game, the entire class had an uniform experience and the faculty could control the concepts that students need to be able to use. In a group project, this was not always possible because with the real world problem, the group and the faculty are not always sure of all the concepts that will manifest in the project. B. Changes in Communication Communication is key in any class. It becomes more important in a large online classes. In Fall 2012, there used to monthly conference calls in the evenings where students could talk to the faculty in an open forum. The conference calls also provided an opportunity for the teacher to address the class on common issues and provide general feedback and announcements. In Fall 2013, conference calls were scheduled more informally whenever the faculty thought the class needed to be addressed. Also, instead of just having the conference call in the evenings, a lunch time conference call was also included. By doing this, students who can t get off work to get on the conference call in the evenings could use their lunch break to participate. This made a huge impact on the students and all conference calls were very well attended. There were about 20 students during every conference call and there were very good communication. Care was taken not to schedule too many conference calls. That would put additional pressure on students to take more time from their other walks of time to attend to the conference call. The teaching assistants conducted virtual office hours. They made themselves available through a webex for a couple of hours in the evenings for 2-3 days in a week especially during weeks when hard assignments were due. The TAs also hosted office hours when there were some challenging milestones while playing the simulation game. The students could call in if they got stuck and the TAs were able to help them proceed. Instead of sending announcements via , an announcement section was created on the class website. All announcements (major or minor) were posted there. In the previous semesters, if students lost the on which an announcement was sent, they will contact the faculty or the teaching assistant. When the announcements are all posted in a common place, the time to search and resend s by the students, faculty and the teaching assistant was significantly reduced.

7 With large number of students, comes a lot of different schedules that the class has to cater to. Students have to travel for work, go to conferences or trade shows, have important deadlines or audits at work etc. So, to make it easier on their part, the class website for the entire semester with the reading and assignments was set up on the first day of classes. When the students knew what they had to do for their entire semester, they were able to plan better around their other activities. This led to lower number of student asking for extensions on due dates and deadlines. Also, the students loved that the course was very organized, structured and made available to them early. III. Feedback from Students Table 2 shows the feedback from the students about the redesigned class in Fall students completed the feedback in 2012 and 29 students provided feedback on The scores are almost similar to 2012 and are very high. This shows a high level of satisfaction from the students about this course. Of course, there is always room for improvement. Instructor Fall 2012 Fall The exams/projects were graded fairly. 96% 97% 13. I felt like part of a class. 94% 94% 19. The instructor encourages diversity of opinions. 94% 94% 20. The instructor has students apply concepts. 97% 94% 21. The instructor shows genuine interest in students. 96% 95% 22. The instructor keeps students informed of their progress. 96% 94% 23. The instructor is accessible to students. 96% 96% 24. The instructor shows interest in quality of teaching. 97% 97% 25. The instructor handles the class responsibly 96% 94% 26. Instructor was aware of the unique needs of distance learners. 97% 95% 27. The instructor responded in a timely fashion when contacted. 97% 95% 28. I believe the instructor was an effective teacher. 97% 96% 29. I would take another class from this instructor. 99% 92% Instructor Section Score 96% 95% Course Design (content, text and objectives) 1. The learning objectives of the course were clearly explained. 96% 94% 2. Text book and lectures were relevant to the course objectives. 97% 95% 3. Content was related to MID curriculum. 97% 97% 5. The exams/projects were related to the learning objectives. 96% 95% 6. The course was well organized. 96% 97% 7. The course material was pertinent to my career. 97% 94% 8. The amount of work was reasonable for credit hours received. 94% 92% 10. On the whole, it was a good course. 97% 96% 12. The course was rigorous. 97% 92%

8 14. The course content was comprehensive. 96% 94% 15. The course content was current. 99% 92% 16. Course offered the challenges expected of graduate course. 97% 94% 17. Course exposed me to some leading edge ideas/technology. 96% 92% 18. Course level was appropriate for an executive Master's Degree. 97% 95% 30. The course focused on important issues in ID & Manufacturing. 97% 95% Course Design Section Score 97% 94% Table 2: Comparison of Feedback Scores Here are some sample student comments. The comments prove that the objectives of redesigning the course have been achieved. Quizzes to ensure readings assigned. Exams pertained to what was taught or read before the midterm or final. Team simulation was very detailed and fun to work with as a team The MCQ made me study more The access to the TA was a major strength in this class A vast amount of information was covered, but the text books and instruction put it into real world application that made sense and was easy to associate to everyday experiences IV. Conclusion and Future Work Overall, the class was redesigned to the satisfaction of the teacher and the students. The teacher was able to cover the topics needed, engage the students, provide timely feedback and assess learning. The students were able to learn and apply concepts and were able to do that without any unnecessary waste of time and resources. When looking at the exam scores from the two years, the midterm and final exam average in 2012 was 97.2% and 92.9% respectively. In 2013, it was 93.3% and 94.7%. Though the exam format was changed, the content that was tested and the rigor remained the same. The averages turned out to be much higher than the instructor s anticipated class averages. This reinforces the fact that the quality of teaching and learning was not sacrificed with the redesign. There are still many areas of improvement for this class. The main objective is to take away noise from the class wherever possible. If students have to worry less about when the assignment is due or how they should format the assignment, they can actually concentrate on working on the assignment. This was the main objective of this redesign so that the students can just focus on the learning in the class. Having a few more web conferences with the students or even small groups of them could help. Also, creating small video lectures by using camtasia vi to get their attention to important topics discussed during the week would also be a good

9 idea for the future. Another area for improvement is to see if small group class projects can be done in the class. Working on real life projects not just helps the students but also shows the student s organization what they are capable of. This could lead to the student s professional career progression and success. V. Bibliography 1. Berry, R.W., Meeting the Challenges of Teaching Large Online Classes: Shifting to a Learner-Focus, Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, Vol. 5, No. 1, March Crosby, G. V. and Dunston, J., The Development and Delivery of an Online Graduate Course: Lessons Learned and Future Direction, Proceedings of the 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Engineering Education, Atlanta, Georgia, June Sull, E.C., Teaching Online with Errol: Effectively Teaching Large-Enrollment Online Classes, Online Classroom, May 1, Strategies for Teaching Large Classes, Published on Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost of the University 5. Natarajarathinam, M., Redesigning a course on Electronics Distribution Networks to meet the contemporary industry needs, Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Engineering Education, Vancouver, British Columbia, June Dunn, C. K., Batts, D. L. and Friend, S. L., How educational institutions can handle more students with fewer faculty members, Proceedings of the 2011 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Engineering Education, Vancouver, British Columbia, June