LESSONS FROM THE WEB

Experience helps in any endeavor. Part of the challenge facing those interested in online education is taking that first plunge, or gaining initial experience. Law professors can do so, of course, by creating online courses or by supplementing their students' in-person class experiences with online course websites and discussion boards. Law schools themselves must try harder to gain experience administering online educational programs, for American Bar Association (ABA)-accredited law schools cannot admit an entire section or incoming

Resources for Developing an Online Program Designing an online program requires some knowledge of both online teaching and master's-level (not J.D.) curriculum design. Because I knew virtually nothing about either when I began creating the M.H.L. program, I did a great deal of reading to inform my work. Following are three resources I found particularly helpful: William A. Draves, Teaching Online (LERN Books 2000) - an accessible and complete reference on online course creation and teaching; Wilbert J. McKeachie, McKeachie’s Teaching Tips: Strategies, Research and Theory for College and University Teachers (Houghton Mifflin 1999) - about in-person, rather than online, educational theory and teaching techniques, but a good recap and discussion of the array of teaching styles for which the program should account; and Rosemary S. Caffarella, Planning Programs for Adult Learners (Jossey-Bass 1994) - also about in-person, rather than online, education, but a look at the educational theory and research behind program design.

class of students who will take all their classes online. ABA-accredited law schools can, however, gain administrative experience by conducting online programs in the LL.M. and non-lawyer master's-level arenas.

Nova Southeastern University's (NSU's) Shepard Broad Law Center has begun to gain such experience. More than a year ago, it launched an online master's degree program for non-lawyers, which I direct. Students in the Master's in Health Law (M.H.L.) program take all their courses online, coming to campus only once a year for a brief Institute for the Study of Health Law. Students, most of whom have full-time jobs, take two courses at a time, using WebCT, in ten-week-long sessions. See http://www.mhl.nsulaw.nova.edu.

The non-J.D. character of the students and the program certainly has posed challenges, but the online nature of the program has posed entirely different, and more complex, challenges. Luckily, the faculty creating courses and teaching in the program are adventurous and smilingly have borne all the work and worry of virgin online course creation and teaching, coupled with the unfamiliar challenges of teaching non-J.D. students.

From my perspective, creating and administering the program has provided some valuable lessons in online education. Anyone considering such an undertaking should go into the process understanding the concerns of all entities overseeing the program, the ways the program intends to overcome the potential for feelings of isolation among students, and the importance of assuring adequate institutional resources.

Views of Oversight Entities

In the case of the M.H.L. program, the views of three entities outside the law school faculty proved crucial to the program's inception, approval and continued operation. Anyone considering development of an online program likely similarly will have at least two and perhaps three or more entities overseeing the process. The added time required for such oversight must be taken into account.

First, at NSU, and perhaps at other schools, all new programs must pass through a university-wide New Program Review committee. Created to ensure the validity of, the need for, and the financial viability of each new academic program offered, the NSU committee requires of all program proponents an in-depth document detailing, among other things, the program's academic focus, its anticipated student mix, course descriptions and outlines of all courses, a market study showing demand for the program, and an anticipated budget. Developing the NSU New Program Review proposal meant outlining each piece of the program; drafting the proposal and working through the committee process took nearly two years.

In addition to university approval, the ABA and NSU's regional accrediting association (the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS)) had to be consulted. The ABA's interest in the program was in acquiescing, rather than in approving, because the M.H.L. program would not educate J.D. students. Pursuant to ABA Standard 307, the ABA's primary concern in determining whether to acquiesce is whether the program harms the J.D. program by diverting too many resources from it. Due to the online nature of the program, our ABA site inspector was able to conduct a "virtual" inspection; she did not have to come to NSU, for everything about the program was as visible on her computer as on ours. From that virtual inspection, she could view program structure and course content while assuring that staffing the program did not drain the J.D. program. At the same time NSU had to assure the ABA that the M.H.L. program would not divert resources from its J.D. program, however, it had to assure SACS that the program was not overly adjunct-based. SACS required a certain level of full-time faculty involvement in the program. NSU thus had to strike a balance between involving sufficient full-time law school faculty in the M.H.L. program and ensuring that the involvement of those faculty members did not detract from the J.D. program.

Overcoming Potential for Student Feelings of Isolation

Oversight entity approval is necessary, of course, but the bottom line was the need to create a program based on sound substance and educational theory. When designing programs that will take place entirely online, for example, one primary goal must be to create a community for the students. One way to do that is to assure interactivity among students, between students and their virtual learning environment, and between students and professors.

Lessons From the Web readers appreciate the importance of interactivity in online courses, for columns on that subject have appeared in this space. If interactivity is important in the individual course, when students attend school in the same building and might also discuss course material with each other in person, just imagine how important it is in a program taking place entirely online, where the students will not encounter each other outside of class.

Students in the M.H.L. program, for example, hail from states as scattered as Florida, Texas, Massachusetts and South Dakota. They work vastly different schedules, ranging from 3-11 p.m. or midnight to 8 a.m. five days a week to four days on/three days off. They truly have no learning community other than their classrooms. Recognizing this, program structure reminds students that they are part of a larger virtual educational community, and program requirements force interaction so the students create their own tight-knit virtual community.

For example, the courses are structured to remind students that they are part of both a larger virtual law school community and an even larger virtual university community. Each student's home page within WebCT contains links to the law school and university websites. Those links also appear with each course, along with direct links to the law school and university libraries. Each student can take advantage of the law school library's email reference desk, and the law school library recently began offering virtual real-time reference assistance to online students. NSU educates thousands of online students each year, so its library website similarly is useful for M.H.L. students; many resources are available online, especially through the school's Health Professions Division library.

Additionally, M.H.L. program requirements force students to interact a great deal. Each 10-week-long course is broken into either nine or 10 substantive modules. Each module must contain a reading assignment, posted lecture materials (e.g., interactive PowerPoint presentations), audiovisual materials distributed to the students on CD-ROM, a quiz, and a discussion board problem. A quiz (usually multiple-choice, true/false or short answer) is included in each module primarily so that students can achieve each week, within each module, a sense of whether they are "on track" by seeing their scores; professors can choose whether to count quiz scores; some do but some don't. The discussion board is the center of interactivity - and the focus of learning - each week, with each student being required to post a response to the discussion board problem for each module. Some professors even require responsive postings among students or teamwork among students on certain postings. A great deal of interactivity can be generated here; in one course of 18 students, for example, one discussion board sprouted 109 postings, all but 13 of which were from the students, within a seven-day period. Requiring these features of each course ensures that each course provides students with an opportunity to engage in discussion and to feel a sense of connection with the course material, their fellow classmates and their professors.

Importance of Adequate Resources

As the reader can divine from the program development process and course structure outlined above, online education is not cheap. Or at least it is not cheap when it is done well. Creating this program has cost NSU's J.D. program the majority of my teaching services for three years now, and temporarily has cost me almost all the pleasure of teaching J.D. students. (My teaching load was reduced as I received course credit in exchange for researching online educational theory; learning about online educational software; developing the program curriculum and New Program Review committee proposal; recruiting, hiring and training faculty; overseeing faculty course development; developing my own course; and juggling a variety of administrative duties.) The law school thus had to, and any law school intending to conduct high-quality online education would have to, pony up a certain amount of human capital to make the program happen.

Additionally, the university has been extremely supportive of the M.H.L. endeavor. It has provided a central instructional technology department to assist with both pedagogical and technological issues in course creation and teaching, and it has thus far supported the law school's insistence that class size remain manageable.

The first of these points cannot be stressed enough. Early in program development, it became clear that the law school had to use WebCT as the M.H.L. program's educational software platform, because the university had selected WebCT as the university-wide platform. I and others at the school were worried. WebCT seemed to have a higher learning curve and to be more "clunky" than other educational software programs such as Blackboard. WebCT often seems counterintuitive, at least to the casual user, and, at least initially, I or anyone else on our faculty would, at best, be a casual user. If we had all had to create our own courses on WebCT, without assistance, the M.H.L. program might never come into existence. Recognizing that concern, the university created a team of instructional technologists, many of whom have Ph.D.s in online learning theory and technology, to (1) assist us mere mortal faculty members in course creation and (2) provide support in course teaching. This team, the Innovation Zone or I-Zone, has proven to be a godsend.

Also, online education prompts the question of class size. One common misconception of online education is that it is a cash cow because, without physical space limitations, unlimited numbers of students can sign up. That can be the case with some types of program and course design. The M.H.L. program, however, is highly interactive. Requiring such a high level of interactivity in each course within the program puts a great deal of pressure on the professor, as reflected by the almost uniform warnings in online educational literature that online class sizes should be small.

In the M.H.L. program, strong institutional support at both the law school and university administrative levels has resulted in class size thus far being capped at 25, with the full expectation that it might drop through attrition to the high teens. That is fortunate, for the financial pressures to try to obtain more return are undoubtedly high. Yet small class size is absolutely necessary, for any of the faculty teaching in the M.H.L. program will tell you (and I encourage you to ask them!) that they spend more time on their online courses than they do on their in-person courses worth the same credit hours. Under the M.H.L. course structure, each professor must check into his or her course practically every day. In addition to making time and space for that each day, each professor must juggle the postings of about 20 students each week on a discussion board, respond to all the emails those 20 students send, and coordinate with technical support staff on continuing course adjustment and tuning while it runs.

Conclusion - Tips for Potential Program Creators

In brief, I have three points of advice for those creating an online program. First, clearly identify the hoops through which you must jump, and dot the I's and cross the T's required to jump through them. Second, ensure that you are creating a program in which you also create a community. Finally, do your best to ensure that those watching the program for viability are committed to providing the resources for a quality educational endeavor, rather than expecting a cash cow. Taking these three steps will help assure a program of which you can be proud.

JURIST's Lessons from the Web series is edited by Professor Patrick Wiseman, Georgia State University College of Law.

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JURIST welcomes your comments on this column and the issues it raises...

• Tuesday October 08, 2002 at 1:12 pm
  Two comments, one as a participant in Prof. Cerminara's program and the other as one who is struggling to put a non-clinical dental subject on line for next year. 1. Great article and a great program. As a participant, I found it to be everything she wants it to be. 2. As a dental faculty member, boy, oh, boy, pay attention. Her advice must be heeded by anyone who even thinks this is easy to accomplish.
  
  John D. Tabak, MS, DDS, LHRM
  NSU College of Dental Medicine
  Florida/USA

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