Demonstration Project
Demonstration Project
Learner Support Advisory Committee
Persons present: John Bober-BCC, Hendra Djaya-BCC, Pat Fleming-CFCC, Steve Lytle- UCF/HPA, Lucy Morse-CFCHE, John Scarpino-SCC, Ren‚e Simpson-DBCC, Steve Sorg- CFCHE, Barbara Truman-CFCHE
Steve Lytle opened the meeting at 9:40 am and members introduced themselves. He asked Lucy Morse to give a global project update.
Morse said the contracts have still not gone through therefore none of the colleges have received money. She reassured members that everything that could be done is being done. The Faculty Development Committee had sent out surveys to all faculty and results are coming in. This committee had also held its first workshop on course design at Seminole Community College on October 17th. Another workshop will be held at UCF in November on course design. Morse said the Survey Course was behind in production.
An all-day seminar has been funded by Sprint on the topic of Learner Support for about 50-60 people from the Consortium. Morse passed out a handout describing the purpose as brainstorming for support services comparably available to traditional students. The target audience is people who work at member institutions who work in areas such as the bookstore, financial aid, registration etc. A deliverable for the seminar will be a professional report of findings and summaries relating to learner support.
Members discussed preparations for the meeting and suggested getting a out a brochure during the middle of November. Because of the limited number of seats, specific people should be invited. Each institution could have 7-8 people. Each institution can determine who to send. January 28th was decided as the date to have the seminar. A location will be sought central to the member institutions.
Institution Surveys
Lytle asked committee members to review the surveys turned in by Valencia, Seminole, Central Florida, and Lake-Sumter. Lytle said the literature indicates that a lot has happened in the last six months regarding advances in learner support systems.
Members described services available on their campuses. Blais said that Valencia has automatic debit for financial aid and that financial aid will be tied in with student's home PCs. After registering, students have the option to pay by credit card or come in within three days and pay cash. Valencia has had telephone registration for about five years. Simpson said Daytona has selected a system to go on-line with in October of 1996. The system will have an automatic debit system tied into financial aid.
Fleming said Central Florida is looking into a card to provide access to student services. They are now sending out lots of print materials to their faculty and students (6,000) to identify concerns for distance learning. Central Florida is building another campus on the west side of town where their technology will be housed. This future site's ability to be a distance learning site will be better for gaining FTEs.
Lytle said UCF is adding dial up servers to increase student and faculty access to the Pegasus network. Sprint will also offer an additional dial up option for students to gain guaranteed access at 28.8 baud rate for the Pegasus network for a flat $10 a month.
Bober said Brevard now has their World Wide Web server up and running. The address is www.brevard.cc.fl.us He said that Brevard had elected to go with the Electronic University Network with America On-Line. When asked if he thought it was expensive for students, he said it would cost more than for out of state students and that didn't include students' on-line time. Bober also said that they are using First Class (Mac) as a graphical interface for students to automatically update their page.
Fleming suggested that other committee members put their e-mail addresses on all print materials. He felt this would attract more students. He said at Central Florida, they are using the same methods for students as faculty to get them support.
Action Items
It was suggested that all campuses is to create a learner support progress report or case study that could be used at the January 28th Learner Support Seminar.
All committee members should bring the list of names of persons they have identified on their campuses who should attend the January seminar.
The next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, December 7th at 9:30 am in room 100 of the UCF Research Pavillion.
Note: The all day seminar has been changed to March 5th.