7:30am – 9:00am Registration and Coffee

9:00am – 9:15am Welcome and Introduction

9:15am - 10:45am Training and Preparing Faculty to Teach a Blended Course
Speaker: Teddy Hristov, Senior Instructional Strategies Specialist, Emmanuel College

The "Blended Learning Initiative" at Emmanuel College, Boston started in early 2014. The Academic Technology and Innovation Group worked with faculty to explore strategies for designing, developing, and teaching blended courses in the fall semester. This presentation will address the challenges of recruiting, training, and supporting professors with various levels of comfort with technology and experience teaching in other than face to face formats. Results from student feedback and information about management and IT support will be also shared. A Project Management template will be provided as a takeaway handout. During the session, participants will be grouped to create a draft of a faculty training plan that models the blended learning approach.

10:45am - 11:00am Break

11:00am - 12:30pm Strategies for Designing Blended Courses
Speakers:
David O’Steen, Associate Director, Blended Learning Initiative, Wellesley College
Laura O’Brien, Research and Instruction Librarian, Wellesley College

This session will explore strategies for achieving an effective implementation of blended learning by working with participants to design instructional materials that successfully fulfill pedagogical goals and provide the best opportunities for students to increase their knowledge and understanding. We’ll refine our definition of blended learning, outline the resources required to successfully develop online content through evaluating a successful blended course, and explore modes of assessment at both learner- and course-level. Participants will engage in a hands-on exercise designing blended content at both the course and content unit level. We will determine what works best in the online realm by reimagining how skills will be taught and assessed; consider how to best use face-to-face time; and discuss how to avoid course-and-a-half syndrome.

12:30pm - 1:30pm Lunch

1:30pm - 3:00pm Supporting Faculty (and Students) during their Blended Courses
Speakers:
Chris Moore, Associate Director, Instructional Technologies, SUNY University at Albany
Billie Franchini, Director, Institute for Teaching, Learning, and Academic Leadership, SUNY University at Albany

Considerations for offering blended courses can sometimes be obscured by the promise of expected benefits that it could deliver. We will present a scenario to inspire discussion of critical factors for success in teaching blended courses, including preparation for student, faculty, and departmental expectations, self-regulated learning, and mid-course adaptations, to name a few. Key elements of support will be discussed stemming from 7 years of blended learning experience at UAlbany and contextualized within our present initiatives for a large expansion of blended learning intended to heighten engagement and interactivity.

3:00pm - 3:15pm Wrap Up/Reflections