« SERVICES
Clients
Below are some examples of the in-depth assistance WCET provides clients through its consulting services. These examples demonstrate the wide range of consulting activities performed by WCET and its teams of advisors from member institutions.
In addition to consulting work, WCET also seeks external funding for projects of interest to its member institutions. Visit Projects for descriptions of such grant- and foundation-funded work currently being conducted by WCET.
Capacity Development
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Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) — WCET worked with CHEA to develop a model for the accreditation of Web-based courses leading to a certificate or certification. Multiple accreditors of higher education institutions are in the process of testing the model for its utility in assuring the quality of such courses. The results of the analysis will be presented in a written report to CHEA by the end of the calendar year.
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PwC's eArmy University Project — Through WCC, Sally Johnstone serves on the PwC's eArmy University Project as a member of the Council of Academic Management to provide advice and insight. The Sloan Foundation manages the council.
Inter-Institutional Collaboration
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Wyoming Community College Commission — The Wyoming Community College Commission received a legislative appropriation for inter-institutional collaboration on distance education courses and programs. WCC helped the commission's executive director consider options and conducted planning meetings with the presidents of the state's seven community colleges.
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Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) — HACU received a grant from Verizon Corp. to explore the issues around creating a "learning marketspace" for its member institutions. Sally Johnstone serves on the advisory committee for this project. WCC assisted HACU in exploring its options and in researching and planning the services that HACU could offer its members.
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Disabled Opportunities for Interpreter Trainers (DO IT) — DO IT is a series of federally funded projects that is operated out of Front Range Community College in Colorado. The project educates interpreters for the deaf in rural areas of the upper plains and mountain states. DO IT is also partnering with other institutions to create a nationwide center for training interpreters through distance education. WCET serves as the project evaluator for one of DO IT's federally funded projects, and is consulting on the services and organizational structure that will make the nationwide DO IT center successful.
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Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) — WCET's EduTools Project Team conducted an in-depth product review for MnMaster, a locally developed course management system, and presented the results inside the EduTools framework. In addition, the team assisted with the development and implementation of MnSCU's systemwide e-learning RFP process, including creating, documenting, and analyzing the RFP review process for the full committee. WCET also developed an audit tool that MnSCU will use in evaluating online student services provided by Minnesota colleges and universities. This tool, to be used in launching the WCET audit service, examines services from the student's point of view across four generations of online sophistication.
Institutional Planning
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The University of Oregon — WCET is partnering with the University of Oregon on a grant from the Northwest Academic Computing Consortium. The project is digitizing a collection of glass plate photographs of the Umatilla tribe of Eastern Oregon. WCET will assist in making these photos (and accompanying information) available on the Web and through other digital media.
Evaluations
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Borderless Access to Teacher Education (BATE) — To offer online certifications for school librarians and administrators in rural states, Montana State University-Bozeman and its partners (University of Nevada-Las Vegas and University of South Dakota) were awarded a FIPSE LAAP grant. WCC serves as the evaluator of this Borderless Access to Teacher Education (BATE) project.
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Annenberg/CPB 'Pathways to a Degree' Program — Pathways to a Degree was a grant program to assist campuses in developing baccalaureate level programs offered at a distance. Our staff members and consultants evaluated the outcomes of the projects developed by participating campuses.
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Louisiana Consortium for the Advancement of Distance Education (LaCADE) — LaCADE sought a team of consultants to perform an external review of the contents of its new Distance Education Certificate Program. A three-person team (including Karen Paulson of NCHEMS and Gary Brown of Washington State University) evaluated the modules in the program and reported its findings.
Grant Reviews
Because of their independent points of view and wide range of e-learning experiences, WCET staff are frequently called upon to serve as grant evaluators. Some recent examples include:
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Louisiana Distance Education Initiative Grant Program - The Louisiana Board of Regents conducts a yearly competitive grant program of around $500,000 to address distance education needs in the state. A WCET staff person served on the three person external review panel that made recommendations on grant awards.
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Hispanic Educational Telecommunications System - HETS has a FIPSE grant to promote distance delivered programs to be developed among its members institutions. A WCET staff person served on an external review panel that examined proposals to divide $120,000 among partnerships of institutions that sought to better service Spanish-speaking students.
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Kansas State University - The University conducted an internally funded program development effort entitled "Targeted Excellence." A staff person served as an external reviewer of proposals that made extensive use of e-learning.
Student Services Online
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Minnesota State Colleges & Universities (MnSCU) - Under contract with MnSCU, WCET researched best practices in 20 student services online. Based on the outcome of that work, WCET developed a prototype of an audit tool for use in measuring the quality and sophistication of online services provided by institutions. Thirty-three MnSCU institutions tested the beta version as a self-assessment tool.
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Arizona Board of Regents - The Arizona Board of Regents asked WCET to conduct an audit of 10 student services available online at the three universities in its jurisdiction: Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University, and University of Arizona. WCET provided a report to the Regents for each institution along with a report from a statewide perspective containing recommendations on the future of Arizona Regents University.
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Athabasca University - WCET conducted an audit of Athabasca University’s student services online to assist it in preparing for its Middle States accreditation review.
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KC REACHE - Kansas City Public Television (KCPT) received a FIPSE grant to work with nine local institutions in the development of some shared student and faculty services. WCET served as a project advisor, researching best practices, making presentations to the project committees, and conducting a strategic planning workshop for the advisory board.
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Hispanic Educational Telecommunications System (HETS) - WCET conducted a two-day workshop on best practices in student services online for representatives from HETS member institutions in Puerto Rico, New York, Florida, and New Jersey.
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The Higher Learning Commission (HLC) - The Higher Learning Commission of North Central Accrediting asked WCET to partner in the design and delivery of an interactive team-based workshop for HLC-member institutions. Through this joint workshop, the Commission and WCET provide a forum for teams to critically examine eight key online services students use and to explore and adapt good practices that will enhance these services on their campuses.
