2024-25 Strategic Initiative: Distance Education Rubric
Advancing Quality Education – Regular and Substantive Interaction in Distance Education
ACCJC has seen a significant increase in distance education delivery by its members, with 66% of students across our membership taking courses in the distance education modality. As institutions have made the impressive transition to online learning, ACCJC has noted opportunities for improvement through its ongoing monitoring activities, as well as increased compliance and improvement recommendations pertaining to regular and substantive interaction. Federal regulations require a high level of scrutiny of online delivery to maintain Title IV eligibility, and the significant institutional consequences for noncompliance that can occur through Department of Education regulatory audits and actions have prompted questions from member institutions.
ACCJC recognizes that identifying and facilitating quality instruction in distance education, promoting equitable student outcomes in the modality, increasing clarity of ACCJC and federal expectations for institutions undergoing evaluation, and providing a consistent and objective approach for peer reviewers evaluating institutions are essential to ACCJC’s ongoing federal recognition and value as an accreditor.
Call to Action: Developing a Distance Education Rubric to Verify Regular and Substantive Interaction During Comprehensive Reviews
To support our work, we are pleased to announce that ACCJC, in collaboration with its members, will develop a rubric to assist institutions and peer review teams with the required validation of regular and substantive interaction per ACCJC’s Policy on Distance and Correspondence Education. Peer review teams and the Commission will utilize this rubric to ensure consistent and objective review of distance education. ACCJC will incorporate the rubric into its Accreditation Handbook and develop and deploy an additional training module and workshops to support its use by institutions and peer reviewers in the comprehensive peer review process.
ACCJC plans to pilot the distance education rubric in fall 2024 for colleges undergoing Team ISER Review and for institutions that had a core inquiry on distance education as part of upcoming Focused Site Visits.
This summer and through fall 2024, ACCJC will partner with members of the field who want to ensure quality education in distance education through the development and roll out of the distance education rubric. If you are interested, please complete the short survey to indicate your availability to participate in any of the following ways:
- synchronous Zoom meetings over the summer to draft an initial rubric (to be scheduled)
- written feedback on the rubric via electronic survey
- fall Zoom webinar listening sessions to provide feedback (to be scheduled)
- provide examples of policies and/or procedures that have been effective tools at your institution for ensuring regular and substantive interaction (email Vice President Gohar Momjian at gmomjian@accjc.org).
For those interested in participating in the summer Zoom meetings, please submit your survey by Friday, July 12.
Timeline: Distance Education Rubric
| Dates of Completion | Milestones and Mode of Engagement |
|---|---|
| July - August 2024 | Develop draft rubric based on best practices (ALOs, faculty, admin) |
| August - September 2024 | Solicit feedback on rubric and make modifications (webinar, survey) |
| September - October 2024 | Pilot application of rubric, include in workshops and materials for fall 2024 Team ISER Reviews and Focused Site Visits |
| November 2024 - January 2025 | Solicit feedback from institutions and peer reviewers on usefulness of rubric & resources and make modifications for use in spring 2025 |
