Abstract:

The team-based approach is commonly used in online course development to form a cost-effective managerial and development team that guides best practices for course development workflow, manages timelines, coordinates solutions, and oversees budgets, all of which is particularly challenging for an international collaboration between large research-intensive institutions. In 2013, University of British Columbia (UBC) Faculty of Forestry signed an agreement with Beijing Forestry University and the Asian Pacific Forestry Network with the main objective to design, develop and deliver six online courses covering diverse topics such as sustainable forest policy, international dialogues in global forestry issues and forest restoration within a timeframe of one and half years. The six courses were from universities in five countries, Australia, Philippines, Malaysia, China, and Canada. In this presentation we will introduce how the (UBC) Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology (CTLT) which has been producing online courses in collaboration with UBC Faculties since the mid-2000s used a team-based course design development and delivery approach with its project managerial experience and professional skills to offer high level support and guidance to develop quality online courses for this project. The development team for the six courses consists of one project coordinator, one instructional designer, one web designer, one graphic artist, and one media expert. In addition, the team interacts with 17 course authors or subject matter experts, multiple developers, media support assistants and professionals from the participatory universities in the Asian-Pacific region. We will present our team-based course development model to explain; our workflow for the analysis, exploration, design, and development stages of course production; incorporating workshop learning, creating strategies for pedagogical and technology support for a pilot module and entire course development, discussing strategies for timeline and budget management, and reporting results of quality assurance (QA) review using an in-house evidence-based quality assurance checklist.

Currently, five out of the six courses were completed on time for opening in Fall 2015. Results of in-house QA Checklist review for each course revealed achievement of quality design. Anecdotal evidence indicates that course templates, pilot modules and attending the workshop were very helpful in orientating subject matter experts to the team-based development process and understand best practices for online course design. Based on these successes, the Asian-Pacific-Forestry Network has entered into discussions with UBC to help develop new online courses to create an Online Master of Sustainable Forest Program centred on the 5 courses developed.

Participants will see specific details and examples of the management strategies used by the CTLT development team in the successful, design, development and delivery of the sustainable forestry online courses for an international collaboration.

Keywords:

Forestry, international, online, collaborating, team, team based, development.