5/2: This week in USDLA News
Get ready to learn, play, and connect with all of your USDLA colleagues July 17-20! Our National Conference in Orlando is on the horizon, and this week we are sharing one of the conference sessions that we know you’ll want to check out: HyFlex Programming as a Delivery Approach for Changing Student Demographics and Demands.
Scroll down to meet the presenters from Southeast Missouri State:
- Abby Ruessler, Online Instruction Coordinator
- Brooke Hildebrand Clubbs, Assistant Professor, Department of Leadership, Middle & Secondary Education
- Chelsea McNeely, Director, Southeast Online & Early College Programs
- Sarah Dietrich, Associate Professor, Department of English, Southeast Online
Click here to view the entire session National Conference schedule.
It’s Official: Our 2023 Member-Elect Board of Director is Laura Creech, who is a Senior Education and Training Manager at Arrow Alliance Industries. Also newly elected to the board were Erica Bell and Tiffany Morgan, while Arletha McSwain, Kristin Deprospero and Valary Oleinik all won re-election. Valary was also nominated to be our President-Elect for the 2024-25 period. All appointments are for 3-year terms effective July 1st, 2023. Congratulations to everyone!
Please tune-in: USDLA Board Member Georgianna Laws, Ed.D., M.Ed., B.Ed will be the keynote speaker at the Distance Learning Administration 2023 Conference. Learn more here: https://www.westga.edu/~distance/dla/schedule.php
We’ll be back on Thursday with our USDLA Brief. Until then, thank you for your continued support of the association, and if you are not a member, please consider joining us by clicking here. Sincerely, Chuck Sengstock, USDLA President-Elect 2023-24
Hyflex Programming as a Delivery Approach for Changing Student Demographics and Demands
The pandemic pivot to online learning has been referred to as ‘panic-gogy’ (Kamenetz, 2020) but now that higher education is settling into the new normal, we can be more intentional about the technological innovations we want to continue to incorporate.
We explored Hyflex class delivery at Southeast Missouri State University at scale during COVID-19. In a Hyflex class, students can choose to attend on campus, asynchronously online, or synchronously online, each class period (Beatty, 2017, 2019). This type of course environment can serve a variety of student populations, and help institutions meet the need of a diverse and changing student demographic (McNeely & Sumner, 2023).
Beyond Hyflex course delivery, two program leaders with unique student populations have explored and implemented Hyflex programming.
In this conference session: The presenters will share how their institution came to adopt Hyflex, and how two programs are using it to meet the needs of their very diverse student groups. Attendees will be encouraged to share experiences implementing Hyflex and will leave the sessions with ideas regarding this model at their own institutions.
Meet the Presenters: Southeast Missouri State University
Abby Ruessler is the Online Instructional Coordinator. She has her Master of Arts in Professional Writing from Southeast and has taught for the English department since 2020. Her professional interests include the continuous effort to make higher education more accessible and affordable for all individuals by promoting flexible learning measures at the university.
Dr. Brooke Hildebrand Clubbs is an assistant professor and program coordinator for the Master of Arts in Higher Education Administration. She has published and presented research on college teaching, faculty burnout, social-emotional learning, mindfulness, and communication in higher education.
Dr. Chelsea McNeely is the Director of Southeast Online and Early College Programs. Her research interests are currently in supporting faculty in delivering flexible learning opportunities and distance student support. Her flipped student service model for distance students is nationally recognized by the Online Learning Consortium as an effective practice.
Dr. Sarah Dietrich is an associate professor of English. She teaches in and serves as co-coordinator of the Masters in TESOL. She has published research in the areas of virtual exchange, eService Learning, and the intersections of person to person peacebuilding and intercultural communication.