UPCEA Central 2015 Conference Program

Networks: 

MESS  Marketing, Enrollment, and Student Services

OEED Outreach and Student Engagement

OMD Online Management and Design

PMIProgram Innovation and Leadership

 

Click here to view a printable PDF version of the program


Monday, October 19

8:30-11:15 a.m.        Emerging Leaders Program (Sponsored by EMSI)
University Room ABC (2nd Floor)

Leadership Development Unbound: Trends, Opportunities, and Resources

Designed for newcomers, new members, and emerging leaders, this interactive session will provide context for leadership in the changing landscape of professional, continuing, and online education. Through presentation and dialogue, attendees will gain access to leadership resources and trends, as well as opportunities to for skill development and engagement with peers in the region

  • Amy Heitzman, UPCEA

Financial Management of Cost Recovery Programs
As resources become scarcer, the financial management of cost recovery programs become more important. Professional, continuing, and online education, both credit and non-credit, can no longer afford the risk of unsustainability. Understanding financial implications of program management is critical. Christina Trombley will provide an overview of financial management tools that will help with strategic decision-making. Tools such as cash flow projections and budgets will be reviewed, and she will lead a discussion on how these tools can be used for better management of programs. 

  • Christina Trombley, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay

11:30 - 12:00 p.m.       Newcomer’s Welcome and Orientation
Senate A


12:00 - 1:00 p.m.       Opening Lunch and Welcome
Caucus

  • Steve VandenAvond, Northern Michigan University, Central Region Chair
  • Cathy Sandeen, Chancellor, University of Wisconsin-Extension and University of Wisconsin Colleges

1:00 - 1:50 p.m.       General Session I
Assembly

An Accreditor’s Crystal Ball: Challenges for Continuing Higher Education

As a chief component of self-regulation in higher education, regional accreditors evaluate college and university programs for their academic coherence, assessment of student outcomes and adherence to best practices in governance and fiscal integrity. But accreditors are criticized for being obstructive to innovation, called a “cartel” of peer reviewers unaccountable to students or parents. This session will address these concerns, look at challenges facing higher education due to possible changes in the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act and discuss new protocols recently established for review and approval of competency-based education.

  • Jeff Rosen, Higher Learning Commission

2:00 - 2:30 p.m.       Break/Visit with Exhibitors
Assembly/Senate Foyer



2:30 - 3:20 p.m.      Concurrent Session I

Increase Your University’s Inquiries for Less than $5,000 a Year MESS
Senate A
Does this sound like something you’ve been through? You put the finishing touches on your newly remodeled website that looks amazing! It’s so good that you know incoming students will be texting, tweeting, and using Snapchat to learn more about your program. But then it happens, your website goes live…and things stay the same, or maybe get worse. How can this happen? How can all of that time, thought, and energy from numerous colleagues and staff not produce inquiries?

This session will go over ideas on how to drive traffic to your website. We’ll also touch base on how to convert that traffic into inquiries, and yes, it's possible to do it with less than $5,000 a year (interns help resources go a long way).
We’ll discuss marketing strategy, website design, and what users actually want from your website.

  • Justin Fraase, University of North Dakota


MOOCs for Wisconsin and the World OEED
Senate B 
In 2013, the University of Wisconsin-Madison offered its first slate of massive open online courses (MOOCs) via Coursera, featuring topics of general interest, including human evolution and video games. The reach was global, with 135,000 participants from 141 countries and 50 states. We learned that most participants gave the credit to Coursera rather than UW-Madison, so for the second slate of MOOCs in 2015-16, the university took ownership of the marketing instead of ceding it to an educational technology company. We oriented the courses toward Wisconsin, the place we serve as a land-grant university, and we built our own MOOC website to connect with state residents. The new MOOCs featured themes relevant to Wisconsin, along with a series of related events around the state. These included meetings at libraries for the course Changing Weather and Climate in the Great Lakes Region and a weekend of conservation-oriented events for the course The Land Ethic Reclaimed. Our presentation will cover the effort to create partnerships with libraries, theater troupes, environmental organizations, government agencies, and other institutions throughout the state to create meaningful experiences; the use of metrics to shape the pedagogical approach and measure outcomes; the attempt to target Wisconsin audiences through public relations, social media, and direct mail on a limited budget; and the possibilities of using the MOOCs to generate leads for UW-Madison’s credit courses. It will demonstrate how we achieved our goals of increasing enrollments for Wisconsin residents, attracting people to our events, and earning strong evaluations with well-designed courses.

  • Lika Balenovich, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Melissa Meyer, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Mary Thompson, University of Wisconsin-Madison


Turning a Passion into an International Certificate Program PMI
Private Dining Room
This presentation will focus on turning a passion into a national or international program using the online animal-assisted therapy certificate program at Oakland University as a case study. Passion about a topic alone will not necessarily ensure global interest; however, identifying needs in the field; gaining and finding school and university support; applying research; networking within the industry; maneuvering through administrative obstacles; and recruiting student prospects through an identified marketing plan can get you there. Your current faculty and staff have niche interests and passions that may or may not relate to their area of expertise. Tapping into these interests and passions could result in popular international programming as well as lead to new fields of practice. This presentation will provide positive insights into how we built a successful international program that started with a passion and ended in a recognized certificate program.

  • Amy Johnson, Oakland University

3:30 - 4:20 p.m. General Session II
Senate A+B

The Context of Change

Those of us who work in higher education literally feel that change is afoot, and we see many signs of it, including competency-based education, alternative credentials, Department of Education experimental sites, etc. These changes are not occurring in a vacuum. Many aspects of our society are changing rapidly, and the consequences of those changes are often compounded and mutually reinforcing, leading to more instability and uncertainty. In this session, we will explore this broader context of change and its impact on higher education. We will discuss how we can position professional, continuing, and online education units to anticipate and capitalize upon some of these changes.

  • David Schejbal, University of Wisconsin-Extension

4:30 - 6:00 p.m.       Centennial Tour
The tour will leave from the conference hotel lobby at 4:30p.m. and arrive at the Wisconsin Historical Society before 5:00p.m. The tour will end at the Pyle Center just before 6:00p.m. The tour will not return to the hotel.


6:00 - 8:00 p.m.       Opening Reception
Pyle Center


Tuesday, October 20 


8:00-9:00 a.m.       Business Meeting/Breakfast  
Assembly/Caucus


9:00-9:50 a.m.       General Session III
Senate A+B

Threats and Opportunities:  Higher Education in the 21st Century

The landscape of American higher education is changing rapidly, driven by issues of funding, technological change, and changing expectations. Where are the threats and opportunities in this new environment, particularly for the professional, continuing, and online education community? In addition to surveying the rapidly changing context, this presentation will explore the crucial leadership role professional, continuing, and online education might play in helping institutions adapt and thrive in a new environment.  

  • George Mehaffy, American Association of State Colleges and Universities

10:00-10:50 a.m.   Concurrent Session II
                 
Crossing the Digital Divide:  Integrating Digital into Your Continuing Education Marketing MESS
Senate A

Research indicates that 89 percent of individuals seeking information on higher education seek it first online. For continuing education marketers, that means that if you want to deliver promotional information touting your workshops, certificates, and degrees, you need to be online. But that means more than just a website.

For your website to be even marginally effective as a recruiting and registration site, you need to drive traffic. That means search engine optimization (SEO), paid search, and email marketing. But it also means optimizing your landing page with the right content and the right navigational structure.

Of course, once you’ve taken steps to enhance your digital marketing, there’s the question of the role digital marketing plays in your overall marketing mix, which probably still involves direct mail, advertising in traditional media, and other legacy marketing channels. Plus, there’s the question of evaluating results. Digital marketing offers marketers a wealth of new measurement tools that enable you to understand which digital marketing campaigns are working and which are not. But access to data is not the same as access to actionable information that allows you to make better decisions in real time.

The goal of this workshop is to help CE marketers effectively integrate digital marketing into their overall marketing mix.

  • Durwin Long, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire; Laurie St. Aubin-Whelihan, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire

 

Strategic Partners Leading Change for Competency-Based Education OMD
Senate B
Two steps forward, one step back…one step forward, two steps back. This is the pattern you can expect when you are building the plane at the same time you are flying it. In January 2014, we launched the University of Wisconsin Flexible Option Competency-Based Education Program. Throughout this “in progress” effort, we have forged an indelibly strong partnership between business operations and IT to lead our teams through massive ambiguity and change at a lightning-fast pace folks are not typically used to. We will contrast and compare experiences with the audience and share our lessons learned while undertaking this exciting University of Wisconsin System (multi-institution) initiative.

  • Andrea Deau, University of Wisconsin-Extension; Laura Kite, University of Wisconsin-Extension


State Authorization Dashboard – Tracking State Authorization Status via an Authenticated Portal PMI
Private Dining Room
University of Nebraska Online Worldwide has created an open-source, web-based portal to manage and communicate state authorization status to the four campuses of the University of Nebraska. The State Authorization Dashboard is a three-tiered system that includes a public interface, an authenticated faculty/staff interface, and an authenticated administrator interface. Each level of the dashboard can be updated simultaneously in real-time, allowing for the immediate dissemination of information to interested parties. The University of Nebraska Online Worldwide State Authorization Dashboard has been licensed under Creative Commons and the source code is available to universities who are interested in installing the application on their campus.

  • Todd Karr, University of Nebraska Online Worldwide

10:50-11:15 a.m.   Break/Visit with Exhibitors


11:15-12:10 p.m.   General Session IV
Senate A+B
Interactive Session on Coordinator Strategies to Assist Instructors

This interactive session will focus on strategies and practical evaluation methods program coordinators can use to help less experienced instructors plan and conduct effective learning sessions that will enhance student performance. Informal coordinator assistance to instructors includes: summary of instructor experience and teaching style; orientation about the use of technology and interactive teaching methods; use of unobtrusive, ongoing evaluation feedback for course planning, improvement, and results; and guidelines for instructor/coordinator cooperation. The session will provide opportunities for participants to discuss connections between evaluation feedback, assistance to instructors, and potential outcomes from competency-based education.

  • Alan Knox, University of Wisconsin-Madison

12:30-2:30 p.m.     Awards Lunch and Emerging Leaders Panel
Assembly/Caucus


2:30-3:00 p.m.       Break/Visit with Exhibitors
Assembly/Senate Foyer


3:00-3:50 p.m.       Concurrent Session III

Purdue NExT - Building Competencies and Skills for a Worldwide Audience OMD  
Senate A
During the height of the MOOC mania, Purdue University made the decision that the business model of offering your most valuable education assets for free at a high volume was not sustainable. Instead, the campus envisioned an innovative platform that could provide learning, skill development, and professional development in an enriching and easy-to-use environment, accessible anywhere, and able to accommodate high volumes of students at varying levels of customization. The vision included the need to be able to be adaptable for use within the Purdue community as a basis for the expansion of the flipped classroom and summer sessions. Through these efforts Purdue NExT has expanded the reach of the university’s expertise to new markets, both domestically and internationally. Using this unique approach to creating online noncredit materials, NExT has focused on skill and competency development to capture relevant academic and workforce development needs for businesses, individuals, and global customers.

  • Steve Dunlop, Purdue University; Michael M. Eddy, Purdue University



Lifelong Learning Community Organizing: Keeping Long Term CommitmentsOEED
Senate B
Creating and maintaining vital communities of lifelong learners can mean committing university resources on a long-term basis. This session profiles four successful (more than 25 years) UW-Madison organizations of lifelong learners: Certified Public Managers, the Participatory Learning and Teaching Organization, the Wisconsin Regional Art Program, and the Writers' Institute. By utilizing classic community organizing principles, universities can create learning communities of adult lifelong learners that can be not only self-sustaining, but also significant contributors to the university and the region.

Specific budget details and funding sources from the four organizations will illustrate the variety of financial structures lifelong learning communities can form. Barry Orton will share language from legal Memoranda of Agreement, by-laws, and other internal documents to illustrate the variety of organizational structure and purpose. The session will explore how these learning communities struggle to cope with turnover in participant and institutional leadership, and the levels of institutional commitment necessary to their long-term survival.

  • Barry Orton, University of Wisconsin-Madison


Maintaining Excellence in Entrepreneurial Leadership: Standards of Good Practice for Agents of Change PMI
Private Dining Room
The University of Wisconsin Flexible Option (UW Flex) program is securely anchored by collaborative partnerships across the state. Building, developing, and sustaining these partnerships requires a commitment to an ongoing level of internal advocacy, professional respect, and entrepreneurial spirit. External advocacy is required from the start and grows as we expand our program array. We want and need the public, accreditors, regulators, and business partners to understand our vision and unfaltering commitment to student success and student achievement—the “river that runs through” our dedication to our field. We are student-centric—consistently looking for ways in which to support our students and to provide them with opportunities for growth. One unique feature of UW Flex is that the same faculty teaching traditional and online courses for Wisconsin degrees also develop the discipline-specific content, identify the competencies needed for their field of expertise, and develop ways to measure the student demonstration of those competencies. As with other academic programs, faculty support includes training, mentoring, and engaging in difficult discussions surrounding workload. Finally, as a self-paced, online program, we are dependent upon available digital technology. As such, we have found that our innovations sometimes outpace current technological capabilities, increasing our need for external advocacy, internal advocacy, and entrepreneurial initiative.

Presented within the UPCEA Hallmarks of Excellence in Online Leadership framework, this session will discuss standards of good practice in the face of leadership challenges. Examples will be provided for all phases of this complex program.

  • Judee Richardson, University of Wisconsin-Extension

 


4:00 - 4:50 p.m.       General Session V
Senate A+B
Culture Shock: What Today’s Generation of Digital Natives Means for Higher Education
An understanding of today’s undergraduate college students is vital to the effectiveness of our nation’s colleges and universities. This session features the results of a multi-year, multi-method research project to benchmark changes in today’s college students, involving over 5,000 college students and 300 student affairs practitioners from diverse college campuses.  We will explore the similarities and differences between today’s generation of students and previous generations; the challenges and changes that digital natives and non-traditional students bring to our collegiate cultures, and the implications for professional, continuing, and online education.

  • Diane Dean, Illinois State University

5:15 - 6:30 p.m.      Conference Reception
Madison Ballroom


Wednesday, October 21

Wear your school colors today!

7:15-8:50 a.m.      Breakfast/ General Session VI
Assembly/Caucus
UPCEA Hallmarks of Excellence in Online Leadership: An Overview and Case Study
This interactive session will present an overview of the UPCEA Hallmarks of Excellence in Online Leadership, and through facilitated discussion and case study, help position attendees to be leaders of strategic change on their campuses.

  • Bob Hansen, UPCEA
  • Ray Schroeder, University of Illinois-Springfield and UPCEA
  • Vickie Cook, University of Illinois-Springfield

9:00-9:50 a.m.       Concurrent Session IV

Launching a Content Marketing Strategy in Support of Lifelong Learning MESS
Senate A  
As part of a comprehensive strategy to promote lifelong learning and continuing education, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Division of Continuing Studies launched a new content marketing plan in fall 2014. In this session, UW staff will explain how they began by studying best practices and incorporating those concepts in a formal content marketing strategy that was endorsed by academic colleagues, division management, and campus leaders. We will showcase examples of high-quality, highly engaging feature stories, videos, interactive quizzes, and other content from two new blog platforms that serve as our content hubs—The Lifelong Learner and Advance Your Career. We will explain how we use social media and email to drive traffic to these sites, and how our reinvigorated team published more content in the first quarter of 2015 than the department had published in all of 2014. We will provide a behind-the-scenes demonstration of our content marketing platform, CoSchedule.com, which provides an affordable way for multiple editors and producers to efficiently manage a dynamic content calendar across two blogs and several social media channels. Finally, we’ll show how these efforts resulted in a broader reach and higher engagement rates.

  • Lavilla Capener, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • David Giroux, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • Dean Robbins, University of Wisconsin-Madison


All Hands on Deck for Success: An Online Orientation Project OMD 
Senate B
   
In a large, complex, and decentralized environment, a multi-disciplinary team came together at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to develop a unified, four-part orientation for use in online courses. The team sought to create an informational support structure for online students and do it with centralized learning technologies, in a way that could be scaled to serve a larger audience long-term. The ultimate goal of the project was to not only orient students to the online learning environment and make the required technology as transparent as possible, but also to prepare them to engage and be successful in their educational experience. The project was piloted in summer 2015 with 15 undergraduate online courses that enroll approximately 1,000 students. After evaluation of the pilot, the orientation tool will be made available across the university for use with academic year online courses, online graduate programs, and noncredit programming. This roundtable discussion led by representatives of the developing team will consist of three segments: (1) a brief overview of the project from inception to evaluation; (2) a discussion exploring the benefits and challenges of developing a “one size fits all” online orientation; (3) participant feedback and an inclusive dialogue around what others have seen or experienced regarding centralized campus technology tools in decentralized environments.

  • Steve Boldt, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • Keri Johnson, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • Haley Kerkhoff, University of Wisconsin-Madison


Residential Students Moving Online: The New Traditional Paradigm OEED
Private Dining Room
Our current generation of students is increasingly taking advantage of online courses and they are beginning to expect that high-tech, blended, and online courses will be part of their traditional education. The most recent IPEDS research verifies that more residential college students are taking online courses, and articles and discussions in higher education periodicals bear out the practical issues involved with this trend. Jason Maseberg-Tomlinson will present the current data on this subject: IPEDS statistics of residential student enrollment in online courses and research that has been done on why students are taking online courses. This session will also review a qualitative research project Maseberg-Tomlinson is undertaking, which will include case studies of students who have chosen to take online courses as part of their residential degree program. Enrollment management strategies ask us to know the population of students interested in our courses. We design courses and programs around the needs of online students. How might we reconsider or enhance our programs as residential college students slowly make their way into online courses?

  • Jason Maseberg-Tomlinson, Kansas State University Global Campus


10:00-10:50 a.m.   General Session VII
Assembly/Caucus
Educating Millennials or Being Educated by the Millennial?
Millennials are growing in workforce numbers and will play an even greater role in not only household decisions but also in the workplace and in redefining cultural, political, and technological values. They will reshape our economy and our education systems. This interactive session has been designed to provide the higher education leader and marketer with new data, trends, insights, updates, and research on this growing and complex economic and political force of our society and how they will impact how we design and deliver education and knowledge to them.

  • Jim Fong, UPCEA

11:00-11:50 a.m.   Send-off and Campus Implementation Planning

  • Bob Hansen, UPCEA
  • Steve VandenAvond, Northern Michigan University, Central Region Chair

 

 


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