I received some funding in 2018-9 to clarify a taxonomy of business models that are in place at the institution where I work for developing online courses. I couldn’t find if there was ever a deliberate attempt to define what I say was a diversity of practice. My attempt was to define what I had seen and experienced working with the various schools and programs over ten years to put courses online. I created a working version based on what I had seen, and then used the funding to validate with various and diverse members at the institute.

As a result, I created a draft of a taxonomy, which looks at both how subject matter experts/instructors are released to work on the courses, as well as the design implications that as Learning and Teaching Centre, we should be keeping in mind if we want to help the schools create sustainable online learning.

An explanation of each of the four main categories is below, and here is the detailed version. This is the presentation I made at the conclusion of my little project and here is my poster from a poster session I did at the 2019 ETUG Spring conference.

As a background to course development models that are possible, I use as a mental model these continuums:

Now, almost two years later, I am wondering if I can narrow down the categories to two essential ones: is it an institute-owned course or is it an instructor-owned course? This is the essential question, especially in light of what I have learned and experienced during the Covid-19 response.

The four drafted categories with details are as follows:

The instructor owns the course and teaches the course

The instructor created the course and offering this course depends on this instructor being available to teach it.

Factors affecting variability of initial development:

Instructor created course:

• on own time,
• as part of teaching duties,
• on release via a grant enabling backfill from teaching workload

Can occur in both full-time and part-time programs as well as service areas.

Administration & Maintenance

The instructor is responsible for administering the course and for maintaining the course. The program or department has no input.

Potential Design, Development/ Re-development Implications

• Can get away with less front-loaded instructional design/development as instructor typically actively teaching.

• Challenges: Critical for lone ranger instructor to consider up-front design decisions as they will affect workload sustainability of delivery and maintenance of the course later on.

The instructor owns the course

One instructor created the course and this is the instructor who “owns” the course.

This authoring instructor has permitted other instructors to teach the course for either concurrent or subsequent offerings by the department.

Factors affecting variability of initial development:

Instructor created course:

• on own time,
• as part of teaching duties,
• on release via a grant enabling backfill from teaching workload

Can occur in both full-time and part-time programs as well as service areas.

Administration & Maintenance

The instructor, the program assistant or the program head/chief instructor may perform administrative tasks.

The instructor is responsible for course changes and updates. In some circumstances, significant changes are discussed as a department.

Significant updates and changes for course currency may be done via:

• Workload: an instructor is released from regular duties to work on changes and updates.
• The program contracts with an instructor via a “yellow contract” to work on changes and updates

Potential Design, Development/ Re-development Implication

Can get away with less front-loaded instructional design/development as instructor typically actively teaching.

• Challenges: Critical for lone ranger instructor to consider up-front design decisions as they will affect workload sustainability of delivery and maintenance of the course later on.

The institution owns the course

The school/program developed the course/program and hired on a contract subject matter experts and/or current instructors to create the course.

Course creation may be an individual or may be a team of subject matter experts/instructors.

Instructors may be full-time or part-time instructors.

The program contracts with instructors to teach the course. The instructor may be contracted directly from industry to teach the course or the instructor may be a full-time instructor contracted to teach the course part-time outside of regular workload.

In some cases, there might be a single full-time faculty for the program with additional part-time contracted faculty. Sometimes, additional tutors are hired on contract to assist the regular instructor in course delivery.

Factors affecting variability of initial development:

In order to develop online courses, BCIT offers ‘yellow contracts’ to:

• full-time instructors
• part-time instructors
• external subject matter experts

Can occur in both full-time and part-time (PTS) programs as well as service areas.

Administration & Maintenance

The instructor, the program assistant or the program head/chief instructor may perform administrative tasks.

Significant updates and changes for course currency may be done via:

• Workload: an instructor is released from regular duties to work on changes and updates.
• The program contracts with an instructor via a “yellow contract” to work on changes and updates
• The program contracts with an external subject matter expert to work on changes and updates

Potential Design, Development/ Re-development Implications

Historically has significant instructional design(ID) front-loaded to compensate for minimal instructional presence during development/almost attempt to ‘instructor-proof’ course. Faculty who regularly teach online can get away with less front-loading of design, but sessional /PTS-faculty need to follow an existing design embedded in the course in order to mitigate their lack of experience.

Some now use synchronous tools for active and dynamic responsiveness.

The institution owns the course

The school/program developed the course/program by adding it to the departmental workload and releasing a full-time instructor from other duties in order to develop the course.

The teaching of the course is allocated to an instructor by the department through workload processes.

Additionally, sometimes, the program may (yellow) contract with additional instructors to teach the course.

Factors affecting variability of initial development:

Occurs in full-time programs and in service areas.

Administration & Maintenance

The instructor, the program assistant or the program head/chief instructor may perform administrative tasks.

Significant updates and changes for course currency may be done via:

• Workload: an instructor is released from regular duties to work on changes and updates.
• The program contracts with an instructor via a “yellow contract” to work on changes and updates
• The program contracts with an external subject matter expert to work on changes and updates.

Potential Design, Development/ Re-development Implications

Historically has significant ID front-loaded to compensate for minimal instructional presence during development/almost attempt to ‘instructor-proof’ course. Some now use synchronous tools for active and dynamic responsiveness.