Institutional Integration and Administration

• Author: Rebecca Purdom - Greg Brandes - Karen Westwood
• Pages: 51-55

51

Chapter 7

Institutional Integration and Administration

Distance learning programs present managerial challenges, bringing new working processes, regulatory

requirements, response time, and the need to coordinate or re-think academic calendars. As schools plan

to launch online programs, they are sometimes surprised by how much previously unrelated departments

must coordinate. Planning ahead to integrate staffing, budgeting, administrative work flow, and student

needs will assure that programs launch and grow successfully.

This chapter addresses:

 Teaching faculty. How do you staff online courses? How do staffing decisions impact

perceptions of the program?

 Administrative integration. What offices will have to coordinate, communicate and develop

new work patterns to effectively support online programs?

 Student support integration. What unique needs to distance learning students present, and

how do student support services best meet those needs?

Many institutions are currently considering the degree to which online offerings should be

interchangeable with, or integrated within, traditional residential offerings. In many non-JD degree

programs offered by law schools —for example, LLMs, specialized masters programs, and post-graduate

certificate programs—schools offer the same classes online and in residential formats, and students may

pick the session that best fits their needs. A few law schools, under variance from the ABA, have begun to

offer both online and residential versions of key classes. As integration of both JD and non-JD programs

increases, there are several curricular and management decisions to consider.

Teaching Faculty

Some schools employ their core residential faculty to develop and teach their online courses. These

schools feel that using core faculty protects the integrity of the brand and the quality of the course

content. By using long term faculty who have a known teaching reputation and a vested interest in the

institution, the school may feel that the integrity of the program is maintained.

Other schools almost exclusively use adjuncts to develop and teach online courses. Because adjuncts are

typically paid less than residential faculty—tenured faculty in particular—this decreases overall program

costs. However, the fluidity of adjunct teaching pools makes quality control more difficult and requires

additional management and oversight.