The Sloan Consortium Announces Recipients of 2001 Awards
for Excellence in Online Teaching and Learning
In recognition of the exponential growth
in online learning, the Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) has announced its
first annual awards for excellence in Web-based education. The honors
were presented to the recipients on November 16, 2001 by the leadership of
Sloan-C, an association of more than 80 institutions of higher education
that have joined together to deliver and promote online learning. Institutional
and individual recipients include Dr. John Bourne of Olin and Babson Colleges,
Dr. Lorelei Lambert of Salish Kootenai College, the LEEP program at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Maryland
University College, and the SUNY Learning Network.
Online learning has greatly progressed since 1992 when the Alfred P.
Sloan Foundation, the sponsor of Sloan-C, began giving grants to institutions
for online learning initiatives. "In the past decade we've gone from
several hundred students enrolled in online education courses to more
than one million," said Frank Mayadas, President of Sloan-C. "It's
time we recognize the individuals who have advanced the field and the
institutions that are leading the way."
The Sloan-C 2001 award for the Most Outstanding Achievement in ALN
by an Individual will be awarded to Dr. John R. Bourne, who holds
a joint appointment at Olin and Babson Colleges in Massachusetts. Bourne
is one of the foremost leaders in the advancement of Asynchronous Learning
Networks (ALN), a term that is used to describe networks of people using
computer and communications technologies that enable anytime - anyplace
learning. Founder and editor of the Journal of Asynchronous Learning
Networks, he also established the ALN Web in 1996 with a grant from
the Sloan Foundation. "I am deeply honored by this award, but I
must recognize all the great help from many individuals over the last
seven years," said Bourne. "Without them, we wouldn't be where
we are today," he added.
Dr. Lorelei A. Lambert, a faculty member at Salish Kootenai College
in western Montana, will be the recipient of the Sloan-C 2001 award for
Excellence in ALN Teaching. At Salish Kootenai, she has developed
and taught thirteen online courses to American Indian learners in Montana,
Arizona, Alaska, and Canada in subject areas as diverse as microbiology,
pharmacology, native science and religion, and holistic wellness. As an
enrolled member of the Abenaki Indian Tribe, Lambert understands the needs
of the American Indian learner; all of her courses, even those in science
and anatomy, contain cultural content relevant to the lives of her students.
The award for Most Outstanding ALN Program will be awarded to
the LEEP program, an online Master of Science degree offered by
the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The program is recognized for graduating
nearly 160 students, with approximately 175 current enrollments. LEEP
has experienced an exceptionally high retention rate for its student body,
which spans 43 different states and eight foreign countries.
The University of Maryland University College (UMUC) will receive
the Sloan-C award for Excellence in Institution-Wide ALN Programming.
UMUC is known for its breadth of degrees, quality of programs, and yearly
online enrollment nearing 25,000. "UMUC clearly had the strongest
program of online education across the entire institution in 2001,"
said Burks Oakley, chair of the 2001 Awards Selection Committee for
Sloan-C. "They also have shown leadership on a national level in
helping to formulate policies related to online education," he
added.
The award for Excellence in ALN Faculty Development will be given
to the SUNY Learning Network, representing the online courses and
programs of more than fifty institutions, ranging from community colleges
to research universities, in the State University of New York (SUNY) system.
The staff of the SUNY Learning Network has provided comprehensive training
to a diverse group of faculty that has gone on to effectively teach online
courses that enrolled approximately 25,000 students this past academic
year.
The Sloan-C Awards Selection Committee was impressed by the caliber of
all of the nominees and looks forward to recognizing others as the field
progresses. "While classroom teaching has been around for thousands
of years, online learning is still in its infancy," said Mayadas.
"While we're proud of the advancement in the field thus far,"
added Bourne, "there is much left to be done until we realize the
dream of providing learning to anyone, anywhere, and at anytime."
The 2001 Sloan-C Awards were presented at the 7th Sloan-C International
Conference on Online Learning in Orlando, Florida, on November 16, 2001.
The Sloan-C Awards Selection Committee for 2001 was comprised of James
J. Duderstadt, President Emeritus of the University of Michigan, Judith
S. Eaton, President of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation,
John V. Lombardi, President Emeritus of the University of Florida, Joseph
McDonald, President of Salish Kootenai College, and Linda M. Thor, President
of Rio Salado College. Burks Oakley II, Associate Vice President for Academic
Affairs at the University of Illinois, served as the non-voting committee
chair.
Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C) is an association of accredited institutions
of higher education offering associate, undergraduate, graduate, and master
degree programs through high-quality online education. Specialized certification
courses, corporate training, and certificates are also offered to students
at a distance. Most distance learning courses are delivered through the
World Wide Web, anytime, anyplace, in a wide range of disciplines. Organizations
that organize or supply online learning may also join Sloan-C. These organizations
may be consortia, university systems, for-profit and non-for-profit organizations
that are part of the online learning industry.
|
