ERIC Number: EJ854021
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2004
Pages: 12
Abstractor: ERIC
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1528-5324
EISSN: N/A
The Importance of Policies in E-Learning Instruction
Waterhouse, Shirley; Rogers, Rodney O.
EDUCAUSE Quarterly, v27 n3 p28-39 2004
Most professionals interested in the use of technology in education understand the importance of an e-learning course site, whether the course is taught totally online or in a hybrid environment where the instructor has some face-to-face contact with students. However, many instructors have not thoroughly considered the importance of posting policy documents on a course Web site. The authors' experience as teachers and e-learning mentors reveals that this important component of a course site is frequently underdeveloped or even missing entirely. Moreover, they have not found references to the subject of course policies in the e-learning literature. In this article, the authors stress that e-learning instructors should anticipate their students' needs for clarity by posting detailed policy documents in a prominent section of the course site. They discuss nine categories of course policies that instructors might consider posting: (1) E-learning Policies in the Course Syllabus; (2) Student Privacy Policies; (3) E-Mail Policies; (4) Discussion Policies; (5) Software Standards Policies; (6) Assignment Policies; (7) Getting Technical Help Policies; (8) Student Code of Conduct Policies; and (9) Intellectual Property Rights Policies. (Contains 7 figures and 19 endnotes.)
Descriptors: Copyrights, Online Courses, Privacy, Educational Technology, Electronic Learning, Educational Policy, Web Sites, Mentors, Electronic Mail, Course Descriptions, Assignments, Information Technology, Ethics, Guidelines, Check Lists, Technical Support, Computer Software, Feedback (Response)
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
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