LAVC Regular and Effective Contact Policy

Instructor Inititated Interaction & Frequency of Contact
The ACCJC has been looking very closely at DE programs in order to make sure colleges are offering true distance education courses and not correspondence courses according to Title 5, section 55376 and US Department of Education (USDE) guidelines section 602.3 (definitions). They are looking to see whether our online and hybrid courses have in place measures for instructor-initiated regular and substantive interactions with students through group or individual contact, orientation either online or face-to-face, telephone contact, e-mail contact, announcements, online office hours, online chats, voice mail, online lectures, podcasts, video casts, discussions, or other activities. The USDE is also focusing on the nature of interaction between instructor and student as well as instruction delivery.
After their 2013 visit at Valley College, the accreditation team recommended “that the college develop a formal definition of correspondence education and a process for determining the difference between correspondence education and distance education.” Additionally, during their visit, the team emphasized that Valley College needs to make certain that “regular and substantive interactions with students” are instructor initiated. To meet these standards for accreditation, online education needs to include two things:

• Formal interactions which use one or more technologies to deliver instruction to students;
• Regular and substantive instructor initiated interactions between instructor and student.

Our DE instructors need to make certain that there are measures for instructor-initiated regular and substantive contact incorporated into their online and/or hybrid course design and delivery.  Regular and substantive instructor contact means that the instructor must keep in contact with students on a consistent and timely basis to both ensure the quality of instruction and verify the student’s performance and participation.
All distance education courses at Valley College, whether hybrid or fully online, needs to include weekly effective contact as described below:

1. Instructor initiated interaction and frequency of contact: Instructors should regularly initiate interaction with students to determine that they are accessing and comprehending course material and that they are participating regularly in the activities in the course. Distance education courses are considered the “virtual equivalent” of face-to-face courses. Therefore, the frequency of the contact will be at least the same as would be established in a regular, face-to-face course. At the very least, the number of instructor contact hours per week that would be available for face-to-face students, should also be available, in asynchronous and/or synchronous mode, with students in the distance education format. Contact should be distributed in a manner that will ensure that regular contact is maintained, given the nature of asynchronous instructional methodologies, over the course of a week and should occur as often as is appropriate for the course.
2. Type of Contact: Weekly instructor contact with students through some combination of the following options needs to take place:

If Valley College’s online courses are viewed by the accreditation team as correspondence courses, instead of distance education courses, the following consequences can take place.

• We could lose all financial aid awarded to our students who take DL courses (not just for their DE courses, but for all their courses).
• Accreditation deficiencies addressed via recommendations and follow-up.
• Accreditation sanctions

The table below will help you evaluate if your online course is a distance education and correspondence course.

(Passed by CDEC Spring 2013.)