XXXX ###
COURSE NAME
(Online)
[FACULTY GUIDE]
Online Faculty Guide
XXXX ### – Course Title
Faculty Guide
This guide is intended to guide you through setting up your course, preparing the syllabus (Adult
Learner’s Guide) for students, and accomplishing the course outcomes in the online format. It
also contains resources for instructors who will be teaching this class. The guide begins with a
short “checklist” of things you need to accomplish before the class start date, and the suggested
timeframe for completing these items.
[Master Course Developer: Please complete all areas highlighted in yellow, then remove the
yellow highlight in this guide.]
Getting Started
Please contact your department chair, assistant dean, or dean (the person who hired you) if you
have any questions about the learning outcomes or the appropriate content for this class.
Name
E-mail Address
Phone Number
Any questions about the learning outcomes or content of this course can be directed to this fulltime faculty member.
General Information
Getting to Know Viterbo:
We encourage all adjunct instructors to take the online tour of Viterbo, to get to know a little
about our campus and our community. You will find the campus tour on our homepage:
www.viterbo.edu.
Policies and procedures for adjunct instructors can be found in our adjunct faculty handbook,
available at the following website:
http://www.viterbo.edu/vice-president-academic-affairs/adjunct-welcome
Viterbo University Mission:
The Viterbo University community prepares each student for faithful service and ethical
leadership.
Technology:
You will need to learn to utilize three systems in order to conduct your course:



Moodle – the learning management system (http://moodle.viterbo.edu),
the Viterbo e-mail system, and
Vitnet – where you can access your class roster and post grades.
All three of these systems are available from the Viterbo homepage (www.viterbo.edu) via the
“MyVU” link at the top of the screen. Your same username and password works for all three of
these systems.
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Online Faculty Guide
Moodle
Tutorials and videos are available that will help you learn how to utilize the many features of the
Moodle LMS. These instructional materials can be found from the Moodle login page, under
“Moodle Help and Tutorials” or via http://libguides.viterbo.edu/moodle. The guides are
comprehensive, covering the many features of Moodle and providing tips for using Moodle
effectively. You are expected to post grades throughout the term of the course using the
Moodle gradebook, so that might be one of the first tutorials to complete.
If you have questions regarding how to learn Moodle, please contact
courserequest@viterbo.edu.
Email
You are expected to use Viterbo email for all email correspondence with students, and they are
expected to use their Viterbo email to correspond with you. You should not ask students to
email you at another email address, as they should not ask you to do this either. For all courserelated correspondence, please use your Viterbo email account.
Vitnet
You should log in to Vitnet and spend a little time getting to know the options available to you
there. From the faculty menu in Vitnet, you will find the option to get a class roster. Within the
roster you can find the profile information for each student (who their advisor is, what their
major is, etc.). Vitnet is also the system you will go into when you are ready to post your grades
at the end of the term. Please note: all grades MUST be posted by Tuesday at noon of the week
following the class session’s end date. So, for example, if an 8-week class ends on a Tuesday, as
most of our online classes do, grades must be posted by the following Tuesday at noon. Grades
for 7-week summer courses are due ______.
Assessment:
We have a strong culture of assessment at Viterbo. All programs are evaluated in an outcomesbased assessment program. The course you are teaching may be expected to contribute an
assessment activity to our overall program assessment. This assessed activity MAY NOT BE
ALTERED. More details on the assessed activity are included later in this faculty guide.
Program Outcomes:
During the _____________ program, learners will accomplish the following outcomes:
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
Outcome 1:
Outcome 2:
Outcome 3:
Outcome 4:
Outcome 5:
Policies and Procedures for Students:
Policies and procedures are communicated to the students in the Adult Learner’s Guide for this
course, as well as in the Student Handbook, available on Viterbo’s website.
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Online Faculty Guide
Assistance:
A student with a disability that may require any auxiliary aids, services, or other
accommodations for this class should contact Jane Eddy (MRC 332 or 796-3194) to discuss their
accommodation needs.
The Academic Resource Center:
Tutors for many of our courses are available in the Academic Resource Center (located on the
3rd floor of Murphy Center), where they provide tutoring on site and online. Students can
receive help with their writing skills there as well. Please ask that they sign up for a tutor or for
writing assistance early in the course to obtain the most benefit from the supplemental
instruction. Online writing assistance is also available online in the summer via
http://www.viterbo.edu/arc/.
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Online Faculty Guide
Information Regarding Your Course
XXXX ### – Course Title
Text and Other Required Materials
All sections of the course are required to use the same textbook. The textbook that has been
selected for this class is as follows:
Ordering an Instructor’s Copy of the Text
All instructors should contact the textbook publisher to obtain a copy of the textbook, and to get
access to all of their instructor’s materials, including any online instructor materials. To get a
copy of the text, and to request access to all instructor materials, please contact:
[Name and contact information for textbook rep]
Course Description / Course Outcomes / Grading Scheme / Schedule
All information pertaining to the course and how the student’s performance will be evaluated
can be found in the Adult Learner’s Guide.
Course Assessment Data
One of the assignments in this course has been designated as the assignment we are currently
using to collect program assessment data. For this course, the assignment we will assess is the
_________________. Please require the students to complete this assignment precisely as it is
detailed in the Adult Learner’s Guide for this class. Use the prescribed rubric exactly as it is
provided to grade this assignment. Then, compile the results and prepare a report of the
students’ scores on this assignment. Send the report within two weeks of the course end date
to __________, the Assessment Coordinator for the _______ program, via e-mail at
____________. This two-week timeframe is very important to ensure that we are able to collect
and assess the data in a timely fashion. We appreciate your participation in this very important
quality management task!
Moodle Course Site
For the Instructor
Your Moodle course site for this class has been pre-loaded with a syllabus template (called an
“Adult Learner’s Guide” or “ALG”), along with this faculty guide, and many other tools and
resources you will need to teach this course. You will need to go into the Moodle site and
explore the materials available to you.
Checklist:
 Open the Adult Learner’s Guide posted on the site and personalize it with your contact
information and any additional information and content you wish to include. Update
any highlighted items and please remove any remaining highlighted text when
finished.
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Online Faculty Guide
o
Assessment: You may not alter the assessment activity, but you do have the
flexibility to take out activities you don’t want to use, and enter other activities
instead. It is only the assessed activity that cannot be altered.
o
Modifying course activities: All other materials that have been pre-loaded into
Moodle are provided for your use, as you see fit. Your activities must meet the
minimum instructional hours and outside work time required of an online
course as listed in Appendixes 1 and 2.
 Review the Moodle course site thoroughly. Make any adjustments based on the adult
learner’s guide.
 Modify any date-specific information in the Moodle site, including the availability dates
for all quizzes and all assignment folders. Be sure to do this before the course begins.
 If you prefer to use Turnitin assignments for student-submitted work, replace any
assignment placeholders with Turnitin assignments. Note: Be sure to create new
Turnitin assignments. Do not duplicate or use Turnitin assignments already placed in
your course.
 Add your own voice. Prepare and post any materials (narrated presentations, discussion
prompts) that you will need to add your own instructor presence to the course.
 You can also “hide” activities that you don’t want students to see until later. The “eye”
button next to the item in Moodle is open when the item is visible to students and is
closed when it is hidden. The text of the item is also dark black when it is visible to
students, or gray when it is hidden. To see the “eye” button, you must be in the editing
mode (click on “Turn Editing On” in the upper corner of your Moodle site).
 To avoid excessive scrolling during the course, move the current week to the top of
the list. Click “Turn editing on” in the upper right-hand corner of your course page, then
click the crosshairs ( ) for that week and drag it to the desired location.
 Once the learner’s guide has been personalized and updated with homework due dates,
etc., then the course site on Moodle needs to be made available to the students. This
must be done at least one week prior to the day the course begins, to give students
time to read through the Learner’s Guide, purchase their books, get their first reading
assignment, etc.
Information about how to accomplish the above tasks and use the instructional tools in Moodle
is available via http://libguides.viterbo.edu/moodle (from the Moodle login page, under
“Moodle Help and Tutorials”).
For Students
Students are expected to be familiar with the Moodle course management software. All
required materials, announcements, and assignments should be posted on Moodle, as that is
where students will be looking for these items.
Grades must also be posted on Moodle, so students can frequently check them and know where
they stand.
More information for students regarding how to use Moodle is available via
http://libguides.viterbo.edu/moodleforstudents (from the Moodle login page, under “Moodle
Help and Tutorials”).
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Online Faculty Guide
Note: If you ask students to use tools outside of Moodle, typical Office applications, or software
specific to the course, please make sure that you can provide support or that support is
available to use those tools.
Course and Instructor Evaluations
Every course that is taught by our adjunct and non-tenured faculty at Viterbo must be
evaluated. All evaluations are sent to students automatically via email, during the last two
weeks of the course. Please support our efforts to collect evaluations by encouraging the
students to complete them in this timeframe. We’ve found we experience a much higher
response rate when faculty are reminding students to complete the evaluations, and
emphasizing the importance of their feedback in making improvements in the course and in
your own development as an instructor.
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Online Faculty Guide
Appendix 1: Viterbo University Credit Hour Definition
Regardless of format, all courses are required to meet the required credit hour standards by a
combination of instructional time and outside work. Outside work could include additional
outside reading, group work, service projects, field work, clinical rotations, among other
learning activities. Viterbo defines one credit hour as 750 minutes over 15 weeks. In addition,
for a 15-week course, each credit requires that students spend two hours of work outside of
class per week (Note: Graduate courses require that students spend three hours of work outside
of class per week). Minimum class and outside work time are calculated according to this
formula:
(750 + 1800) *
the # of credits of a course =
the minimum number of minutes of seat
time and outside work required
For example, for undergraduate courses, a three-credit course requires a minimum of 7,650
total minutes. For graduate courses, a three-credit course requires a minimum of 10,350 total
minutes.
In the adult learner’s guide, please indicate the requirements for your course where requested.
You may do so by copying the corresponding row for your course.
The following table illustrates how the instructional time and outside work time requirements
should be met for an undergraduate 3-credit course in each format:
**Requirements
for a 3-credit
Course**
Course Format
Instructional Time Requirements
In Class (face-toface) time per week
Online instructional
activity time per week
Outside Work Time
Requirements
(amount of time students
will spend on outside
activities per week)
Total Time per
week times
number of weeks
15-week on-site
course
150 minutes (or 2.5
hours)
0 minutes (or 0 hours)
360 minutes (or 6 hours)
(150+360)*15=
7650 minutes
8-week partially
online course
Weeks 1-7: 200
minutes (or 3.3
hours)
Weeks 1-7: 107
minutes (or 1.8 hours)
Weeks 1-7: 743 minutes
(or 12.4 hours)
Week 8: 0 minutes
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
3.3 hours)
[(200+107+743)*7]
+ [100+200] = 7650
minutes
Week 8: 100 minutes
(or 1.7 hours)
8-week fully
online course
8-week blended
course (will vary
based on how
many class
sessions meet)
Weeks 1-7: 0 minutes Weeks 1-7: 307
(or 0 hours)
minutes (or 5.1 hours)
Weeks 1-7: 743 minutes
(or 12.4 hours)
Week 8: 0 minutes
(or 0 hours)
Week 8: 100 minutes
(or 1.7 hours)
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
3.3 hours)
On-site weeks 1-7:
200 minutes (or 3.3
hours)
On-site weeks: 107
minutes (or 1.8 hours)
Weeks 1-7: 743 minutes
(or 12.4 hours)
Online weeks: 307
minutes (or 5.1 hours)
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
3.3 hours)
Online weeks 1-7: 0
minutes (or 0 hours)
[(307+743)*7] +
[100+200] = 7650
minutes
[(307+743)*7]
+[100+200] = 7650
minutes
Week 8: 100 minutes
Week 8: 100 minutes (classroom OR online)
(classroom OR
online)
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Online Faculty Guide
**Requirements
for a 3-credit
Course**
Course Format
Outside Work Time
Requirements
Instructional Time Requirements
In Class (face-toface) time per week
(amount of time students
will spend on outside
activities per week)
Online instructional
activity time per week
Total Time per
week times
number of weeks
7-week partially
online course
(Summer only)
200 minutes
(or 3.3 hours)
121.5 minutes
(or 2 hours)
771.5 minutes
(or 12.9 hours)
(200+121.5+771.5)
*7 = 7651 minutes
7-week fully
online course
(Summer only)
0 minutes
(or 0 hours)
321.5 minutes
(or 5.3 hours)
771.5 minutes
(or 12.9 hours)
(321.5 +771.5)*7=
7651 minutes
7-week blended
course (will vary
based on how
many class
sessions meet;
Summer only)
On-site weeks: 200
minutes (or 3.3
hours)
On-site weeks: 121.5
minutes (or 2 hours)
Every week: 771.5 minutes (321.5+771.5)*7=
(or 12.9 hours)
7651 minutes
Online weeks: 0
minutes (or 0 hours)
Online weeks: 321.5
minutes (or 5.3 hours)
A four-credit course requires a minimum of 10,200 total minutes, including 3,000 minutes of
instructional time and 7,200 minutes of outside work. This standard for the total instructional
and outside work time applies for all formats of instruction: 15-week on-site courses, 8-week
partially online courses, 8-week fully-online or blended courses, and 7-week summer courses.
The following table illustrates how the instructional time and outside work time requirements
should be met for an undergraduate 4-credit course in each format:
Instructional Time Requirements
***Requirements
for a 4-credit
Course***
Course Format
In Class (face-toface) time per week
15-week on-site
course
200 minutes (or 3.3
hours)
8-week partially
online course
Online instructional
activity time per week
0 minutes (or 0 hours)
Outside Work Time
Requirements
(amount of time students
will spend on outside
activities per week)
Total Time per
week times
number of weeks
480 minutes (or 8 hours)
(200+480)*15 =
10,200 minutes
Weeks 1-7: 250
Weeks 1-7: 164.3
minutes (or 4.2 hours) minutes (or 2.7 hours)
Weeks 1-7: 1000 minutes
(or 16.7 hours)
Week 8: 100 minutes Week 8: 0 minutes
(or 1.7 hours)
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
3.3 hours)
[(250+164.3+1000)
*7] + [100+200] =
10,200 minutes
8-week fully online Weeks 1-7: 0 minutes Weeks 1-7: 414.5
course
(or 0 hours)
minutes (or 6.9 hours)
Week 8: 0 minutes (or Week 8: 100 minutes
0 hours)
(or 1.7 hours)
8-week blended
On-site weeks 1-7:
course (will vary
250 minutes (or 4.2
based on how many hours)
class sessions meet)
Online weeks 1-7: 0
minutes (or 0 hours)
On-site weeks 1-7:
164.3 minutes (or 2.7
hours)
Weeks 1-7: 1000 minutes
(or 16.7 hours)
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
3.3 hours)
Weeks 1-7: 1000 minutes
(or 16.7 hours)
Week 8: 200 minutes (or
Online weeks 1-7: 414.5 3.3 hours)
minutes (or 6.9 hours)
[(414.5+1000)*7] +
[100+200] = 10,202
minutes
[(414.5+1000)*7] +
[100+200] = 10,202
minutes
Week 8: 100 minutes Week 8: 100 minutes
(or 1.7 hours) on-site (or 1.7 hours) on-site OR
OR online
online
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Online Faculty Guide
Instructional Time Requirements
***Requirements
for a 4-credit
Course***
Course Format
7-week partially
online course
(Summer only)
In Class (face-toface) time per week
250 minutes
(or 4.2 hours)
Online instructional
activity time per week
Outside Work Time
Requirements
(amount of time students
will spend on outside
activities per week)
Total Time per
week times
number of weeks
178.5 minutes
(or 3 hours)
1028.5 minutes
(or 17.2 hours)
(250+178.5+1028.5)
*7 = 10,199
minutes
7-week fully online 0 minutes
course
(or 0 hours)
(Summer only)
428.5 minutes
(or 7.2 hours)
1028.5 minutes
(or 17.2 hours)
(428.5+1028.5)*7 =
10,199 minutes
7-week blended
course (will vary
based on how many
class sessions meet;
Summer only)
On-site weeks: 178.5
minutes (or 3 hours)
Every week: 1028.5
minutes (or 17.2 hours)
(428.5+1028.5)*7=
10,199 minutes
On-site weeks: 250
minutes
(or 4.2 hours)
Online weeks: 0
minutes (or 0 hours)
Online weeks: 428.5
minutes (or 7.2 hours)
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Online Faculty Guide
Appendix 2: Examples of Instructional Time and Outside Work Time Activities
Syllabi should delineate “Instructional Time” from “Outside Work Time”. Instructional time is
distinguished from outside work time by the presence of the instructor as a facilitator in
activities of the course. If the instructor is not participating and facilitating an activity, it is
considered outside work. Some examples of instructional time versus outside work time are as
follows:
Activities Considered “Instructional Time”:










On-site class meetings and instructor-facilitated (in-person) discussions
Instructor-facilitated online chats
Instructor-facilitated discussion board interactions
Streaming videos recorded and posted by the instructor
Instructor’s voice-over power points
Planned email discussions with the instructor (part of the pre-planned course activities,
not simply responding to questions that may or may not arise)
Quizzes and tests with feedback directly from the instructor
Instructor-facilitated group work
Online streamed lecture video from an expert in the field, with a related discussion
facilitated by the instructor
Other activities with active instructor involvement
Activities Considered “Outside Work Time”:







Writing papers
Reading books and articles
Preparing presentations
Textbook assignments
Watching videos
Accessing and reading content on external websites
Other activities that do not include direct instructor involvement
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