In May 2017 I completed Quality Matters Reviewer training. I completed it as part of a subscription my K12 district purchased and was the QM Coordinator for that district 2017-2022.It has been a touchstone for me as I lean into online education.
Context
At the time of my initial training, I was an in-person teacher trainer and professional developer working in the Technology Department. I specifically worked with classroom teachers to blend their content online the training was transformational. I have now experienced deep looks at online content and now see how extensive, how detailed a complete course review is. I realize now, I have always been starting the online content shift and never finishing it.
Since my initial training, the QM Rubric(s) and the mindset shift has meant different things to me.
Employment Opportunities
Since completing the training I have added many experiences to my resume. I have been paid for all of these experiences and encourage anyone who can to become a QM certified reviewer. I teacher at two different colleges in instructional designer/technologist courses. I have contracted to create complete online courses for adult professional learning courses. I have contracted to author lectures for online courses based on course and modules objectives. I have contracted to “pre-review” course before colleges submit them for QM Certification. I contract directly with Quality Matters to complete course reviews. And I have implemented a learning management system (LMS) from the request for proposal (RFP) through a two year road map.
Not all of these opportunities were because of my certification, but also the perspective it provided me.
Perspective
Thinking about online course content through the lens of the QM rubric helps me understand what I am and what I should be experiencing in on online course.
Personally, my oldest son transitioned to an online high school in his sophomore year for his unique scheduling needs. Considering the QM rubric, his courses are what they should be; considering what I used to do in my in-person classroom I found the course experience less than…. but this helped me see what is the school learning versus what is the experience learning he has available to him.
Now when I look at online courses I intuitively understand – and am still explaining to many K12 classroom teacher – the academic content is distilled to the most straightforward content and learner experiences only. When a in-person classroom teacher tells me “that isn’t real school” I think to myself, but it is what you say you want to do.
In my son’s situation, school distilled down to the required learning allows he to be immersed in his in-person real world learning.
Professional Learning
In 2021, I guided our longest standing K12 online instructors in the district (Foreign Languages & Physical Education) through a Quality Matters self-review. The self-review differs from a QM review, but in this case we used the opportunity to meet as a professional learning community (PLC) to compare the QM rubric to the most mature online offering. This course had been revised over a number of years. When we applied the rubric to the course we discussed many instructor dispositions and assumptions. These discussions generated a dialogue of improvement in content creation, moving the course into alignment with the rubric. The most interesting part of the process was to listen to these course creators and practitioners discussing the way the students interacted with the content.
As I have reviewed and created online courses I have increased my capacity to view courses from the perspective of author, teacher, and learner. I would recommend this activity to any PLC involved with online courses.
I woudl encourage all educators to consider if either a Quality Matters K12 or Higher Education reviewer course or certification is right for you.