Onsite Support Person Instrumental

  by  enriqueburgosgarcia 

Perhaps I am using this blog post as a way to say loud and clear that the role of the On-Site Facilitator or support person is very important.  I want to shout it from the rooftops:  A key factor for the success of an online student is the on-site facilitator. You are valuable!  I wonder why so often this partnership between Cyber Schools and the home school is weak.  How can we support the support people? I think that for some there are unclear boundaries as to what their role is, perhaps they have been given no extra time to support their students (it is seen as an extra job that they don’t  have time for), or no one ever trained them in their role.  I don’t think that it is a natural God given talent to be a good on-site facilitator.  Since my PLC goal is to increase online student success I need to be looking at all of the areas that contribute to an online student’s success and focus on how to strengthen it. 

In de la Varre, Keane, and Irvin’s research, Dual Perspectives on the Contribution of On-Site Facilitators to Teaching Presence in a Blended Learning Environment,  they look at the role of the On-Site facilitator through interviews with both online teachers and their facilitators. 

In their article(pg. 2) they site that Roblyer, Freeman, Stabler, and Scheidmiller (2007, pg. 11) found “ the role of the facilitator is critical.  Students at remote sites are less independent than first thought and a facilitator should be available…to offer support and guidance”.  They discuss in the article, and I also see it in my role as an online educator, that it is ideal if the on-site facilitators are knowledgeable in their role and that they have had some training on how to support the online learning environment; however, that is not always the case.  In my school division it varies from school to school as to who the on-site facilitator is.  It could be the librarian, an educational assistant, a teacher, or the principle.  The students in our division are not allowed to enroll unless there is a support person listed for each student.  In many cases a person is listed but the reality of how much they are willing or expected to assist varies from being given scheduled time to help the student to it being one more thing on a long list where distance learning falls to the bottom.

I found it very interesting that de la Varre et al. (p. 3) state that “from the learner’s perspective, the student is in a blended learning environment even when a course is delivered completely online, because the local setting influences the student’s online experience”.   

“Students in an online course are constantly traversing the space between the virtual and the local learning context and teaching presence cannot be isolated to the virtual domain.  The assumption often made that when a student takes an online course it is entirely the responsibility of the instructor and the overall course structure to create a viable learning community.  However, K-12 students take virtual courses in other learning contexts, i.e., the school classroom, library, or home-school environment. As one instructor noted, “People forget these are high school kids. You can’t just say ‘there’s your computer; now I’m going to sit here and ignore you.’” (p. 12)

 This is what their research through interviews of on-site facilitators and online educators says in terms of the roles and responsibilities:

On-Site Facilitator’s Role:

·         Student Support- “listen, be supportive and accessible, but not stand in the way of what the instructor does” (p. 8)

·          Establishing and maintaining relationships with the students

·         Encouraging, acknowledging, or reinforcing student contributions.  They cited that “these were necessary to guide students through two simultaneous and challenging learning experiences: academic rigor and online learning” (p. 8)

·          “Keep current with students’ assignments, be knowledgeable about the course schedule and content, and communicate regularly with the instructor” (p. 9)

·         Encourage the students to contact their teacher directly

The roles for the support people as outlined by the Chinook Cyber School are:

• Track students' progress and reporting to the school's administration when a drop might be necessary
• Monitor progress of students and ensuring the timely completion and submission of course work.  Students should be handing work in regularly as part of continuous feedback.  Leaving all work to the end of the course for hand in limits the student's opportunity for self assessment and improvement.
• Communicate student progress to school administration, especially if there are concerns
• Ensure students have all the necessary materials for their courses

de la Verre et al. argue that the above learner support is vital along and that along with on-site facilitator training, there should also be a conversation at the beginning of each course with the on-site facilitator and instructor to talk about things such as communication preferences, facilitator to student support, local school issues, and anything else that may affect the learning of the student. 

I would certainly note that from my own personal experience the school support is much more effective if the teacher and the support person establish a relationship outside of just contacting each other when things are going wrong.  As part of our PLC to increase online student success we are trying to make it out to the support schools to meet the support people face to face as well as to include them in any student intervention through adobe connect.  We are trying to create a team environment rather than an us vs them attitude.  If there can be a partnership between the home school and the distance learning school where there are positive interactions focusing on the support and success of the student then the entire distance learning experience is much smoother. 

What strategies to you have for building that relationship between the distance learning school and the on-site school?  The sink or swim model would certainly be easier that trying to create a PLC for online students but the student PLC is so critical for student success.  Support people play a such a key role in online student success.  Do you think they know that they are key players in student success?  How can they be supported?