Concept

Higher education institutions are realizing that students want and need flexible options for attending and participating in courses. During the COVID years, the world saw that many jobs could be done online. We also saw how many college and university courses and programs could be completed online and still produce quality graduates. This set a precedent for employees to expect more flexible options upon their return to the workplace. It also set a precedent for students to request more flexible options upon their return to campuses. Educational institutions can reach more students by offering flexible learning options and therefore, increase revenue and maintain growth, so it is an attractive option. Students prefer flexible course design because it allows them to have a work-school-life balance and meet their personal, work, and academic goals. Flexible learning is happening and is probably here to stay! The question is, “How much flexibility should an institution build into course design in order to meet the needs of their students?” This book examines this question and provides a suggestion for bimodal flexible (ByFlex) course design as the preferred choice.

Author

As a college professor for more than 20 years, I have had the opportunity to work on many projects and have been a member of many committees. I have designed, developed, and delivered many courses including in-classroom, online, blended, and hybrid. I have also been a program coordinator and course lead. These experiences have helped me develop skills in designing and developing courses. I have noticed over the years that there was, and still is, a need to provide students with flexible options for attendance and participation in courses in order to support student success. I find myself wondering if the HyFlex course model is too high maintenance, and I wonder if there is another flexible course model that would meet students’ needs yet at the same time be easier to instantiate and deliver. I envision a course that offers both synchronous and asynchronous options for students and allows them to switch between delivery modes as they prefer or need to. The bimodal flexible (ByFlex) course model may be the answer.

I will try my best to update the book content from time to time and check that videos or resources do not become obsolete or outdated.

I hope you find the information in this book interesting.

Sincerely,

Kerri Shields

Copyright

Unless otherwise specified within the Pressbook, Bimodal Flexible Course Design is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Accessibility Statement

The author of this resource is committed to providing free, open, and accessible educational content for all. The web version of Bimodal Flexible (ByFlex) Course Design was designed to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0, level AA, and follows all guidelines in Appendix A: Checklist for Accessibility of the Accessibility Toolkit – 2nd Edition.

If you are having problems accessing this resource, please contact kshields@centennialcollege.ca.  Please include the following information:  The location of the problem by providing a web address or page description.  A description of the problem. The computer, software, browser, and any assistive technology you are using that can help us diagnose and solve your issue (e.g., Windows 10, Google Chrome (Version 65.0.3325.181), NVDA screen reader)

Each chapter has been evaluated using WAVE® and modified as needed to meet zero errors in accordance with WCAG AA. “WAVE®  is a suite of evaluation tools that helps authors make their web content more accessible to individuals with disabilities. WAVE can identify many Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG) errors, but also facilitates human evaluation of web content. Our philosophy is to focus on issues that we know impact end users, facilitate human evaluation, and to educate about web accessibility.”^[1]

The web version of Bimodal Flexible (ByFlex) Course Design has incorporated the following accessible features:

• Content can be navigated using a keyboard.
• Links, headings, and subheadings are formatted to be screen-reader friendly.
• All images include detailed alt text unless they are used for decorative purposes only.
• Important information is not communicated via images or colour, and all colours meet WCAG contrast requirements.
• Videos are from YouTube and do have closed captioning available, although many YouTube videos have captions that are auto-generated and these do not always translate correctly, therefore, PDF (English) transcripts have been posted for download with each video.
• Tables are used to structure information and not for layout. Tables include row and column headers. Row and column headers have the correct scope assigned. Tables include a caption. Tables avoid merged or split cells. Tables have adequate cell padding.
• All Web links describe the destination of the link and do not use generic text such as “click here” or “read more”. If a link will open or download a file (e.g., PDF), a textual reference is included in the link information (e.g., [PDF–New Tab]).
• In-text citations are embedded using the Footnote feature of Pressbooks, therefore, footnotes appear as References at the end of each chapter with Web links to the original sources.
• Font size is 12 points or higher for body text in PDF documents. Font size can be enlarged to 200 percent in Webbook or Ebook formats without needing to scroll side to side.
• In addition to the web version, this book is available for download in a variety of file formats including PDF, EPUB (for eReaders), and Common Cartridge (LTI Links).

eCampus Ontario

eCampusOntario is a provincially-funded non-profit organization that leads a consortium of the province’s publicly-funded colleges, universities, and indigenous institutes to develop and test online learning tools to advance the use of education technology and digital learning environments.^[2]

References

(Note: This list of sources used is NOT in APA citation style instead the auto-footnote and media citation features of Pressbooks were  utilized to cite references throughout the chapter and generate a list at the end of the chapter.)