Balancing quality online course design with instructor autonomy is a growing challenge. This presentation explores how to provide instructors with flexibility while ensuring consistent course quality through varied flexible template design approaches. We’ll also discuss strategies for enhancing instructor presence within these flexible course designs.

Producing quality courses that can serve a larger population of educators and students is becoming a growing need in online learning in higher education. While many institutions utilize blueprint or template courses, where many instructors teach the exact same course, we found a different need for more flexible sharable courses that allow instructors to infuse their own unique experiences and skillset into a course without creating a unique course for every instructor.
Our institution also uses a quality rubric to ensure all courses are high quality online courses. By creating a flexible and sharable template, the courses can be shared and customized by each instructor while still maintaining the course quality designation. By creating this flexibility, we also allow for increased instructor presence within the courses.
The challenge is creating these courses that can meet a variety of teaching needs while still maintaining quality standards and being approachable enough for an instructor to pick up and teach with little hands on training. We discovered that each course needs a tailored approach to ensure it meets the needs of each individual groupl wishing to share the course. While each course is customized, we did create certain elements that work well in all courses to work from.
In this session, we will share examples of these customized flexible templates, share how they meet the unique needs of each group, and share the strategies we use to create the courses.
Session Structure and Interactivity:
We will open with an introduction of ourselves, our team, and design process. We will define flexible for the purpose of this presentation. We will poll the audience to get a sense of prevalence of this need for flexibility. We will then move into a presentation of case examples of ways we have provided flexible course designs and how we are able to maintain quality standards in each instance. We will encourage participants to share ideas or solutions they have or use in their own environments. We will then end the session with an open discussion and Q&A.
Key Takeaways:
By the end of the session, attendees will have gained:
An understanding of flexible course design strategies that support varied teaching styles while upholding consistent standards for course quality.
Insights into using shareable templates that allow for instructor autonomy without compromising on quality or alignment with institutional standards.
Practical ideas for enhancing instructor presence in online courses through thoughtful design elements embedded within these flexible course structures.
Actionable strategies for balancing quality and flexibility in their own course development processes, which they can immediately implement.
The session will conclude with a Q&A or open discussion, depending on time availability, where attendees can ask further questions or explore more detailed aspects of the cases presented.
This presentation addresses the critical need for flexible yet rigorous online course design. By exploring real-world examples and fostering an interactive, idea-sharing environment, participants will leave equipped with tangible solutions for enhancing both the autonomy and effectiveness of online instruction.