Innovation Diffusion Plan
Replacing WebCT with SmartCourse on the Panacea campus of Atlantic University (AUP) is a prickly problem because it is the replacement of one innovation with another. Having already gone through one innovation process for putting courses on line, there is understandable resistance from faculty who used WebCT. Why, they must ask themselves, should we learn another software package when we already complied with the university’s earlier request to use WebCT? How long will it be before we have to do it a third time? In addition, if the faculty who currently use WebCt cannot be convinced to embrace the new SmartCourse, who will be the ones to push the diffusion to the faculty at large? The WebCT users are the early adopters of technology in the faculty community, as evidenced by their placement of courses online. Alienating them promises to make the diffusion of the new SmartCourse even more difficult. Resistance is also piqued because SmartCourse is an authority-innovation decision. Administrators decided to make the change without identifying the needs and desires of the users. Thus, the potential users are not as disposed to involving themselves in the innovation. Since placing courses online is optional, the potential adopters are put in a position of choosing to change to SmartCourse or not participating in online teaching at all. The risk is that some of those who adopted WebCT will opt to not continue online and the attraction of remote learners will decrease rather than increase.
A further resistance exists among the other faculty members who may not see the value to themselves of putting their courses online. The increased time and effort needed to format their courses for online learning, as well as the increased effort of adapting their teaching methods to online courses, may seem to make the effort less than attractive.
Stakeholders include the AU Vice President of Information Technology, AUP Vice-Chancellor of Academic Affairs, AUP instructional technologist, and AUP faculty members. The Vice President of Information Technology announced the plan, so it is basically his egg to fry. That means everyone below him is going to be held accountable for the success of the plan, including the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs at AUP. The Vice Chancellor can affect the innovation plan positively by supporting his Instructional Technologist, negatively by undermining him by not delivering on his promise to support a sound plan. The AUP Instructional Technologist has been given responsibility for implementation of the plan. Success will be a good career move, failure not, so he has plenty of incentive to make the plan a success. The faculty will be affected by the amount of work the innovation requires of them, the potential rewards available, and their perception of the need for increasing the online presence of the university. If the rewards do not outweigh the detriments, the plan will fail.
In order to ensure a successful adoption of SmartCourse, a number of needs must be met. First, the new software must be taught to those faculty and faculty/administrators who are enthusiastic about the new SmartCourse program. Especially important is the Dean of Arts & Sciences, who is in a position to champion the innovation. With his authority over several areas of the campus academic community, his interest in the diffusion of SmartCourse will reach more people with greater emphasis than other faculty members. When the dean and other friendly faculty are taught the software and start developing courses, they can help educate and train other faculty.
The critical players in this innovation are the faculty who have WebCT courses online. They must be convinced that SmartCourse is a smart course for them to take. They must be sold the advantages of SmartCourse, must be given incentives to continue online courses, and must receive some expression of appreciation for their efforts in the past when they accepted and met the challenge to go online. Plus their experience should be tapped for producing the next generation of online courses. Because they are undaunted by technology, they must be kept in the game to be able to spread the innovation to those less technologically sophisticated.
In order to produce the desired innovation, the following steps should be implemented:
1. The Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and the AUP instructional technologist will make the SmartCourse Kickoff Presentation at a meeting of all department heads. The presentation will demonstrate the new SmartCourse software, show examples of courses already developed with SmartCourse, and allow opportunities for department heads to do rudimentary functions with the course software. The presentation will also describe the incentives for using SmartCourse, which will include:
a. Recognition by the Chancellor’s office of the departments with the most online courses with certificates and public recognition at the year-end awards banquet.
b. Similar recognition of faculty members who put courses online.
c. Release from serving on committees for a semester for faculty who create online courses.
d. Reduced course load for faculty who are teaching online.
2. All faculty members will receive brochures on the day after the presentation describing the advantages of SmartCourse and the incentive plan. On the same day, faculty members will receive email promoting SmartCourse and encouraging them to study the brochure and consult with their department heads if they have questions. The brochure will emphasize the superior features of SmartCourse over WebCT. Also in the brochure and email will be phone numbers to call for technical information and to set up a training session.
3. Faculty who already have courses online with WebCT will get an additional email or phone call from the Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs explaining the need to change to SmartCourse for the long-range financial health of the University; expressing thanks for their efforts with WebCT; ensuring them that they will get extra support for changing their courses over to SmartCourse; and enlisting their help in examining the SmartCourse beta version and making suggestions for improvement of the formal version.
4. Training sessions will be set up, on an individual basis if necessary, in the early phase of the innovation. Those faculty members who are eager to learn, including the Dean of Arts & Sciences, will receive training without delay. Technical training support must be made available from Atlantic University-Greenville in the weeks immediately following the kickoff.
5. The AUP Instructional Technologist will contact department heads weekly for the first three months to encourage them to continue encouraging faculty members to sign up for SmartCourse training. After the first three months, the Instructional Technologist will advise the department heads of upcoming regularly scheduled training sessions.
6. The AUP Instructional Technologist will contact faculty members who have courses online at present to answer objections, elicit insights, and encourage participation. It is imperative that these faculty members know their previous work is appreciated and their experience valued. They will be further encouraged to use the beta software in Spring 2002 and input their ideas for improvement.
7. Graduate assistants will be trained in SmartCourse so they will be available to assist faculty who already have online courses to shift these courses to SmartCourse. Much of the objection to the new software can be overcome by taking some of the drudgery out of the transfer. Since the course has already been designed for the Web, a lot of the work will be reformatting the information, which can be done without redesigning the course.
8. Early participants in training will conduct workshops, for which they will be paid, educating other faculty members.
9. Online courses will be eligible for awards for course design. The awards will be publicized in campus print communiqués and on the University Web site.
10. Monthly email to faculty will publicize other faculty members’ efforts with online courses by selecting an Online Course of the Month with the course’s online address and encouragement to faculty members to examine the new online courses. With permission of the instructor, the phone number and email of the instructor will be included so other faculty may contact him/her with questions.
11. Continue technical and moral support for faculty.
12. At end of Spring 2002, survey faculty about their feelings about SmartCourse. Get their input concerning changes. Send this information to AU-Greenville to aid in the preparation of the formal version of SmartCourse.
13. Strongly encourage SmartCourse developers to include online quizzes and online rosters in the software to increase likelihood of adoption by faculty. Do this through the Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs at Panacea and the Vice President of Information Technology at Greenville.
14. Continue offering SmartCourse workshops with the help of AU-Greenville and AUP faculty.
15. Ask for testimonials from faculty who have put courses online using SmartCourse to distribute to other faculty.
The implementation of this plan will successfully diffuse the innovation. The plan allows for the development of awareness of the plan through a variety of media: meetings, brochures, communiqués, email, and phone. The plan identifies the key early adopters and gives them adequate support and training to apply SmartCourse to their courses. Relationship building is stressed between the Instructional Technology department and the WebCT- experienced faculty to get them on the side of SmartCourse. Extra support is offered to help them move their present WebCT courses to SmartCourse and their experience is valued and appreciated. Training is immediately available when the diffusion plan is initiated, so enthusiasm of early adopters is not lost because of time lapses. Incentives are offered to encourage participation in SmartCourse, as is recognition for those who put a course online. The continuing recognition and presentation before the faculty of progress in online course construction will keep the goals of the University in the consciousness of the faculty community. Both technical and moral support are available. Peers are enlisted to provide training, information and support.
Any innovation has to deal with resistance. An innovation that replaces a rather recent innovation has even more. Not only does one have to convince people to adopt a new way of behaving, but one also has to deal with the resentment of those who went along with your previous innovation and now feel like they wasted their time—that they are starting all over again. Whether or not this SmartCourse innovation succeeds will depend greatly on whether or not the faculty who have already put courses online will adopt SmartCourse and continue to teach online.
Another factor that could negatively affect this innovation diffusion plan will be the support of the central administration at AU-Greenville. The directive to switch to SmartCourse came from them. They have promised technical support personnel to help with the implementation. If they do not come through, it could create a major snag. In the event that the switch to SmartCourse throughout the AU system overwhelms the available personnel resources, faculty who are ready to accept the new innovation may be put off by waiting for training and support. The lack of timeliness could negatively affect their decision to adopt the innovation.
Also needed to make the implementation successful will be the willingness of instructional developers to include in the SmartCourse formal version the features that faculty feel are necessary to conduct a successful online course. If the developers, for reasons of time, or money, or lack of expertise fail to include the most valued features that WebCT offered, many faculty members may decide it would not be worth their while to use SmartCourse if doing so means putting an inferior course online.