Live to Online Growing Pains

Prior to 2012, the school I previously worked for, a certificate health coach training program, was 100% live. Students attended sessions on the weekends for almost a year. Students had workbooks and materials they could access online, but majority of learning occurred during the weekend sessions. The school had a primary instructor who led the majority, if not all, of the weekend sessions. Each session had around 150 students and it was becoming very draining for the founder. He decided to take a risk and go entirely online. In his last live course, he recorded all of his lectures and had a small staff convert his assignments into online discussions. They decided to use moodlerooms as the LMS as well as putting all pre-recorded content in small ipods. At that time, most lectures were audio only, but some were video. Students could listen to content on the go, and then interact with classmates and instructors in the LMS. They also completed tests and submitted assignments in Moodlerooms.

From a business perspective, this was a major success. Student enrollment went from 200 students per class to now almost 2,000. Switching to online allowed students from not only all over the country, but now all over the world to enroll in the course. The founder was able to teach more people on how to become a health coach. Now, the school has over 60,000 graduates and an annual student body of 12,000 per year.

With this incredibly growth came major growing pains. The number of staff to start could not accommodate the growing volume of support needed from our students. It was quickly determined that our students were not tech savvy, therefore the volume of questions that came in multiplied to such a degree that it took days for staff to respond. Too many students were posting in the same discussion boards and barely any students were receiving feedback from either students or staff. It became all too easy for students to feel lost in the sea of students. In their end of year evaluations, students voiced that they did not feel as part of a community as past graduates expressed and they felt less confident in their coaching skills.

After a few years, staffing started to normalize. What was once a staff of 15, is now over 100. Our discussions are now on Facebook, where students easily adapt since they had prior knowledge of the platform before starting the program. It has also allowed for more productive conversation and students have reported feeling strongly supported by IIN staff. We also use Zendesk to answer student questions outside of Facebook. Student services response time is now less than 24 hours which is better than industry standards.

This experience left myself and education staff to understand what not to do for our students and learning objective. We are using these “lessons learned” to develop a much more functional LMS within the Canvas system. For example, we will be creating smaller groups to improve communication, develop better tracking of assignments, and improve feedback methods from instructors.

It was an incredible learning experience for the school. A lot of valuable information was taken away even though it was challenging in the moment. As I go into my next professional chapter, I am taking away a lot of lessons from that transition that I hope can create a more effective learning experience for those who enroll in our master’s program.