The Distance Education Operating Plan requires that HCC Department Chairs are responsible for the ongoing quality of all distance education courses in their area of instruction. Therefore, it is the role and responsibility of department chairs to perform evaluations/observations of their faculty who teach distance education courses just as it is their responsibility to do the same with on-campus faculty and courses. It is not the role of the Distance Education Department to perform these observations

However, it is the responsibility of the DE to recommend criteria for department chairs to include in the DE and online faculty observation process. Therefore, in addition to the instrument used for faculty teaching on-campus courses, this Online Course Observation Rubric has been approved by both the Academic and Workforce Deans for all online courses, including distance education.

The Online Course Observation Rubric is one of several data sources for evaluating the effectiveness of instruction of online courses – distance education, hybrid, and web-enhanced. It can be complemented with other sources of data such as on-campus observation forms, SEOI reports, syllabi, class handouts and projects, tests, etc.

Other information regarding Department Chair requirements is available in the Distance Education Operating Plan.