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New on EEE: MessageBoard

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The Electronic Educational Environment (EEE) web team has launched the new MessageBoard tool, which allows instructors and TAs to create online forums for discussion with students outside of the classroom. MessageBoard includes a number of new features based on feedback from users of the earlier NoteBoard tool, which it replaces.

New features include:

  • Subscription: Receive email updates when new posts are made
  • Uploading: Post a file for others to download
  • Rich text: Easily format text and add links without HTML
  • Advanced controls: Restrict a forum to instructors and TAs, board admins, or specific people identified by UCInetID
  • Custom web addresses: Choose a friendly URL for your message board

You can visit the MessageBoard tool here.  The EEE Web site has extensive documentation on MessageBoard, including tips on how to use MessageBoard in instruction.

EEE: Streamlining Administrative Tasks to Facilitate Instruction

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In Fall 2008, the Electronic Educational Environment (EEE) web team introduced new features to facilitate course administration for instructors and TAs.

SignupSheet
In August 2008, SignupSheet was added to the EEE toolbox. This new tool helps instructors and TAs manage their classes by collecting online sign-ups from their students.

SignupSheet is in use already, with 100+ sheets published for students to sign up for presentation time slots, paper topics, and office hours with their instructors and TAs.

EasyWebsite
It’s easier than ever to build a class website and provide course materials to students with the new ‘Images’ feature in EasyWebsite. Instructors and TAs can add full image galleries, with automatically created thumbnails and customized image layouts.

Rapid Return
The Rapid Return process, originally launched in March 2007, has been streamlined. Starting Fall 2008, scanned exam files are automatically transferred directly to EEE from Distribution & Document Management (DDM), where instructors and teaching assistants can securely distribute them to students via EEE DropBox.

Help & How-to Primers
EEE Help & How-to guides now feature one-page student primers, useful for printing and distributing in class as part of the syllabus, or linking from a class website. Each downloadable PDF covers basic information about an EEE tool: what the tool is, how to access it, how to begin using it, and where to find more information.  Popular student primers include:

EEE wants to hear from you!
The EEE Web Team is always looking for new and better ways to serve the UCI community. EEE development is driven by the feature requests, questions, and other comments we receive every day. To share your feedback today, Contact Us.

Rapid Return

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David Pritikin (NACS) and Linh Nguyen (DDM) with Larry L. Sautter Silver Award

David Pritikin (NACS) and Linh Nguyen (DDM) with Larry L. Sautter Silver Award

Returning exams can be a burdensome task for instructors involving the distribution, collection and storage of graded work. Currently, exams may be returned through a distribution center or exam room where the students are required to present their IDs while a staff member retrieves exams from a wall of filing cabinets. Or, exams may be returned during discussion or lecture, taking valuable time away from instruction. Instructors may also return exams during office hours, which may not be accessible to all students.

To streamline the exam return process, Distribution and Document Management (DDM) and Network & Academic Computing Services (NACS) have partnered to release a new tool called Rapid Return.

Using barcode-assisted imaging technology and high-resolution scanners, DDM staff will scan and save graded exams as PDF files. Instructors then download their files and use Rapid Return to batch upload all the exams into the EEE DropBox. This enables students to download their individual exams securely and on their own time from any computer with internet access. Since students receive an exact copy of their exams, the integrity of the original document is maintained if the assigned grade is later challenged.

Rapid Return will drastically reduce the costs associated with storing and distributing paper copies of exams. The Department of Chemistry estimates that the elimination of their exam return room would save roughly $20,000 annually. Rapid Return will also free up limited office space currently used for storage and, most importantly, save precious time for more instruction and less administration.

Rapid Return recently received a 2007 Larry L. Sautter Silver Award from the University of California Information Technology Leadership Council.  The awards recognize innovations that have the potential to improve UC academic or administrative processes.

To learn how to use Rapid Return, visit http://eee.uci.edu/rapidreturn .

EEE Develops New Online Survey Tool

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The newest instrument in the ever-expanding EEE toolbox is the online Survey Tool. The tool allows any instructor, TA, or staff member to create and compose a quick and easy survey and then target a specific audience for responses. Results can be analyzed online and in real time.

“By the time we returned from lunch, we already had 14 responses. We were very excited. We never had this fast of a turn-around time when we were mailing out bulky, paper surveys,” said Adam, who has just finished overseeing the school’s 4th major survey.

Any faculty or staff member with a UCInetID can create and publish a survey. Instructors who want to survey their class will find a link to the tool in their MyEEE / MyInstructorClasses module. Other UCI staff can access the Survey Tool from the ToolBox in EEE’s main page navigation bar or go directly tohttp://eee.uci.edu/toolbox/survey/

A fill-in-the-form wizard guides you through each step of the way when you build a survey. Surveys can be reused or shared with a colleague. To make the survey address easy to remember, you can designate an alias, called a “Friendly URL”.

Surveys can be deployed to students in specified classes, research groups, or even to the general public, depending on the settings you choose. The tool generates e-mail and sends it to your target audience, containing a link to the survey.

Data results can be viewed, even as responses are coming in. You can review the results in a graphical display or download them as a spreadsheet.

The Henry Samueli School of Engineering began using the EEE Survey Tool immediately after it was launched to solicit feedback from industries in and around the community regarding eight engineering programs. Iris Adam, Senior Analyst for HSSoE, reported that one survey was sent to two hundred people, and results came in very quickly. “By the time we returned from lunch, we already had 14 responses. We were very excited. We never had this fast of a turn-around time when we were mailing out bulky, paper surveys,” said Adam, who has just finished overseeing the school’s 4th major survey.

NACS has created an example survey to illustrate the tool. You are invited to check it out at http://eee.uci.edu/survey/article-sample

Scrap the Scantrons — Course Evaluations Go Online

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When it comes to course evaluations, a growing number of schools and departments will be canceling their Scantron orders this coming academic year, opting for pixels instead of paper. They are making the switch thanks to EEE‘s new online course evaluation tool.

Previously a means for instructors and teaching assistants to assess the progress of learning in a class, EEE’s online evaluation tool can now be used for the formal course evaluation process, when authorized by the Dean or Associate Dean.

“This project has saved the School of Physical Sciences staff many hours,” asserts Cindy Fern, Academic Counselor, Physical Sciences.

One advantage of online course evaluations is that results are available immediately after final grade submission. Dr. Rudi Berkelhamer, Associate Dean, Division of Undergraduate Education used the online evaluation system in her University Studies class. She appreciates not only that the data was available much more quickly than in the previous paper-format, but also in a concise form easily imported into a database program for analysis.

Online evaluations conserve resources and reduce expenses. “This project has saved the School of Physical Sciences staff many hours,” asserts Cindy Fern, Academic Counselor, Physical Sciences. “Each of our departments had staff members who spent anywhere from 10 to 40 hours per quarter managing the paper process. With the on-line forms, the time spent each quarter has dropped to about one hour or less for each of the five staff members involved in the process.”

The online form also allows students more time to fill out the form, and in many cases they are more responsive. Bob Cassidy, School of Engineering observed: “This quarter we had 5,600 evaluations completed, so that’s almost twice the volume of what we did on paper.”

Dr. Robert Doedens, Chemistry Professor and Associate Dean, Physical Sciences recognizes that “the proportion of students providing free form comments is larger, the comments tend to be longer, and their overall quality is notably higher.” Dr. Doedens believes that “these changes are largely a result of the absence of time constraints during the completion of the evaluations.”

As of spring, 2005, 21 departments have migrated to the online tool. These include all departments in the schools of Engineering, Biological Sciences, Social Ecology, and Physical Sciences. The EEE Web development team works directly with faculty and staff to ensure that all evaluation needs are met. To find out more about EEE’s new department evaluations process, contact eee@uci.edu.