December 2004

Monaco Heads Education Subcommittee as UMUC Prepares for Middle States Review

By Stefanie Johnson
Special to FYI Online

The Middle States accreditation team is coming to UMUC in the spring 2006, but UMUC personnel have been preparing for the visit since the spring 2004. This accreditation, which occurs on a 10-year cycle, will mark the first time that UMUC’s operations in Europe, Asia, and North America are examined as a single entity, presenting one final report to the visiting team in 2006.

UMUC is charged with completing a self-study on 14 standards issued by the Middle States accrediting body. The logistics of gathering the required information from the thousands of UMUC administrators, faculty, and students internationally are daunting. To make the task more manageable, each of the 14 standards has been assigned to a team of relevant personnel, with representatives from Europe, Asia, and stateside.

Pamela Monaco

Pamela Monaco, assistant dean in the School of Undergraduate Studies, chairs the education subcommittee, charged with conducting a self-study on three of the 14 standards: educational offerings, general education, and related educational activities. Monaco’s team will address a variety of concerns, including the selection of general education offerings, the accuracy of student assessment, the availability of appropriate support assistance, and content consistency in courses that are taught over a variety of sections at different times, on different continents, both online and face-to-face.

“We are working very hard to address these standards by asking probing questions of a diverse group of people at UMUC,” said Monaco. “Gathering the appropriate information requires a tremendous commitment. We meet once every two weeks as a subcommittee and each committee member spends an estimated three hours per week on this project.”

Three hours might not sound like much, but it adds up quickly. On top of already full loads, the 10 committee members plus Monaco have spent, collectively, close to one thousand hours gathering and assimilating materials for the accreditation. And this is only one of eight such teams.

Each of the members of the education subcommittee has been gathering feedback from faculty and administration in his or her respective geographic locations. These findings will be compiled in a first draft report due to the steering committee this February 2005.

“The sheer information output from this process is going to be incredible,” said Monaco. “The accreditation team wants to see all of the findings supported by paper documents and one of our biggest challenges now is finding a physical space large enough to store all of the reports being generated for this accreditation.”

Monaco’s team currently uses the WebTycho Middle States classroom to post intra-committee documents as data is shared across three continents.

“Our biweekly meetings are conference calls, and we have had to find a time when both our colleagues in Europe and Asia can reasonably join in,” said Monaco, whose office is in Maryland. “The WebTycho technology at our disposal has been very helpful in sharing information, and I think that UMUC will be used as a model for the accreditation process in the future.”

Even though most UMUC faculty and administration members are comfortable with online communication, the coordination of so many people requires some face time. A three-day accreditation summit was held at UMUC’s Adelphi headquarters in early November. There, subcommittee and steering committee members met with each other and with representatives from American University and Anne Arundel Community College—institutions that recently completed the accreditation process.

Despite the substantial demands that the accreditation process places on UMUC faculty and administration, Monaco feels that the process is generating significant positive interaction.

“Many of us honestly didn’t feel very enthusiastic about participation initially, but it has been a really wonderful experience,” said Monaco. “It is easy to become isolated in your own office, in front of your own computer, and this process is giving us the opportunity to meet so many people from across the University. It is like writing a research paper as a student—you may cringe at the thought of doing it, but once you begin, you are really excited by what you find.”

Monaco also sees the accreditation process as an exciting opportunity for growth.

“This isn’t about making UMUC look good to someone else,” said Monaco. “This is a chance to take a careful look at our strengths and to consider how we can use these successes in areas where we can make improvements.”