The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2008: §2533 Home Papers/Indices prev (§2532) Next (§2534)

Fri, Nov 7, 2:30 - 2:55, Pueblo C Paper (refereed)

Recommended Citation: Russell, J, B Russell, L F Pollacia, and B Mai. An On-Line Multi-Disciplinary Computer Information Systems Minor: Responding to Declining Enrollments in CIS Majors. In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2008, v 25 (Phoenix): §2533. ISSN: 1542-7382.

An On-Line Multi-Disciplinary Computer Information Systems Minor: Responding to Declining Enrollments in CIS Majors

Refereed

20 pages

Jack Russell    [a1] [a2]
Northwestern State University    [u1] [u2]
Natchitoches, Louisiana, USA    [c1] [c2]

Barbara Russell    [a1] [a2]
Northwestern State University    [u1] [u2]
Natchitoches, Louisiana, USA    [c1] [c2]

Lissa F. Pollacia    [a1] [a2]
Northwestern State University    [u1] [u2]
Natchitoches, Louisiana, USA    [c1] [c2]

Bin Mai    [a1] [a2]
Northwestern State University    [u1] [u2]
Natchitoches, Louisiana, USA    [c1] [c2]

The purpose of this paper is to bring attention to the need to develop new, innovative and quality programs that reverse the decline in CIS enrollments. The multi-disciplinary minor in CIS has proven to be successful in attracting students into the CIS arena. A brief review of the authors’ research on declining enrollments is presented as a rationale for this minor. During the 2007-08 academic year, the authors attended National Science Foundation Title III training in preparation for developing the new courses. In order for the new courses to pass the Title III requirements the courses had to meet the expectations of the Quality Matters (QM) Rubric by 2006 MarylandOnline, Inc. This paper discusses how the courses were chosen for the minor. The training modules the authors attended are summarized and how this training was used in the development of the new courses for the minor. An overview of the QM Rubric is given and how it was used as a measuring rod (rubric expectations) for the quality of the new minor courses. Example rubrics are presented. An example course syllabus is used to illustrate how various QM rubric expectations are mapped to sections of the syllabus. Pictures of Blackboard folders from one of the courses within the minor are used to illustrate a quality structure and sequence that addresses the QM Rubric expectations. The QM Rubric expectations can be found at http://www.qualitymatters.org.

Keywords: Declining CIS enrollments, CIS minor, multi-disciplinary CIS minor, Quality Matters Rubric, QM Expectations, QM Standards

Read this refereed paper in Adobe Portable Document (PDF) format. (20 pages, 2191 K bytes)
Preview this refereed paper in Plain Text (TXT) format. (36 K bytes)

CDpic
Comments and corrections to
webmaster@isedj.org