Getting the Buy-In and Budget to Launch Hybrid Courses Right Now

How is one of the smallest community colleges in the state of Washington with one of the largest service districts - 4,000 students across 4,500 square miles - finding the money, time and political will to launch new programs at a time like this? 

Russell Beard of Big Bend Community College will show you how. 

After twelve years investing deeply in videoconferencing, the college found it was still a struggle to maintain a stable environment over the course of an 11 week quarter. They'd lose a connection, a mic would go out or they weren't able to capture the visual aids from multiple devices. 

Then when the economic crisis hit, they had to take a hard look at their education technology infrastructure, soon realizing they were spending a 6-figure sum to generate maybe 6 FTE credits.

That's when they decided to move entirely to webcasting via Mediasite.

Beard will present Big Bend Community College:

• Launched new programs in the face of budget cuts through executive buy in and grant writing
• Moved from having to beg, borrow and threaten faculty to use their technology-enabled classrooms to having a line of faculty waiting to get in
• Determined webcasting with Mediasite to be the most cost effective approach for reaching every one of their constituents with a decent internet connection
• Created best of breed hybrid class offerings with virtual classrooms, lectures and office hours both synchronous and asynchronous
• Leverages Mediasite for creative uses outside of lecture capture in the classroom, including Small Business Administration courses, board of trustee meetings and their State of the College address