Instructional Setting

Instructional Setting and Content Area The main campus of Olivet Nazarene University is in Bourbonnais, IL, approximately 55 miles South of Chicago. The school of graduate and continuing studies consists of faculty, who live in the Bourbonnais area, and adjunct instructors who can live anywhere in the United States. All of the faculty subscribe to a statement of faith which binds them together as they strive to provide education with a Christian purpose. There are many faculty development initiatives for instructors. Webinars, faculty development days, and frequent communication across departments help to provide a cohesive, strong sense of culture among both local faculty and adjunct faculty though they are spread across the country.
Universal design for learning (UDL) provides the principles for providing accessible online content. Many instructors of both online and face-to-face courses in the Olivet Nazarene School of Graduate and Continuing Studies do not know how to create content that is fully accessible in a learning management system (LMS). This provides an inconvenience to incoming students with special needs, and it may even result in dire consequences in the financial and accreditation realm should our courses be audited. As such, it is imperative to ensure our instructors are aware of the principles of UDL and are equipped with the knowledge and tools they need to create fully accessible content in the
They range in age from 20 to 70. Because the Olivet Nazarene School of Graduate and Continuing Studies serves non-traditional students, most courses are taught online. As such, instructors have more technical savvy than traditional instructors.
The instructors are all well-educated. All possess at least a master’s degree with xx% possessing a doctoral degree. They are very driven to succeed academically and place great value in learning. Some learners may be hesitant to see the value in instruction specific to making content in the LMS accessible because the majority of their course content is provided for them from a master course template.
Olivet Nazarene University subscribes to the values of the Church of the Nazarene. Accordingly, most are socially conservative. As instructors, they have a faith based devotional at the beginning of every weekly module. Though they are not geographically close, their faith provides a common bond and is the mainstay of the university culture. Strong morals and ethics are strong themes throughout the curriculum they