The only place the word “on-line” appears in our contract is in the section about enrollment incentive, 9.1.2.5.1. However, on-line teaching is addressed in article 6.7 under the heading of Distance Education.

6.7.1 “Distance education” courses are those credit bearing courses delivered to and taken by students who are not co-located with the faculty member(s) responsible for the course.

On-line courses would fall into this category. An on-line course could be part of someone’s load, or be an overload or summer assignment. On-line courses will be developed, approved and assessed in the same framework as an on-campus course. No one is required to teach an on-line course. It must be agreed upon by the department head and faculty member (6.7.5). Enrollment maximums are the same as for similar courses that are taught on campus, unless you agree to a higher cap.

This is just a summary of the main points of this section. Please see the full article 6.7 in the Master Agreement for the details.

There is currently a plethora of course and program development that is on-line, so I wanted to make sure we are all aware of what the contract says about it. Please contact me if you have any concerns.