Rural schools face unique and complex challenges and opportunities specific to rural contexts. Recognizing this, the Region 15 Comprehensive Center (R15CC) created and facilitates a community of practice (COP), the Rural COP, focused specifically on rural education in Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah. The goals of this COP are to share…

The Networking "Menu" is a customizable learning experience for online students to explore various ways to network virtually and to sharpen their networking skills. The "menu" offers four networking options for students to select from. Some networking options require that students network with their peers via virtual platforms…

Remote learning communities are peer groups that meet regularly by connecting online and via video and telephone conferencing, to work toward shared learning objectives in a structured virtual environment. Led by skilled facilitators who act as guides and sounding boards for these groups, the ongoing discussions may help staff incorporate new…

Online learning discussion formats provide an opportunity for learners to share their experiences, negotiate meaning, and take ownership of the subject matter. Chat rooms also provide learners with anyplace and real-time ways to participate in academic discussions. Shared understanding occurs when individual experience mediated through group…

Given that our current educational context has required many educators to utilize online instruction in some capacity over the past year, the purpose of this paper is to describe how literacy specialists and teachers can use digital tools to remotely engage in data-based decision-making within a collaborative professional learning community.…

Faculty learning communities (FLCs), established prepandemic to disseminate and discuss evidence-based teaching practices as part of an NSF-funded project, Investigating Student Success Using Evidence-Based Strategies-eXpanded (ISSUES-X), proved effective at facilitating learning during a pandemic. As our university made the decision to operate…

This paper reports on how the FutureLearn Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) "Becoming a Better Teacher" was blended into English Language Teaching (ELT) university programmes in conjunction with telecollaboration. It discusses how the addition of a MOOC blend can enhance a telecollaborative exchange by adding to it increased…

Online counselor education has been studied extensively since its inception, but the experiences of students within these programs have received limited attention. This collaborative view from faculty and students of online counselor education was developed to share the stories of students who have engaged in both synchronous and asynchronous…

With increased improvements to technology for online teaching, synchronous instruction continues to grow. Increasing student interaction has been an important component to enhance a sense of community in online learning and improve student satisfaction. There is a paucity of research on how to effectively manage online interaction and increase…

For school librarians, being part of a "connected" community provides support for getting specific needs met, solving personally relevant and meaningful problems, and developing professional expertise. AASL provides many avenues for members of the profession to learn with and from one another. These include AASL and subgroup electronic…

Community, while inherent in assumptions about online education, rarely materializes as an integral component of the experience. Misconceptions and misguided motivations can derail participation and engagement in the online setting. Creating a successful online community is dependent on knowing what works in the face-to-face environment and…

The first five articles of this series on technologies that enable collaboration, highlighted ways to foster shared learning experiences among students. For this, the final installment, focus is shifted to teachers. States, districts, and groups of teachers are enhancing their collaboration opportunities through synchronous online meetings and…

The Elko County School District in Nevada has elementary school librarians that are "solo" librarians. Over the last several years they have worked to collaborate on meeting monthly--even though the district covers 17,100 square miles--and on providing professional development face to face and online. Sharing and collaboration help them…

Connecting with other education professionals is important in supporting teacher learning. Teachers in remote locations in Australia experience a professional isolation due to geographic isolation that makes it difficult to engage in sustained collaborations with other teachers. In a national project ICT was used to assist these teachers by…

In November 2008 the Sloan Consortium published "Staying the Course: Online Education in the United States." This study produced survey statistics relating to enrollments in online courses. The study confirmed what most administrators and faculty members already suspected: the growth of online higher education continues to be astounding;…