These guidelines are a companion to the Substantive Interaction Policy for Online Courses, which was approved at the Graduate Council on 4/24/2023 and the Academic Council on 1/22/2024. This policy is in alignment with federal regulations that apply to all online courses for which students may use Title IV funds and current practice in our online graduate programs, which emphasize substantive interactions in the online classroom that foster intellectual engagement and deeper understanding among diverse individuals.
This article covers the following topics:
Interaction between students and the instructor should be regular (at least once weekly), and interaction should be academic. This interaction should occur with reasonable frequency, considering the length of time the course is run.
To establish participation, students must log in to each course within the posted Schedule Adjustment Period and either submit an assignment or substantively interact with classmates and/or the professor. Your class must have trackable opportunities to meet these requirements to comply with financial aid requirements and to allow you to drop students who do not meet the requirements.
All of this means students are engaged through teaching, learning, and assessment. In addition, the course must include at least two of the following 5 categories.
- Providing direct instruction via live lecture or videoconferencing.
- This does not include micro-lectures or recorded webinars.
- Assessing or providing feedback on a student's coursework.
- Limited feedback, such as posting "good job" or just entering a numerical grade, does not qualify as substantive.
- Providing information or responding to questions about the course content.
- Actively facilitating a group discussion regarding the content of a course.
- Limited feedback, such as posting "good job" or just entering a numerical grade, does not qualify as active facilitation in a discussion.
- Other instructional activities approved by the institutions' or programs' accrediting agency.
Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) in Distance Learning
- Provide regular direct interaction via Zoom
- Provide meaningful assessment feedback, both when a student is doing well and in areas where they could improve. Feedback can be written, audio or video.
- Provide information by responding to questions via announcements, messages in Canvas, discussion boards or email.
- Summarize discussions with highlights in a post from the faculty.
- Instructor-created Video lectures with discussions
- Post a video as part of the discussion with discussion prompts tied to video content
- Group discussions of the video lecture
- Weekly Announcements explaining content (not just due dates)
- Regularly scheduled Office Hours/Help Sessions/Review Sessions
- OSCQR SUNY Online Course Quality Review Rubric: The SUNY website provides a rubric for evaluating the quality of online course materials based on 50 criteria organized into nine categories. This rubric is designed to help instructors and instructional designers ensure that their online courses are effective and engaging for students.
- U.S. Department of Education Issues Final Rules on Distance Education and Innovation: The US Department of Education has released final regulations on distance education and innovation. The new rules aim to provide more flexibility to institutions offering online programs and ensure quality standards are maintained.
- UTRGV Regular Substantive Interaction: The UTRGV Teaching Online Process emphasizes the importance of regular and substantive interaction between instructors and students in online courses to promote engagement, communication, and learning.
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The above graphic and examples are based on Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) in Distance Learning. (n.d.). UTRGV. Retrieved August 3, 2023, from https://www.utrgv.edu/online/teaching-online/process/regular-substantive-interaction/index.htm