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Meeting Quality Standards

A page within Online Education

UWL instructors must ensure that their online courses meet U.S. Department of Education’s requirements for Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) and as is vital to an institution’s relationship with the U.S. Department of Education for student financial aid eligibility. It is important to note that the Department of Education will seek to determine whether the institution has created expectations for instructors to monitor each student's engagement. Faculty Senate created a policy regarding RSI which includes official definitions of RSI from the U.S. Department of Education. This website provides additional guidance, ideas, and examples about RSI and integration into online courses.

While RSI is a part of good course design elements, simply adhering to RSI standards does not equate to offering a quality course. RSI mainly forces regular and substantive interaction, but for a quality course, there are many additional considerations in course development and delivery. UWL CATL will continue to use the UWL Online Course Evaluation Guidelines to promote and train instructors about quality online course design and delivery, as well as provide feedback to instructors; these guidelines are currently being updated to ensure alignment with RSI.  

Regular and Substantive.

Institutions are expected to ensure regular and substantive interaction between students and instructors in their distance education and competency-based education offerings. An institution ensures regular interaction between a student and an instructor or instructors by, prior to the student’s completion of a course or competency:​

  1. Providing the opportunity for substantive interactions with the student on a predictable and scheduled basis commensurate with the length of time and the amount of content in the course or competency; and​
  2. Monitoring the student’s academic engagement and success and ensuring that an instructor is responsible for promptly and proactively engaging in substantive interaction with the student when needed on the basis of such monitoring, or upon request by the student.
Regular Interaction, Defined.

By regularly engaging with students, instructors can then proactively engage in substantive interaction when needed based on how the instructor gauges students’ engagement and/or success (e.g., reaching out to a student who is not participating or whose work quality is below a satisfactory level) or upon student request. 

Regular Interaction, Explained.
Substantive, Defined.

Substantive interaction is engaging students in teaching, learning, and assessment, consistent with the content under discussion, and include at least two of the following:​

  1. Providing direct instruction;​
  2. Assessing or providing feedback on a student’s coursework;​
  3. Providing information or responding to questions about the content of a course or competency;​
  4. Facilitating a group discussion regarding the content of a course or competency; or​
  5. Other instructional activities approved by the institution’s or program’s accrediting agency.
Substantive, Explained.

1.  Providing direct instruction - Examples:  

  • Pre-recorded video lectures of content with slides  
  • Readings and additional materials such as web content, podcasts, videos, etc. 
  • Synchronous lectures with a potential of two-way communication 
  • Instructor led synchronous discussion around the course content 
  • Regularly scheduled learning sessions where there is an opportunity for direct interaction between student and instructor to discuss course content and materials 

2. Assessing or providing individual feedback on a student’s coursework - Examples:  

  • Using Canvas auto-graded quizzes with feedback for both correct and incorrect answers; also using application question(s) that allow you to provide students with individualized feedback.  
  • Using a variety of feedback approaches to provide whole-class feedback and individualized feedback. Options include but aren’t limited to automatic quiz feedback; announcements with written, video or audio feedback themes addressed; in-line commenting on a submission; assignment comments (written or audio) on a submission; completed rubics on submissions.  
  • Include graded assignments with individualized feedback in alignment with syllabus feedback timelines. 
  • Using Canvas learning analytics, provide whole-class feedback on common questions, strengths, and "stickiest point" at regular intervals.  
  • Provide regular virtual office/student hours  

3. Providing information or responding to questions about the content of a course or competency. - Examples 

  • Responding in a timely manner to student emails; Responding in a timely manner to questions regarding course administration and content; Hosting regularly scheduled office hours. 
  • Instructor announcements made at appropriate intervals for the length of the course (daily or weekly), scheduled announcements answering common questions or summarizing class progress or concerning course assignments and offering additional guidance.  
  • Use announcements to post about academic aspects of the course and to provide additional information relevant to the class content.  
  • Regularly respond to questions regarding academic aspects of the course and to provide additional information relevant to the class content. 
  • Host student/office hours for content/topic reviews; record and post Q&A for class to access. 

4. Facilitating a group discussion regarding the content of a course or competency (includes asynchronous discussions). - Examples 

  • Instructor responds to questions posted in group discussions. 
  • Instructor-facilitated discussion forums are included throughout the course if applicable to the course context and outcomes. The instructor's role is to make posts that promote critical thinking, expand conversations, provide clarification, note strengths, create connections to resources, suggest improvements, motivate, and/or encourage students. 
  • Instructor regularly posts to course discussion forums in a variety of mediated formats to pose guiding questions related to the course subject. 
  • Instructor actively checks and posts as needed to peer-to-peer discussions.  

5. Other instructional activities approved by the institutions/program’s accrediting agency 

  • UWL advises incorporating standards 1-4 in online synchronous courses, and 2-4 in online asynchronous courses. Additional program/department guidelines may be added to augment these existing standards.
Instructor-led Interaction is....
  • initiated by the instructor, meaning that it does not include interactions prompted at the request of a student (e.g., responding to a request for a student/office hour appointment). 
  • not entirely optional to students. 
  • prompt and proactive.
  • carried out in accordance with institutional policies.  
CATL' s Role with RSI.

CATL is willing to support instructors in their understanding and ability to implement RSI criteria. Individual and groups of instructors can contact CATL@uwlax.edu to request a consultation to learn more about RSI. Quality online course design and delivery is the focus of our existing Online Instructor Training and Advanced Online Instructor Training; RSI is addressed in these trainings. CATL is not the campus organization that is responsible for ensuring instructors comply with the RSI criteria. However, CATL is willing to train and support campus employees charged with monitoring UWL’s execution of RSI.  

Additional Resources and Credits.