First Past The Post!

Posted: November 1, 2019

By Sandy Rozecki, CBR Project Manager

On October 25, Tom Grant, Dustin Blackwell, Dean Ferguson, Cosmin Lazar and Dietrich Schellenberg charted new territory by presenting the first Phase II CBR submission to Senior Academic Committee (SAC), resulting in approval of 3 programs for launch in Fall 2020. The programs are: Outdoor Power Equipment Technician (Marine and Powersports), Heavy Duty Equipment Mechanic and Automotive Service Technician Diploma programs.

All programs involved in Phase II are required to develop a SAC submission that incorporates key program details, market evidence, alignment to RRC’s credential framework, work integrated option details and known risks. Additionally the submission must reference the new Academic Framework that the CBR Steering Committee has developed as an evolution from Phase I.

These presentations required considerable preparation, focus and research in order to put the programs’ best foot forward – and that they did! Congratulations to this team, and to their Dean, Derek Kochenash, for trailblazing this step for the remaining 16 programs. Well done!

To learn more about Course Based Registration Phase II, click here.

Programs Announced for Phase II CBR

Posted: October 17, 2019

By Christine Watson

I am excited to announce that Phase II has now kicked off with the goal of bringing new programs online for Course-Based Registration for the Fall 2020. From the feedback and interest expressed by so many program areas at the College, Phase II has a substantially expanded scope with significantly more programs involved. The programs are listed below.

Phase II Course Based Registration Programs

Type	Program Name	Faculty / School	Department / Unit	Chair/Program Lead
New Program	Data Science and Machine Learning	School of Business and Applied Arts	ACE	Haider Al-Saidi/
Renewal	Business Information Technology	School of Business and Applied Arts	ACE	Haider Al-Saidi/Marnie-Leigh Boulet
Renewal	Business Technology Management (BTM)	School of Business and Applied Arts	ACE	Haider Al-Saidi/Marnie-Leigh Boulet
Renewal	Information Security	School of Business and Applied Arts	ACE	Haider Al-Saidi/Marnie-Leigh Boulet
Renewal	Business Administration	School of Business and Applied Arts	Applied Commerce and Management Education	Lisa Jamieson/Phil Fletcher
Renewal	Applied Accounting	School of Business and Applied Arts	Applied Commerce and Management Education	Lisa Jamieson/Phil Fletcher
Renewal	Commerce Industry Sales and Marketing (CISM)	School of Business and Applied Arts	Applied Commerce and Management Education	Lisa Jamieson/Phil Fletcher
Renewal	QA/QC for Pharmaceutical and Food	School of Health Sciences and Community Services	Life Sciences	Isabel Bright/Said Hassan/Curtis Aab
Renewal	Pharmaceutical Manufacturing	School of Health Sciences and Community Services	Life Sciences	Isabel Bright/Said Hassan/Curtis Aab
Renewal	Science Lab Technology	School of Health Sciences and Community Services	Life Sciences	Isabel Bright/Said Hassan/Curtis Aab
Renewal	Manufacturing Computer Aided Drafting (CAD)	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Mechanical, Manufacturing, and Communications	Mark Blackner/ Shylyte Bloodsworth
Renewal	Precision Metal Machining	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Mechanical, Manufacturing, and Communications	Mark Blackner/ Warren Palmer
Renewal	Manufacturing Technician	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Mechanical, Manufacturing, and Communications	Mark Blackner/ Evan Himelsteinshy
Renewal	Automotive Service Technician	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Transportation Heavy Apprenticeship and Trades	Tom Grant/Cosmin Lazar
Renewal	Heavy Duty Equipment Mechanic	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Transportation Heavy Apprenticeship and Trades	Tom Grant/ Dietrich Schellenberg
Renewal	Outdoor Power Equipment Technician	School of Skilled Trades and Technologies	Transportation Heavy Apprenticeship and Trades	Tom Grant/Dustin Blackwell
New Program	Indigenous Languages	School of Indigenous Education	Indigenous Education	Manoj Nowrang
New Courses	Common Core Communication	School of Education, Arts and Sciences	Math, Sciences and Communication	Wayne Dixon/Kevin Boon/Amanda Le Rougetel

Phase II is being driven once again by a Steering Committee and a Project Team, with the introduction of an additional Academic Team composed of Chairs and specialists. These teams are being managed by Project Manager Sandy Rozecki with support from a Change Management team of Nigel Louis, Angel King and Jacqueline Wood.

With the greater scope in Phase II comes the recognition that communication and engagement are key principles that will contribute to success. No matter what your role, chances are you will be impacted by CBR. I invite you to make sure that you ask lots of questions, discuss the impact on your role with your supervisor, and participate in the process.

Uncertainty and the unknown are a part of any change – and that includes Course Based Registration. While we may not have all of the answers to every question, please don’t let this stop you from asking them.

If you have questions about the changes that CBR may have on you indidividually, or your team, start by asking your manager. You can also contact Sandy Rozecki at (204) 632-3468 or email cbr@rrc.ca.

Phase III Planning

Programs not yet involved in CBR can benefit greatly from following along with Phase II – read the updates on this site, talk to others going through the transition, ask questions, and keep up-to-date on progress and lessons learned. The more you learn along the way, the better prepared you will be to start. With that in mind, we’ll start bringing forward some stories from students, faculty and staff who have experienced Phase I and II to help spread awareness.

Stay tuned and let us know what else you’d like to see in these updates.

CBR Phase I Update: Lessons learned, successes, and next steps

Posted: October 8, 2019

By Christine Watson

Over the past year, four academic programs at Red River College broke ground and switched from a cohort-based registration model to a customized, student-led experience that allowed for greater choice in mapping out their education – known as Course-Based Registration (CBR).

The four Phase I programs – Automotive Technician Certificate, Business Information Technology, Business Technology Management, and Information Security – have all experienced successful transitions and are now continuing with CBR in their new terms, or for shorter programs, preparing to welcome a new group of students.

Here are some early Phase I successes and feedback we’ve received:

• 70% of students successfully registered within first 5 days of registration being opened.
• No complaints about the registration process were received.
• One instance of a fee-related issue was identified and resolved right away for a student
• Some students did not read the instructions on how to self-register. 17 students who had registered incorrectly had their schedules cleared to re-set them, and information was re-sent to emphasis the correct procedures. This quickly resolved all 17 instances, resulting in no delays for students to begin their programs.

Lessons learned: Some of the greatest challenges in implementing Phase I involved tight timelines; early starts and stops while we developed a shared understanding of how we would transition to CBR; and a few challenges with our current systems including Web Advisor.

With CBR, we are “building the bridge as we walk on it” to develop a new process for transitioning programs from current model to CBR. In fact, one of the biggest achievements of Phase I is that we now have a process and template to allow for a seamless transition for programs that will be involved in the next phase of CBR – more on which programs are participating in the next update.

As Phase I sees students through to the completion of their programs, we may uncover additional issues or new lessons learned that can be applied to Phase II and we will continue to monitor closely, and respond to and loop what we learn into further planning.

As the Sponsor of this initiative, I offer my heartfelt gratitude and thanks to all the teams that contributed to the success of Phase I! Stay tuned for another update on Phase II coming shortly.