Searching for colleges or universities can be tough. You are bombarded by ads and worse, spammy emails. How can you cut through all the noise? By choosing a quality university. But how do you do that? Look for a university that is partnering with Quality Matters® (QM).
QM’s mission focuses on one thing, a high quality online education. They work hand in hand with university faculty to promote and improve the quality of online education and student learning nationally and internationally.
What does Quality Matters mean?
Quality Matters (QM) is a quality assurance organization focused on faculty professional development. QM provides a network of professional instructors to help improve and nurture all aspects of online courses. With the speed of the Internet, everything, including education, is constantly evolving, and the QM community is in place to help faculty remain at the forefront of education.
What is QM?
According to the QM website, Quality Matters is a non-profit organization that has staff all around the country. A wide range of people make up the QM team: QM Coordinators, workshop facilitators, peer and master reviewers, program reviewers, conference presenters, and many others. QM’s mission as an international organization is to be recognized as a leader in quality assurance for online education.
What is a QM certification?
QM offers different levels of certifications to college and university faculty who teach online courses. For instructors, these include Peer Review training, and Applying the Quality Matters Rubric (APPQMR). These certifications lead the instructors to getting their courses recognized as Quality Matters courses. All of this is backed by years of research.
The bottom line is a better experience in the online classroom for you, the student.
QM accomplishes their goals by:
- Developing current, research-supported, practice-based quality standards and appropriate evaluation tools and procedures.
- Recognizing expertise in online education quality assurance and evaluation.
- Fostering a culture of continuous improvement by integrating QM standards and processes into organizational plans to improve the quality of online education.
- Providing professional development in the use of rubrics, tools and practices to improve the quality of online education.
- Offering peer review and certification of quality in online education.
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It is hard work completing your degree, and you want prospective employers to value it. So, when you are looking for a college or university, put quality first. Find a university committed to offering you a quality online education. The University of Southern Mississippi has partnered with QM for Quality Matters certification, and faculty are QM certified in APPQMR as well as peer reviewers. If you choose Southern Miss for an online degree, you get the quality you deserve.
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