We hear it over and over:
“I teach lots of courses, sections and students – among all the other things I have to do. Don’t show me three complex graphs and five bewildering charts and expect that I’ll decipher what’s going on. I need to know what I can be doing right now to improve results!”
That’s where Junction Insight comes into play. Oh, that isn’t to say we’ve abandoned charts and graphs entirely (don’t worry data hounds!). Instead, it’s a focus on surfacing the right information at the right time to the right audience. Sounds simple in theory, but if you’ve ever tried to review reports coming from a learning management system (LMS), student information system (SIS) or other teaching and learning system you’ll know it’s a bit more complicated to execute.
Let’s start with the Faculty Insight Center, this is the new front door to Junction for anyone teaching a Junction course.
One of the first things you may notice is the Learning Gauge at the top left-hand corner. At a quick glance, this shows an instructor how well their students are tracking toward completing their course. Next, the engagement indicator identifies disengaged students who need a push to get back to work, struggling students who need help with the material, and engaged students who could use positive reinforcement and potential enrichment. Better yet, Junction Beacon automates many of those messages so instructors can spend less time sifting data and crafting messages and more time on driving student learning.
In the center columns you’ll find a handful of metrics ranging from logins and time spent to assignment submissions (and missed submissions) to discussion board participation and early alert warning messages sent to students from Junction Beacon. Most tiles also have a simple up/down tick indicating changes in the metric from lesson to lesson so you can quickly tell if your students are becoming more engaged and performing at a higher level without having to pore through endless streams of data. Want to probe a bit further? Click on any tile and get a detailed view, by student, without having to leave the Faculty Insight Center.
If you’ve taught blended, hybrid or fully online courses you’ve probably struggled managing assignment open and close dates. Those days are thankfully over as you can manage assignment due dates, times, attempts and more from within the Insight Center. Change graded assignments to practice, revise the maximum number of submissions, toggle from untimed to timed, and even decide when students should see their scores and feedback. We understand that making things easier saves instructors time – and there is never enough of that!
This quick peek just scratches the surface on what you can do with Junction Insight. Current Junction adopters will be automatically upgraded to Junction Insight, at no charge, in the weeks ahead. New adopters will have the opportunity to test drive Junction Insight, and provide feedback, beginning with their summer courses.
Big data in education doesn’t have to be difficult, but it should be insightful. Drop us a line to learn more or to arrange a demo.
