Regular and Substantive Interaction, abbreviated as RSI, is a defining concept in distance education. RSI is a determining factor in whether courses are considered “distance” or “correspondence,” which directly impacts a college’s accreditation status and its ability to accept federal student financial aid and grant money.
With the federal government’s recent sharpening of the definition of RSI and enforcement of RSI in college courses, Online Learning wants to make sure all MHCC faculty understand what RSI is and how it can be included in every course.
What is RSI?
The concept of “regular and substantive interaction” has been around for some time, but was clarified in regulations that went into effect in 2021. Curious?Read more about the pre-2021 history.
Loosely, RSI is the concept that teachers must initiate meaningful learning interactions among students on a scheduled basis in order to ensure active participation in their course. The following five conditions that must be met for interactions to qualify as RSI (quoted fromOSCQR SUNY Online):
An emphasis on regular and substantive interaction is entirely consistent with well-documented research-based effective practices in online course design and delivery. In online teaching and learning environments of any kind, (asynchronous, synchronous, blended/hybrid), regular and substantive interactions must:
Be with an instructor as defined by the institution’s accreditor.
Be initiated by the instructor.
Be scheduled and predictable.
Be academic in nature and relevant to the course.
Substantive interaction assumes direct interaction between the learner and the instructor and requires direct instruction from the instructor including:
Assessing or providingfeedback on a student’s coursework.
Providing information or responding to questions about the content of a course.
Facilitating a group discussion regarding the content of a course or competency.
Other instructional activities approved by the institution’s or program’s accrediting agency.
Why is RSI Important?
Aside from being a valuable strategy in teaching and learning, the inclusion of RSI is also important to the college, as its presence is a federal requirement to make schools eligible for accreditation and to be able to accept financial aid funds.
The federal government has determined that schools offering “correspondence courses” should not be eligible for financial aid. The presence of RSI is examined to demonstrate a school’s “distance education” courses are not “correspondence courses.”
Online Learning provides MHCC faculty with resources regarding RSI, as well as individual guidance and training sessions, including at scheduled events throughout the year offered by the Teaching and Learning Center.
As with all online learning topics, you can contact any of the instructional designers in Online Learning to chat or set up a meeting for a deeper dive to implement RSI in your course.
Practical Examples of RSI
What does RSI look like in an online course?
As intimidating as a federal regulation may sound, it is not difficult to include RSI in your course. Most online courses at MHCC already have some degree of RSI built in. Many courses have a framework in place that already leans into RSI, but may need some fine-tuning to make sure the planned interactions meet the parameters necessary to satisfy the RSI requirement.
For a helpful infographic that broadly delineates between the types of activities that do and do not meet RSI requirements, see the RSI Dashboard developed by SUNY.
To get an idea of the ways RSI can be woven throughout a class, see this outline of suggested RSI examples prepared by our in-state neighbor Blue Mountain Community College. BMCC's list has been borrowed by schools across the country as it is one of the first formal, public documents of its kind.
Two great resources that can apply the concept of RSI to your online course were pioneered by State University of New York (SUNY) in their Online Course Quality Review rubric (OSCQR, pronounced "Oscar") and Blue Mountain Community College of Oregon (BMCC).
When visiting the pages below, please be mindful that different institutions have different contexts, which can include different course modalities, among other things.
SUNY OSCQR
SUNY's OSCQR rubric includes several RSI Standards. Each standard on their list is a hyperlink to a page that explains the standard in depth and gives suggestions and real-world practical examples of how the standard can be applied in an online course.
BMCC RSI Examples
BMCC underwent a Title IV review in 2017. One recommendation given by the Federal Title IV Review was that, "Office of Instruction will conduct audits of online courses to determine the level and quality of Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) between instructors and their students."
Additionally, Online Learning has prepared a table indicating which of the OSCQR RSI standards is addressed by our course templates. Open the table by clicking the buttom below.
OSCQR RSI Standards in OL Templates
This page offers a way for faculty to gauge the presence of RSI elements in their Blackboard courses.
The tables below are populated with descriptions of RSI Standards from SUNY's OSCQR.
The first column in each table specifies the standard number;
the second column includes the text of the standard, linked to the OSCQR page which details that standard;
while the final column indicates whether this standard is included/addressed in the Online Learning course templates.
In the case that a standard is not addressed by the language of an OL template (or if the language has been edited or removed), the instructor will need to add language and/or activities to the course to meet the standard.
Addressed by OL templates To be Developed by Instructor
RSI Tools and Resources
This page includes a few curated tools and resources. Please remember that any sites from other schools may include information that is specific to their institutional context.
Useful Resources
Below are a few college sites that have clear explanations of RSI. Please keep in mind that other schools' pages may refer to different LMSs, their respective school or department policies, and so on. These are offered only for their information about RSI.
A good overview of RSI and an alternative infographic (similar to the RSI Dashboard form SUNY, above) is provided by The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley's Center for Online Learning and Teaching Technology. (You may notice this page links to an adopted version of BMCC's RSI examples, noted above).
While the OSCQR and BMCC standards can help you you assess how much RSI is in your course, Online Learning is working on tools to help with planning your RSI as you plan your course. Since RSI is woven throughout a course -- announcements, discussions, office hours, assignment feedback, etc. -- we aim to develop visual organizers and similar tools to help instructors map RSI as an integrated element of your course.
Course Map with RSI Indicators
Online Learning provides a Course Map tool for faculty to use when planning the content of a new online course. This tool has been adapted to included indicators for RSI. The course map is provided as a 365 Excel document. One issue with adding more columns to the course map is that the document becomes very wide. To reduce the "sprawl," a second version of the tool was developed with student activities only (no columns for instructional materials).
These tools are a work-in-progress. If you have suggestions or comments, please email Eric Prochaska in Online Learning.
OL is working on an updated version of a feedback plan document to help instructors incorporate RSI in their feedback plan.
More to Come...
OL is exploring more ideas, including a simple weekly schedule table to clearly chart RSI patterns throughout the term. Watch this space and upcoming trainings on RSI for updates.
