Online Service Standards

ITHEA offers a range of courses that can be delivered partly or wholly online. ITHEA is committed to providing a quality learning experience for students studying online and these online service standards explain our commitment to students in key areas. ITHEA’s online service standards are focused on providing online learners all the support they require to gain a positive outcome, better job prospects and a pleasant experience.

Online Learner Support

ITHEA has policies and procedures to determine the support needs of the individual learners and to provide access to the educational and support services necessary for individual learners to meet the requirements of the training product. ITHEA will provide the following support to students studying any aspect of their course online.

Outline

The Student Manager is responsible for the implementation of this procedure and to ensure that staff are aware of its application and implement its requirements
Prior to their enrolment or commencement (whichever is the earliest), ITHEA will identify any support that individual learners will or may need to successfully complete their training.
Identify particular requirements such as literacy, numeracy, English language levels (LLN), physical capabilities and computer literacy (where applicable) of learners needed to complete each course.
Where gaps are identified, develop strategies to make the support available.
To provide access to that support throughout the learner’s training; either through ITHEA’s internal resources or appropriate external third parties.
To outline in all pre-enrolment and marketing information any requirements needed by learners to complete the course and state any additional cost to the learner associated with additional support. To describe any limitations on support that may be available by ITHEA or third parties recommended by them.
An assessor who is qualified in the unit of competency TAELLN411 or equivalent will undertake the review of learner’s language and numeracy skills.

Student Entry Requirements and Induction

ITHEA conducts a comprehensive Pre-Training Review for all prospective students to determine whether a course is suitable and appropriate for their individual needs. As part of the Pre-Training Review, we will include an assessment of your level of digital literacy, by:

Completing the online Application Form
Completing Pre-Training Review online
LLN is then assessed by trainers, and outcomes are awarded based on ISLPR levels.
LLN outcomes are then discussed with the prospective students, alongside the reasons of enrolling in the course.
Based on the information gathered through the process, ITHEA Administration Staff / Trainer / Assessor make recommendations about whether the course is suitable for the student or if the student needs additional support in order to complete the course.
Students with low LLN outcomes may be recommended to enrol in an EAL course to bring ISLPR levels to an acceptable level for the enrolment.
As part of the process, ITHEA Administration Staff / Trainer / Assessor then categorise the student’s learner outcome at the end of the course from the following categories:

a) Enable the student to obtain the required skills to make them job ready?

b) Assist the student to undertake further education?

c) Promote or enable access to training for disadvantaged learner?

Educational and support services may include, but are not limited to:

pre-enrolment materials
study support and study skills programs
language, literacy and numeracy (LLN) programs or referrals to these programs
equipment, resources and/or programs to increase access for learners with disabilities and other learners in accordance with access and equity
learning resource centres
mediation services or referrals to these services
flexible scheduling and delivery of training and assessment
counselling services or referrals to these services
information and communications technology (ICT) support
learning materials in alternative formats, for example, in large print
learning and assessment programs contextualised to the workplace
any other services that ITHEA considers necessary to support learners to achieve competency.

Online – Trainers/Assessors

ITHEA Online Trainers / Assessors will be available for queries about learning and assessment by

Phone Monday to Friday 9am – 5pm (excluding public holidays)
Email Monday to Friday 9am – 5pm (excluding public holidays)
And through the online learning platform. This will depend on individual Trainer’s availability and should be discussed between student and trainer. This support will be available for the duration of the course.

ITHEA Online Trainers /Assessors will reply to queries within 48 hours and assessment will be returned within 7 days. There will be a maximum of 60 On-line students to each trainer/assessor for each course.

Online Platform

ITHEA uses Catapult eLearning and the myecc Learning Management Systems (LMS) for online course delivery.

The following are the minimum information technology requirements to enable optimal access to the LMS:

A Microsoft Windows 8 or 10 computer or Mac OSX computer that can connect to the Internet with a Web Browser. Content is web based and is available on hand held devices as well.

Browsers and Software Requirements

Chrome 71 or better
Internet Explorer 11 or better
Edge 18 or better
Firefox 64 or better
Safari 12 or better

Other software users will require for full functionality of the system:

The latest Flash Player
A PDF reader – Adobe Acrobat recommended

Online Learning Materials

ITHEA ensures that learning materials used in online training are interactive and are presented in a simple to use format. Online course content could include:

Orderly content
Audio content
Video content
Interactive assessment
Discussion forums
Downloadable PDF’s

Student Engagement

ITHEA provides an online learning experience that is engaging and interactive. We will monitor your participation and ensure that you continue to progress throughout your course. The LMS Platforms have collaborative learning opportunities so that you can interact with peers through discussion forums. Detailed feedback will be provided as you complete online tasks The Trainer/Assessor will contact students who have not logged on within 2 months of the course commencement date. The Trainer/Assessor will make 3 attempts to contact students to re-engage with their course. Those that do not re-engage after 3 attempts by the Trainer/Assessor to contact will be deemed to have withdrawn from the course.

Administrative support

ITHEA administration staff will be available for queries by phone and email between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday to Friday (excluding public holidays)
ITHEA Online students will have access to the same support services as on campus students.

IT Support for technical queries

ITHEA IT support is available through ITHEA administrator team. Students can call 03 – 9650 3900 Monday to Friday 9am – 5pm (excluding public holidays). Students can email at elearning@ithea.edu.au
ITHEA Administrative staff will be able to elevate student technical issues directly to developers. Developer support is available 9:00am to 5:00pm Monday to Friday.

Support Service

Student Manager and Trainers/Assessors are available by appointment between 9:00am and 5:00pm Monday to Friday (excluding public holidays)
Please refer to Support learners [Standard 1 – Clause 1.7] on ITHEA website www.ithea.edu.au/student-information/policies/

Scheduled Maintenance

From time to time

There may be an organised scheduled maintenance of each LMS. Where possible, students will be notified ahead of time.
There may be a need to perform emergency maintenance without prior notification. This may be required to protect and/or maintain the integrity of the service.

Storage And Backup Of Information
Maintaining the integrity of our data is paramount. Our data is backed up daily and we are confident that should there be a fatal error in the system we will be able to retrieve all associated data.