COTO gains supplemental grant
On September 27, 2018, the U.S. Department of Education awarded a one-year $85,000 Strengthening Institutions Program (SIP) grant to College of the Ouachitas (COTO). The new award is a supplement to the $2.24 million Title III grant COTO was awarded in October 2016. The supplemental award is designed to allow the College to expand its current Title III initiative, which is focused on improving COTO’s online courses and student services.

As part of the supplemental grant, COTO’s Honors College will develop a series of online mini-courses focused on two major topics: Civics and American Citizenship, and Financial Literacy and Responsibility. The mini-courses, which are designed to be used individually or collectively, will be available to high school students, post-secondary students enrolled in academic, professional, and vocational programs, and the adult populations served by COTO’s Workforce and Community Education programs

Second cohort appointed, January 2018    

Title III and members of the first cohort present at the Arkansas Community Colleges conference, October 2017

First cohort completes Quality Matters training, August 2017

A proposal by the Title III staff has been selected for presentation at the Instructional Technology Council’s eLearning conference to be held in February in Las Vegas, Nev.

Along with Melissa Poole, Director of Quality Assurance for Quality Matters (QM), the group will present “The Critical Role of Faculty Development in Online Course Design.” Faculty training in QM standards is the basis of COTO’s Title III course revision initiative.