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The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is an agency within the U.S. Department of Transportation that supports state and local governments in the design, construction, and maintenance of the Nation’s highway system (Federal Aid Highway Program) and various federal and tribal owned lands (Federal Lands Highway Program). Through financial and technical assistance to state and local governments, the Federal Highway Administration is responsible for ensuring that America’s roads and highways continue to be among the safest and most technologically sound in the world.

In 2014, FHWA Operations Discipline instituted a distance virtual learning approach for the continued professional development of all staff members. The training had to reach thousands of participants at regional offices across the U.S. without requiring travel to attend. After hosting a series of 2-hour webinars, FHWA saw decreasing participation rates and created an innovative, “flipped-classroom” approach with their Corridor Management Approach to Operations training course.

To meet this need, FHWA's flipped classroom approach allowed participants to watch short videos (less than 10 minutes each) and participate in scenario-based online discussions. Participants then joined live online webinar sessions to discuss what they had learned, as well as their on-the-job experience of the subject matter, with experts and colleagues from across the country. This rhythm of self-study, group-based online discussion and live, facilitated online dialogue occurred over the course of three consecutive weeks.

The course was built and delivered with an agile learning approach, developing learning outlines, validating them with key government stakeholders and building prototypes of content before launching the final version to course participants.

Based on both formative and summative evaluation results, participants provided the following feedback:

• 94% said “the instructors were effective in conveying course information.
• 83% said there was enough interaction to keep me engaged throughout the course.
• 87% said the content will be valuable in helping me to implement Corridor Management in my division.

In addition to the weekly polls, participants were asked to provide summative feedback in a final course evaluation within one week of course completion. This evaluation was developed to measure each respondents overall learning experience:

• 85% said the live webinars were effective or highly effective
• 85% said the online discussions were effective or highly effective.

With the success of this pilot project, key stakeholders and senior leaders in the Operations Discipline elected to replicate this flipped classroom by expanding it to 20-plus disciplines at the agency. Without question, this combination of engaging, self-paced, social learning online is having a clear and sustain-able impact on FHWA’s approach to training.