RSI: Regular and Substantive Interaction
- Teaching Strategies
Last modified: February 13, 2026
RSI is an important component of online classes and a federal requirement
What is RSI?
Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) is what distinguishes an online course from a correspondence course, and it is a US Department of Education (DoE) requirement for institutions receiving federal financial aid. If an institution is found to be out of compliance during a DoE financial aid program review, institutions may be required to repay financial aid associated with online classes not meeting RSI requirements.
Online classes that have a synchronous meeting time have an easier time meeting the requirements for RSI because the instructor is providing direct, live instruction, and students have the opportunity to ask questions and get feedback during the class meeting time. Instructors teaching asynchronous online classes, however, need to ensure that they are building RSI into their course design. An asynchronous course where students are using an online textbook with activities that are automatically graded with little to no instructor feedback may be in danger of being considered a correspondence course in the eyes of the DoE.
Below are examples and recommendations for how to incorporate or increase RSI in your online course:
Examples of RSI
In order to be considered regular interaction:
- It must be scheduled and predictable
- It should occur regularly throughout the semester (at least once a week)
- It can include monitoring of student progress and engagement in the course and proactively reaching out to students as needed or at a student's request
Ways to incorporate regular interaction:
- Have regularly scheduled office hours
- Send out announcements at a regular and predictable time each week
- Have consistent discussion or interactive activities (like social annotation assignments)
- Use the monitoring tools in Blackboard to keep up with student progress:
- Turn on Progress Tracking in your Course Settings
- Use the Analytics section to check student engagement and set up alerts
- Run Course Reports (in the Analytics section)
- Use the Messages section to connect with students about their progress
- Use EAB tools (email, text, alerts) to reach out to students who are not engaged or who are doing poorly
- For example, reach out to students who haven't been on the course site in the first few days or who are not turning in assignments
According to the regulations, instructors teaching online classes need to ensure that at least two out of the following five substantive activities occur in the course:
- Provide direct instruction (this applies to live, synchronous course sessions only - recorded lectures for asynchronous classes do NOT count)
- Assess or provide feedback on student work (auto-graded assessments DO NOT count toward meeting this standard)
- Provide information or respond to questions about course content (regularly scheduled office hours DO meet this standard - even if students do not take advantage of office hours)
- Facilitate a group discussion regarding course content (asynchronous discussions DO meet this standard)
- Other instructional activities approved by the institution's or program's accrediting agency (NWCCU does NOT have any approved activities, but program-specific accrediting agencies may)
Ways to incorporate or increase substantive interaction:
- Provide personalized comments and feedback on individual student's work - these can be text feedback through the Blackboard grading system, video feedback, email, or another medium
- Include regular announcements that are content-focused (not just reminders about deadlines)
- Engage students in group work that is moderated by the instructor
- Have online discussions that are moderated by the instructor
- For example, respond to each student in a content-focused discussion
- Add a course Q&A forum, and respond to posts in a timely manner
- Incorporate social annotation activities that are moderated by the instructor
- Include a mid-term survey for students, and then review results, make reasonable changes, and report back to the students
In order to be considered instructor-led, the interaction must be initiated by the instructor, not prompted by the request of a student. The interaction cannot be optional. Interactions must also be timely and proactive.
Ways to incorporate or increase instructor-led interaction:
- Set up regular office hours and remind students of them
- Create learning activities to go along with recorded lectures and participate in them to clear up student misconceptions
- Hold review or study sessions or work sessions where students can receive feedback (can be asynchronous)
- Keep up with student progress and reach out to students who are falling behind or aren't being successful on assessments
- Include a mid-term survey for students, and then review results, make reasonable changes, and report back to the students
What does NOT constitute RSI
The following is a list of things that do NOT count toward RSI requirements:
- Pre-recorded video lectures NOT associated with a substantive, instructor-led activity
- Video feedback on an assignment or an interactive activity with pre-recorded video (like VoiceThread) DOES count, but just posting video lectures for students to watch does NOT count
- Only offering student-solicited office hours (no regularly scheduled times)
- Offering only live webinar-style meetings with no opportunity for student interaction
- Automatically-graded quizzes or other assessments
- No personalized feedback on any assignments - comments like "good job" or "needs improvement" do not count as personalized
- Having discussion board activities that are not moderated by the instructor (with interaction from the instructor)
- Only posting announcements 2 or 3 times a semester
- Announcements that are only focused on due dates or policies
Sample Syllabus Statements
Your syllabus should clearly indicate how you will provide regular and substantive interaction. The examples below are starting points. Please feel free to edit them to best reflect your course content and use of RSI.
For Synchronous / Hybrid Classes (sample)
This course has (#) live, synchronous class meetings where you will receive direct instruction and have the opportunity to collaborate with your peers. I will also substantively interact with you through [weekly scheduled office / student support hours, class discussion boards, regular individual feedback on assignments and/or projects, announcements that provide course content and/or feedback, guided group projects, etc.]
For Asynchronous Classes (sample)
This course is fully asynchronous and has no set meeting times. It is not self-paced, and you will have regularly scheduled course activities and due dates. I will substantively interact with you through [weekly scheduled office / student support hours, class discussion boards, individual feedback on assignments and/or projects, announcements that provide course content and/or feedback, guided group projects, etc.]