Preference of Students' Response and Outcomes of Distance Education Course Evaluation.

Overview & Synopsis

A Web-based survey examined student rankings of teacher-student and student-technology interactions in distance education courses. Respondents were 61 students taking undergraduate or graduate distance education courses in special education at a Carnegie Research I university. Five instructors taught these courses. Three were full-time faculty members who had used an interactive teleconferencing system before, but two were new to the Internet-delivered interactive teleconferencing system used for these courses. Two instructors who co-taught a course were first-time instructors in a higher education setting, were adjunct faculty, and were new to distance education. Concerning how effectively instructors used the technology delivery system, the instructor with the most experience received the highest student ratings, followed by the two other instructors with prior distance education experience. The two instructors with the least amount of distance education experience received the lowest ratings. This pattern was repeated on other questions concerning teacher-student interactions. A majority of students found the course Web site useful, but again the instructor with the most distance education experience received the highest ratings. Most students strongly agreed that the course Web site was easy to use. However, the class having the students with the least experience in distance education received lower rankings on this question. (TD)