This article explores the changing nature of P-12 distance education, from its traditional roots of rural and remote students to urban students seeking an alternative to conventional school. The present study examined distance education in the Australian context, focusing on Queensland, through a semistructured survey of parents (n = 43) across…

A descriptive qualitative design explored how graduate students in a master of public health program perceive the advantages and disadvantages of online learning communities and identified factors promoting graduation success. Zoom video and audio interview recordings from 12 participants were analyzed using Braun and Clarke's (2012) six-step…

This quantitative study aimed at investigating various barriers that hindered the diffusion of learning management systems (LMSs) as perceived by teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) or English as a second language (ESL) teachers in the states of Alabama and Mississippi. A nonprobabilistic purposeful sampling was used in the…

This paper describes a case study of one large asynchronous college-level organizational psychology class taught during COVID-19, in which a major intent was to develop virtual teamwork skills in students. A literature review yielded four challenges of virtual teams in higher education--communication, trust, connection and social bonding, and…

This multicase study describes the unique experiences of online instructors within a novel context of grant-funded online course design assistance in a large Midwestern university. Five instructors reflected on their experience, from conception to implementation of their asynchronous online courses, in individual debrief sessions conducted by the…

Student perception of class size remains a consideration in the online setting. This study explored graduate student perceptions of class size and impact on instructor effectiveness and student engagement. Data was gathered via a web-based survey with a sample of online graduate students. Respondents noted 20 or 25 students as the point that…

Instructional designers at a medium-sized, public, comprehensive university in the Midwest investigated student perceptions of online course design elements in terms of whether they experienced the elements and the importance they placed on those elements to address the issues of inconsistent gathering of student evaluation feedback in online…

As online courses and degree program offerings at colleges and universities continue to grow, further exploration of the unique characteristics of distance education faculty is warranted. For example, research suggests faculty job satisfaction can impact the overall quality of online courses (Bolliger & Martindale, 2004; Bolliger et al.,…

Many instructors in higher education aspire to use the course evaluation experience as an opportunity to reflect on and improve the teaching and learning process. Online courses' low evaluation response rates and the limitations of traditional course evaluations make that difficult. Student completion of a reflective course evaluation may address…

This interview study offers educators practical tips on using tools to improve online learning experiences. Eleven instructors, professors, and instructional designers were interviewed about the challenges they faced designing and teaching online university courses in Florida. This study aimed to explore how educators and instructional designers…

The COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted most aspects of daily life and higher education has not been spared. Social distancing requirements meant that at some point, educational institutions had to transition to remote teaching. This shift enabled classes to continue running both synchronously and asynchronously. A state university in the…

Although previous research has identified undergraduate student motivations for selecting online courses over face-to-face courses, this work tended to examine students as a single group. The current research presents survey results of business school students demonstrating that these motivations differ significantly by classification. Freshman…

Virtual teams are increasingly being utilized by organizations to connect employees across geographical boundaries and promote collaboration through communication technologies. The COVID-19 pandemic forced organizations to shift their employees to hybrid and remote settings. However, little is known about the use of virtual teams in educational…

This research brief comprises three articles published in the three-article dissertation at the University of Missouri (MU) in February 2023. The three-article dissertation, "An Exploration of Online Information Spaces That Support Instructional Design and Teacher Professional Development," examined three online communities of practice…

An uptick in online enrollments at higher institutions in recent years serves as the driving force behind an increase in the number of science courses available online. The shift to online science courses introduced a new laboratory environment vastly different from the traditional laboratory, giving rise to doubts on how safe these nontraditional…