By Jan Kempster

I’ve taught online courses for eleven years in higher education using various learning management systems.  Generally, I’ve found my college students to be willing and curious participants.  During the past two years, I entered the realm of training higher education faculty members to be online instructors.  These faculty-turned- online students are not always so willing or curious.  As I prepare to teach another round of faculty training courses this spring, I find myself reflecting on the reasons why some faculty resist  the online learning/teaching trend.

My sense is that some higher education faculty members simply fear the unknown.  The world of teaching technology is advancing faster than most of us can keep up with it.  Educators who did not start out using learning technologies may feel unskilled and under-prepared to manage the technology. Does the fear of feeling unskilled lead to resistance toward online learning?

When I first began teaching online in 1998, faculty at my then institution believed online courses were of lesser quality than face-to-face courses.  Entire departments refused to convert courses to the online environment. In 1998, little research existed about the outcomes of online learning.  Today, there is evidence to suggest quality online courses offer different, but equally valuable benefits to the student as in-person courses.  Despite the evidence, is there still a belief in the myth or stereotype of online course being of lesser quality?  Or, is it that institutions offering substandard online courses create a reputation for online courses that clouds the overall vision of them? 

The popularity of online courses and degree programs drives adminstrations to expand their offerings.  Sometimes the expansion efforts take advantage of faculty by failing to recognize the level of effort and skill required to teach online.  Administrators who lack experience developing courses and teaching online sometimes make the assumption that teaching online is ‘easier’ than teaching in-person courses.  However, those of us in the profession know this is a false assumption.  Fair compensation for teaching online and the availability of quality training courses have been slow to come about in higher education.  Do these factors promote resistance among higher education faculty? 

Whether we embrace it or resist it, the online learning trend has firm footing in higher education today.  Businesses are also utilizing learning management systems to promote products, services, and information.  My goal this spring is to reach out to my resisters in ways that invite them to examine the many positive outcomes and aspects to online learing in higher education and beyond.

Tags: higher education, online education, online learning, teacher training

This entry was posted on Friday, March 20th, 2009 at 11:47 am and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.