Mentoring Students in Online Graduate Programs

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Mentoring Students in Online Graduate Programs

• Melissa Engleman,
• Mary Schmidt,
• Jessica Wetherington
• East Carolina University

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What Do You Remember About Your Favorite Mentor?

• Would your university experience as a student
  have been less satisfactory without your mentor?

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A Mentors Influence Can Be Powerful

• Consider these mentors from a galaxy far, far away

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• What Style of Mentoring and Advising Did you
  Receive?

Encouraging and helpful to the point of self
sacrifice?
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• What Style of Mentoring Did you Receive?

Demanding and arrogant, and possibly even
harmful? Direction through intimidation Inabilit
y to get along with other professors and advisors
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• What Style of Mentoring do Students Want?

Balance between optimistic encouragement and
confidence in abilities. Unassuming, but comes
through when needed as a strong advocate.
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• What Style of Mentoring do Students Want?

High expectations Willing to support and assist
students through the hard times and
lessons Stays connected and available to student
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Which has the best chance for leading to student
success?

• When students leave you, will they be confident
  of their ability to address their professional
  goals?
• Whatever the style, students need guidance. They
  need to have individual attention.

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Which has the best chance for leading to student
success?

• How can we meet student needs in a 100 online
  program?
• How do we maintain the reputation of a large
  university with a small college atmosphere?

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Brief History of Our Program

• Students worked through at their own rate -
  piecemeal
• Graduated a handful each year
• Distance Education meant DRIVING.

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Program Growth and Change
Over 250 increase in total number of
students Gradual decrease of face-to-face
graduate students to zero
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Students Need Assistance

• Academic Year 2004-5, we began to see more
  instances where students werent receiving the
  type of guidance through the program that we
  intended.
• Sometimes students needed types of assistance
  that we didnt anticipate
• How could we better address these needs?

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Growth of ECU Special Education Graduate Program
Advising Personnel, Students Served
2001-Present Curriculum and Instruction
Graduate Studies Director (gt 300)
1998-2000 Special Education Graduate Studies
Coordinator (30 - 40)
Prior to 1998 Special Education Department
Chair (10-15)


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Growth of ECU Special Education Graduate Program
Other Changes
Prior to 1998
1998-2000
2001-Present

• Most courses
• face-to-face
• Online courses still experimental

More Students Higher Expectations Program
Requirements Electronic Competency

• All courses online
• All courses on Blackboard
• All contacts electronic
• Shared advisor - 200-300
• students
• Equity issues off-campus

Face-to-Face Time Direct, Individual Advising
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Growth and Change of the Program 1999-2000

• Change in the program, and the population
• Advanced licensure MA Ed
• Could no longer accept students without teaching
  license
• Initial decrease in number of students was
  followed by intensive recruiting
• External funding support became available
• Some courses were offered online

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Growth of ECU Special Education Graduate Program
Advising Personnel, Expectations
2001-Present Curriculum and Instruction
Graduate Studies Director (gt 300)
1998-2000 Special Education Graduate Studies
Coordinator (30 - 40)
Prior to 1998 Special Education Department
Chair (10-15)

• MAEd
• New Program, Require Teaching License
• Tougher Entrance and Graduation Requirements
• All Courses at Advanced Level

• MS Ed
• Undergraduate
• Degree in Some Area
• Could add on License
• Some Introductory Courses

Expectations Requirements
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The New Method and Population 2000-2005

• 100 online MAEd in Special Education first
  cohort began
• Mostly experienced teachers returning for more
  training
• Students from all over the country, and a few
  outside of the US

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Evaluation and Revision of MA Ed, 2004-5

• Some 100 online students are on campus, and seek
  out faculty to help them.

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Evaluation and Revision of MA Ed, 2004-5

• This creates an apparent inequity in the advising
  and mentoring received, according to where
  students live

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How Could We Address This Apparent Inequity?

• An advising and mentoring site would be created
  and maintained for our graduate students.

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What Should Our Mentoring Site Include?

• We would determine the site contents according to
  the needs of our students.
• A simple survey was developed to assess student
  mentoring/advising needs.

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Rationale for Study Our Hypotheses

• Students needed more detailed advising and
  mentoring
• Students needed consistency in information
• We wanted to individualize the advising process
  and make it equivalent to face-to-face programs

Our students were letting us know their needs in
informal ways, asking course instructors for
advice throughout their programs.
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Rationale for Study

• A few faculty seemed to be bearing the burden of
  advising
• Not all faculty were equally knowledgeable about
  program requirements

Some adjunct faculty used off-campus knew almost
nothing about the program requirements.
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Rationale for Study

• Not all faculty were available to advise -
  especially if they didnt teach grad. Level
  courses, or hadnt met students who had gotten
  their undergraduate degrees with ECU.

Some adjunct faculty used off-campus knew almost
nothing about the program requirements.
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Rationale for Study

• Estimates of time intensiveness for faculty of
  delivering online courses altready range between
  25 to 50 increase over face-to-face courses
  (without consideration of any advising time)

This additional burden made teaching online even
more time consuming.
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Students Need Assistance

• Degree Requirements (Portfolio, Research)
• Selection of Add-on Certificates
• Technological Issues
• Using the Library
• Disability Student Services
• Career Planning
• Who to go to if Something Goes Wrong

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Faculty all had various styles of mentoring, and
not all of them gave the same information.Facult
y had differing amounts of time to help students
in this way. Most had very little.
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Confusion Reigned
Information from Other Students
What choices do I need to make?
Electronic Portfolio
Rumors....
Research Project or Thesis?
Which cohort am I in?
HUH?
Information from different faculty
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Basis for the Survey

• Extensive review of the literature on mentoring
  online
• Consideration of our own mentoring styles and
  experiences
• Consideration of the perceived struggles of our
  students

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Method

• The Survey
• Initial group of 38 current and former
• A pilot study
• Would continue over each semester (ongoing)

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Method

• We knew our advising was inadequate thus far, and
  began to design a mentoring and advising
  website for our students.

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We designed our survey to answer several basic
questions

• What information were students getting now, and
  how and when did they receive the information?
• Was it timely?

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Information Categories of Survey Questions

• Was current advising equitable between off and on
  campus students?
• Did off-campus students get information about all
  university services and programs?

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Did online students feel they had an advocate?

• Who could students go to when things went wrong?

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and the most important question

• What did students think was important to include
  on a mentoring web site? What did they think was
  missing?

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Results and Discussion
??

• Did we answer our questions?
• Orjust end up with more questions?

?
?????
?
?
?
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Demographics of the Population

• 22 of our surveys were returned
• Age range 24-50
• Mean age 32
• 82 in between 24 and 39

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Distance from Campus in Miles
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Respondents Distance from Campus Under Over 1
Hour Drive
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Undergraduate Degrees from ECU?

• Roughly 1/2 had done their undergraduate training
  at ECU, so they had some familiarity with
  programs and services.

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Undergraduate Degrees from ECU?

• Sometimes this made them feel more comfortable
  approaching faculty who they already knew.

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First Set of QuestionsTechnology Requirements
of Program

• Equipment
• Competency
• Software
• Connectivity

• Clarity of Information
• Where Got Information
• Timeliness of Information

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What they said about Program Technology
Requirements

• Technical Equipment
• 1/3 understood clearly
• 2/3 understood somewhat
• 17 got information from faculty outside courses
  or their advisor

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Source of Information on the Program
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Clarity of Explanation of Program Design
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Timing of Program Design Explanation
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Understanding of Research Project
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Source of Information on Research Project
(percentages)
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Timing of Research Project Information
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Understanding of Portfolio
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Source of Information on Portfolio In
Percentages
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Timing of Portfolio Information
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Clarity of Explanation of Estimated Program
Completion Time
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Clarity of Sequence of Courses
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Questions We Will Add or Change

• Who is their advisor?
• Who is the Graduate Director?
• Who is the Program Coordinator?
• Were they assigned an advisor, or did they choose
  one?

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Answers to Research Questions

• Were faculty bearing the burden in filling out
  the gaps in advising?
• Was the information being distributed unevenly?

• Yes
• And YES!

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Answers to Research Questions

• Is there need for students to have assigned
  advisors?
• Is there a need for a website dedicated to
  advising and mentoring our graduate students?

• Yes
• Absolutely

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Answers to Research Questions

• Is there a disparity and an inequity in the
  advising and mentoring
• Is there a need for a website dedicated to
  advising and mentoring our graduate students?

• Yes
• Absolutely

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• Before Admission
• Orientation to the Program Length, Requirements
  and Costs
• Comprehensive Orientation of Technology
  Competencies, Equipment and Software Needed
• Invitation to Professional Student Organizations
  (SCEC, ODK, etc..)

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• At Admission
• Thorough, required orientation to the program
  design, rationale courses
• Thorough orientation on roles of various
  administrators
• Thorough orientation AND training in developing
  the electronic portfolio

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• At Admission
• Assignment to an Advisor, who will be their
  faculty advocate and mentor throughout the
  program
• Information about where on the University website
  they can go for various types of help

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• At Admission
• Orientation to the types of services that are
  available to online students (library, bookstore,
  office of disability services, and so on)
• Orientation to the online writing center and
  exactly what they provide

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• At Admission
• Students should be told where to go and who to
  contact for advising.
• There should be a career exploration section to
  the website.

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Recommendations What Do Students Need in A
Mentoring/Advising Website?

• At Admission
• Former students, or students further along in the
  program should be made available, on a volunteer
  basis to newcomers.

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What Do Students Need in A Mentoring/Advising
Website?

• The survey indicated that at least 50 of
  students did not feel fully a part of the campus
  community.
• The website should be friendly, and a place where
  students go to feel part of the community.
• A chat room and phone line (Skype) should be on
  the website.

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What Should be Done Now?

• A mentoring website with all of the mentioned
  components will be made available to students in
  the program
• Faculty will be encouraged to become familiar
  with the site, so that they can just refer
  students there, instead of spending long hours on
  advising.

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What Should be Done Now?

• Conduct ongoing research to determine
• what works and doesnt work, and to
• improve the advising process.