eLearning Research in the US: Challenges

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eLearning Research in the US Challenges
Opportunities

• Dr. Melody Thompson
• American Center for the Study of Distance
  Education Pennsylvania State University
• WUN eLearning Seminar Series
• Researching Dialogue Communities of Enquiry
• in eLearning in HE
• April 15, 2005

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Background

• Presentation grows out of earlier discussions at
  WUN meetings in Orlando, Florida
• Research needs/agenda identified based on the
  literature and discussions with faculty,
  students, and administrators engaged in eLearning
• Examples of current situation drawn from three
  research dissemination venues 2004 Distance
  Teaching Learning Conference, 2004 Sloan-C
  Summer Invitational Research Workshop, and The
  American Journal of Distance Education.

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Overview of Presentation

• A developing eLearning research agenda
• General characteristics of eLearning practice and
  research in the US
• Characteristics of the three eLearning
  communities
• Research in the three communities
• Challenges and opportunities

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A Developing eLearning Research Agenda

• Institutional Policy and Management
• Finance/Business Plans
• Competition and Cooperation External and
  Internal
• Faculty Policies and Support
• Quality Assurance

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A Developing Research Agenda

• The Faculty Experience/Pedagogy
• Changing Faculty Roles
• Unbundling of roles or
• New focus on design and development
• Engagement or encagement?
• New teaching skills and tools
• Faculty resistance to participation
• Barriers
• Lack of incentives
• Administrative responses

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A Developing Research Agenda

• Student Experience/Student Outcomes
• Meaning measurement of student needs and
  satisfaction
• Design support factors that enhance
  satisfaction and outcomes
• Role impact of interaction and community
• Experiences of adult vs. traditional-aged
  students
• Retention What is it? How do we foster it?
• Relationship between faculty experience student
  experience

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A Developing Research Agenda

• Context Ethics
• Contextual issues
• Institutional
• Social
• Global
• Access/Inclusion
• Extending vs. enhancing
• Integrity
• Institutional
• Student
• Faculty
• Researcher

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eLearning Practice and Research in the US

• Distance education as a marginalized activity
• eLearning as a transformative or disruptive
  innovation
• Paradigm shift vs. extension of earlier distance
  education approaches
• Program descriptions/evaluations, how to
  papers, and best practices dominate the
  literature

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Characteristics of the 3 Communities

• Annual Distance Teaching Learning Conference
• Pioneers in distance education
• Established for scholarly study of DE based in
  theory and research
• From opportunities for collegial exchange in a
  marginalized field to over 1000 participants and
  150 paper sessions.

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Characteristics of the 3 Communities

• Sloan-C Summer Research Workshop
• Representatives of Sloan Foundation grantee
  institutions
• The new wave of e-educators
• Focus on what works to promote access and ensure
  quality in content, process, and outcomes

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Characteristics of the 3 Communities

• The American Journal of Distance Education
• Peer-reviewed, research-based articles on all
  forms of distance education in the Americas
• Mix of/transition from old-timers to new wave

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Research in the 3 Communities

• Topics Classified on the basis of categories in
  the proposed research agenda
• Methods Classified on the basis of a
  modification of the system proposed by Lee,
  Driscoll, and Nelson (2004)
• Experimental/quasi-experimental research
• Field research (case studies, ethnography,
  grounded theory)
• Evaluation research
• Developmental research
• Survey research
• Mixed-method research
• Meta-analytic research

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Research in 3 Communities

• Distance Teaching Learning Conference
• 17/77 papers represent eLearning research
• Institutional policy/management - 1
• Survey research (1)
• Faculty experience/pedagogy - 7
• Developmental research (4) Evaluation research
  (1) Experimental/quasi-experimental research (2)
• Student experience/outcomes - 6
• Developmental (2) evaluation (1) field (1)
  mixed method (1) meta-analysis (1)
• Context ethics - 3
• Survey (1) developmental (1) field (1)

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Research in 3 Communities

• Sloan-C Summer Research Workshop Invited papers
  on topics of current interest to the Sloan
  Foundation
• 5/10 represent research
• Institutional policy/management - 3
• Evaluation research (1) field research (2)
• Faculty experience/pedagogy - 1
• Evaluation research (1)
• Student experience/outcomes -1
• Mixed method research (1)

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Research in 3 Communities

• The American Journal of Distance Education
• 10/12 main articles focus partly or completely on
  eLearning research studies
• Institutional policy/mgmt. - 1
• Survey research (1)
• Faculty experience/pedagogy - 3
• Evaluation research (1) field research (1)
  survey research (1)
• Student experience/outcomes - 5
• Quasi-experimental research (1) survey research
  (2) field research (1) mixed methods research
  (1)
• Research on research
• Mixed-methods research (1)

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Trends

• Faculty student issues are most researched,
  1112/32, respectively
• 7/32 studies focused on role of interaction,
  dialogue, and community
• Institutional policy and context/ethics have
  received little attention
• Variety of research methods represented with
  developmental, field, and survey predominating

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Challenges

• Philosophical/Axiological
• Epistemological
• Methodological

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Philosophical Axiological Challenges

• Research begins within particular philosophical
  frameworks
• These suggest the ultimate purposes and goals of
  education, eLearning, and eLearning research
• Individual growth
• Development of human resources
• Addressing structural inequalities of higher
  education
• Clarity is essential how important is agreement?

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Epistemological Challenges

• What counts as knowledge?
• Unfortunately, it is often the case that those
  who work within one theoretical framework find
  others unintelligible. (St. Pierre, 2002)
• Unprecedented federal legislation exalts
  scientific evidence as the key driver of
  education policy and practice. (Feuer, Towne,
  Shavelson, 2002)
• Who decides?
• adherence to scientifically-based research will
  be a critical factor in federalfunding
  decisions. (Beghetto, 2003)
• what is appropriate is to mandateprocesses to
  ensure research quality, such as rigorous peer
  review panels. (Pellegrino Goldman, 2002)

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Methodological Challenges

• Matching methods to questions and context
• The question drives the method, not the other
  way around. (Feuer, Towne, Shavelson, 2002)
• Educational research forces us to to deal with
  particular problems, where local knowledge is
  needed. Therefore, ethnographic research is
  crucial, as are case studies, survey research,
  time series, design experiments action research,
  and other means. (Berliner, 2002)
• In the rush to emphasize generalized causal
  inferencesthe developers of the WWC standards
  end up endorsing a single research method to the
  exclusion of others. (Chatterji, 2002)
• qualitative research is more than merely
  allowable it is essential if causal analysis is
  to succeed. (Erickson Gutierrez, 2002)

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Opportunities

• Under-researched topic areas
• Institutional management policy changes
  necessary to integrate eLearning quality
  assurance
• Faculty experience barriers institutional
  responses
• Student experience How? Why? Relation to
  interaction and community relationship to
  faculty experience
• Context ethical issues relevance of eLearning
  to larger contextual problems integrity of
  research and researchers
• Inter-disciplinary research
• International collaborations