Examining the Preferences of Online Business Course Students

Abstract

There were three purposes to this study; (a) ascertain why students chose to enroll in online courses and the number taken to date in their academic careers in the College of Business at a regional University, (b) determine the preferences of 300 and 400 level course participants regarding online interaction, feedback, and course design, and (c) find out participants’ specific complaints about faculty members’ practices and elicit recommendations for course design improvements. Results from the study indicated; (a) the average number of online courses taken by course participants was 8.5; (b) course participants: valued interaction with faculty, appreciated supplemental course materials (e.g., videos, web links, etc.), did not expect an online class to be similar to a face-to-face class, were nearly equally split regarding the value of graded discussions, valued simplicity of course design, content and amount of interaction in online courses, and did not value audio feedback on written assignments. Finally, replies to two qualitative questions regarding course improvements and things that aggravated online students indicated that, while there were statistically significant differences between 300 and 400 level participants’ online course expectations both groups point to the need for faculty improvements in terms of course design and instructional methodology. Four recommendations were made for future research and implementation.