What do they really like? An investigation of students' perceptions of their coursework in a fully online educational technology program

Abstract

The higher education market space has become increasingly competitive during the past few years. For instance, there are now hundreds of fully online master’s programs in educational technology. Given this increased competition, it is more important than ever for those working in graduate education to understand what students, and specifically those who have graduated from their program, like and dislike about their coursework. We constructed a survey using Rovai’s Classroom Community Scale (CCS) and some additional questions about the easiest, most difficult, and favourite courses to investigate what graduates thought about the coursework of the program they just completed. Results suggest that students in the program prefer courses with practical content, continuous interactions, and hands-on projects; and they dislike courses that are too theoretical. We conclude with implications for practice and additional research.