Instructor and student perceptions of online student engagement strategies

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this article is to report findings pertaining to faculty members’ perception of the importance of engagement strategies utilized in the online learning environment and to compare them with student perception data that had been previously collected using the same instrument. A validated survey instrument, the online engagement strategies questionnaire, was used to collect data from online instructors who teach in higher education. Email distribution lists of two professional associations were utilized to collect the data. A total of 161 online instructors responded. While instructors and students agreed on the importance of several engagement strategies, results also show that instructors perceive engagement strategies listed on the survey instrument as more important than do students.

KEYWORDS:

• Online education
• higher education
• student engagement
• strategies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Doris U. Bolliger

Doris U. Bolliger serves as an associate professor at Old Dominion University. Her research interests include faculty and student satisfaction, communication, community, engagement, and interaction in the online environment. Secondary research interests include the utilization of mobile technologies in informal learning environments.

Florence Martin

Florence Martin is an associate professor in the Instructional Systems Technology program at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. She received her doctorate and master’s degree in Educational Technology from Arizona State University. Her research focuses on designing and integrating online learning environments. She may be reached at [email protected].