Student Retention in Online Classes

I'm one month into my Masters of Ed. program at U of I and through my assigned readings and my own experience in this program, I can see that the student dropout rate in purely online classes is an issue that needs to be addressed if any online class is to be successful.

Four factors contribute to the problem of student retention in online programs.

Time constraints
The first is that some students will sign up for an online class because it seems convenient and easy. In fact, a well-designed online for-credit course from an accredited institution will require more work and time to complete, on both the student's and the teacher's part, than its traditional, face-to-face (f2f) counterpart. (I'll explain why in a future post.)

Technology learning curve
Some students who sign up for an online class have little experience with navigating websites, searching for documents on the Internet, or even just typing accurately (not quickly, just legibly). These students need a lot of patient hand-holding and have trouble keeping up with assignments the first few weeks because they have so much more to learn. If the instructor is not willing to exlain, and re-explain, what seem like obvious, basic steps for navigating an online class, these student are gone.

Writing requirements
The third cause of the higher dropout rate in online classes is also one of the pedagogical benefits of an online class. Discussion and assignment completion take place mostly in the form of writing (forum postings, chat discussions, email exchange, etc), and writing requires focused, organized thinking. Even poor writing takes more thought and time than speaking, which is why writing contributes to student learning....and student retention problems, especially among students who thought an online class would be easier than an f2f one.

Unclear guidelines
Finally, in an online class, too often assignment instructions, discussion guidelines and writing prompts are written exactly the way they would be if they were going to be handed out in a traditional f2f class, with an instructor present to observe student reactions and immediately "decode" anything unclear or intimidating about the assignment. For a successful online class, extra work needs to be put into designing and writing online instructions, guidelines and prompts so that this f2f teacher decoding, rephrasing and patient explaining is built right into the assignment description.

Student retention in my own online class
Because of a combination of all of these issues, my own online graduate class has dropped from an enrollment of 19, to 10, and now 9.

While some of these were student-generated issues, all of them, especially the poorly written guidelines, could have been minimized with extra (sometimes Herculean) effort on the part of the online teacher. Graduate students are expected to be independant learners, but encountering new technology can make even the best student feel like a lost freshman all over again. If the goal is both course quality and student retention, this effect needs to recognized and accomodated.

The designers of the Global Campus online interface, and the designers of the standardized course documents (I'm guessing the University of Illinois Education Department) hold responbility, too. However, by the time the class starts, it is the teacher who best knows how to modify or supplement the course materials and presentation in order to address the particular misunderstandings, underestimations, frustrations, and sometimes panic, in his/her own class.

For an online class to work, extra effort must be made to teach not only the course content, but also how to be a successful online student. This must take the form of detailed, supportive, extraordinarily helpful, communication (not just a note to go back and reread the assignment or grading rubric posted on the class site). Define terms in simple ways, even when it seems the student should already know the definition. Give urls and hyperlinks in messages instead of directing students to find and click on course sites themselves. Have an FAQ page! Enable both the teacher and students to add to this page.

I teach English as a Second Language, both in private lessons and in college writing and speech courses. I have learned the hard way the importance of making instructions simple, specific and jargon-free. This is also true of an online course, especially an entry-level course where students may be struggling with the course interface as much or more than with the course content. This is a simple, important, and all too often overlooked step for limiting the student dropout rate in online courses.