University of Derby
Case Study - Online delivery of MSc Strategic Management in Africa
Background and context
This case study is about the change University of Derby made for the delivery of its blended learning modules within the MSc of Strategic Management to the delivery of them purely online with specific reference to how they was rolled out in Southern Africa, specifically Botswana and Malawi.
The modules are part of the part time MSc and within the Southern African context students are professional senior or middle managers who work fulltime. Lectures from Derby travel to in country sites at the start of the modules for a 3 day face to face session for the blended learning modules. For the online modules the students were required to access all materials and work online and undertaken online sessions with tutors, with students being required to draw on their professional experience as part of the course.
The course design was adapted from the face to face programme and all previous materials were put into webpage format. Communication problems in Africa resulted in students not accessing the website and thus required workbooks to be given to students.
Technology used
The programme is run through the in-house adaptation of Blackboard VLE with access to students via a portal. This has been a progression from University Alliance/NextEd and followed the central IT decisions.
Tangible benefits
The case study struggles to find specific tangible benefits of this programme as a result of the switch in delivery to online only. In fact it notes they were forced due to student opinion to change delivery back to face to face in 2007.
One of the major benefits cited was online access to the e-journals which does allow students to access academic resources at any point though the Derby portal.
Disadvantages/difficulties
The case study lists a number of negativities (these far out weigh the positive aspects) around the programme citing the dissatisfaction of students who prefer face to face discussions, seminars noting e-learning discussions as slow and lack dynamics of face to face sessions. Staff feel e-learning distances their students from them and feel they have little interaction with them with them only surfacing to hand in their assignments. They noted no better retention rate (they also did note it was no worse) than face to face courses, they also note there are no cost savings citing that both in terms of administrative and teaching time online delivery was more expensive.
Kathryn’s thoughts
I may have read this case study wrong but I was a bit confused as to the reasons for implementation and change from face to face and online only. My initial thinking was it was only for the students in Africa but as I read on it became apparent that student who were at Derby also took the purely online modules. I have a couple of thoughts about this.
First of all they note they were experienced at teaching these modules and also within the context of Southern Africa. If this was the case then I am surprises at the decision to move to online delivery away from blended. Professional people everywhere are extremely busy and the flexibility of online delivery would rest only on the accessibility of the internet. They site that communications in Africa do not allow (at this time) for courses to be carried out online only, I am no expert but this is not a surprise to me. Thus it would be essential for students to have a variety of means to study and not totally reliant on one mode. If they have introduced this to their face to face students in Derby I am also not surprised they did not like it, one of the reasons to take a face to face course is the seminars and interaction.
The fact that their staff note they did not like the online delivery also makes me think they may not have consulted them in the first place and then trained them. A face to face tutor takes time to learn to teach online thus if students were not interacting online (assuming they could get online) then this I would think is because the structure of the course has not been set up for them to do so.
The aspect of time is also a notable point. I am not sure where it says it takes less time to teach online, in my experience and most others tutors I know this is not the case. We timetable more time for distance learning students not less. Again the consultation that staff did not like this mode due to the timetables time leads me to think this project was not well researched before implementing.
I thought this was an interesting case study that illustrated some of the pitfalls of thinking that online delivery was a panacea for a number of things (distance, time, resources etc). I think it also showed a lack of background research (and dare I say it a little common sense…)
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As you say, Kathryn, it seems strange that if they have a course that is already successful face to face and have no reason to change it, they implement a course that it totally online - especially when there are issues with access to the internet for students.
ReplyDeleteI think a course only works completely online when there are good reasons for it to be that way (like ours - with a geographically scattered population) - and when the staff are motivated to make it work.
Sounds like a disappointing experience for all concerned - a pity.