The CTL identified 88 faculty members teaching hybrid/online classes in the Spring 2015 semester. Faculty members received two surveys about their hybrid/online courses via email: one in January that asked them to assess their expectations and one in May to evaluate their experiences. Thirty-one faculty members completed the January survey and 43 completed the May survey. Most of the faculty members who answered the January and May surveys identified themselves as full-time professors (63%) who had previously taught hybrid/online courses at Baruch College (77%). The faculty members taught hybrid/online courses in various disciplines across the College during the Spring 2015 semester; the majority of the faculty survey respondents came from the School of Public Affairs and The Department of Statistics and Computer Information Systems.

By distributing these surveys, the CTL hoped to gain additional insight into the experience that Baruch faculty have had in teaching hybrid/online courses. The surveys were kept intentionally brief so that faculty would not feel beleaguered by answering them. Ultimately, the goal of these surveys was to get a snapshot of Baruch faculty’s relationship with the hybrid/online course formats  in terms of preparation, teaching and learning, and technology and support. The summaries below point to areas that warrant further research and investigation.

Faculty Training and Preparation

Overall, the vast majority of survey participants felt sufficiently prepared to teach their hybrid/online courses, though slightly fewer in May (83%) than in January (90%). These results suggest that some faculty may have had unrealistic expectations about the preparation involved in teaching a hybrid/online class. Since preparation is a key component of hybrid/online training seminars offered by the CUNY School of Professional Studies (SPS) or Baruch’s Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL), increased participation in these seminars may benefit faculty members preparing to teach a hybrid/online course. Additionally, even though 83% of faculty felt comfortable with the technologies they used, increased participation in training seminars may also provide faculty members with information about and access to technical support. This aspect of faculty development could be especially beneficial since in the May survey only 61% of faculty members indicated that they felt that they received satisfactory technical support.

Fewer than half of the respondents had participated in a hybrid/online training seminar, either organized by the SPS or the CTL. However, of those faculty who had participated in the SPS or CTL training seminars, the majority felt adequately well-prepared in terms of time management, pedagogy, and technology. These results suggest that increased faculty participation in hybrid/online training seminars would benefit the College’s hybrid/online initiative.

 

A greater number of CTL seminar participants felt very-well prepared in terms of technology (43%) compared to the SPS seminar (19%). This difference could perhaps be explained by the length and comprehensiveness of the CTL seminars, most of which have been semester-long courses that introduce a variety of technologies to faculty. Additionally, the CTL staff is available to offer individualized help on technology and pedagogy to faculty enrolled in the seminars, which could account for the reported increase in faculty perceptions of their preparedness.

In the future, the CTL plans to integrate time management skills into the next round of seminars since one-third of faculty (31%) who had gone through the CTL seminar felt only slightly well-prepared to deal with this aspect of hybrid/online courses. As with all the data points in this survey, however, the results can be interpreted in a number of ways, and are best seen as representative of issues that should be investigated further. The issue of time management is complex and could speak to faculty struggles with personal issues, administrative responsibilities, family obligations, or research and writing projects unrelated to their hybrid/online courses. In future seminars and surveys the CTL will investigate how best to address the concern about time management and its specific implications for hybrid/online courses.

Next section: Pedagogy & Technology

Success in transitioning to a hybrid/online mode of instruction requires a willingness to experiment with various methods and tools to maximize teaching and learning opportunities. The process of finding the best pedagogical practices given one’s discipline, interests, and values takes time. Reviewing the differences between expectations and experiences that faculty reported in the surveys offers some insights.

The data in the graph suggests that faculty believed their experiences met their expectations in terms of learning goals and meaningful interactions with students; however, faculty did not feel that expectations for their hybrid/online classes were met in the categories of rewarding teaching and learning opportunities and effective and realistic assessment plans. This data, like the other results from this survey, can be interpreted in a number of ways.

High faculty expectations for rewarding teaching and learning opportunities may reflect the ambitious plans with which many faculty begin each semester; the drop in agreement in this category may reflect an inevitable self-critique at the close of the term.

Likewise, the assessment of student work is one of the areas which requires some adjustment from the traditional face-to-face course model. Faculty may have felt overconfident in their assessment plans at the beginning of the semester, which does not necessarily mean that the assessments were ineffective. It would be helpful for the CTL to gather more information about faculty’s assessment practices in hybrid/online classes and develop a handbook for all faculty based on these experiences. Moreover, whether the drop in satisfaction demonstrates reflective criticism or actual disappointment, it indicates that even faculty who are experienced in teaching hybrid/online courses would benefit from faculty development. The CTL will focus more on assessment strategies for hybrid/online classes in upcoming seminars and brainstorm about ways to reach faculty already teaching hybrid/online classes.

While a small percentage of faculty seemed to be disillusioned with their initial hybrid/online teaching experience, others found it successful. For example, in short, open-ended responses to the question “Is there anything else you would like us to know about your experience teaching a hybrid/online course at Baruch this semester?” some faculty reported that they desired more face-to-face interactions with students, but many reported that the online dialogue in their hybrid/online courses strengthened the course and noted  that students received more individualized attention than in a traditional face-to-face format.

As with all of the survey data, faculty disillusionment and satisfaction could be explained by various factors. One such explanation for the differing experiences in hybrid/online courses may lie in the technologies faculty members chose to deliver their hybrid/online course.

Faculty used various technologies to facilitate their hybrid/online courses and many used more than one. The majority of faculty used Blackboard (89%). Many used Blogs@Baruch (32%), open-source or web-based applications (32%), or other technologies (30%) such as Camtasia, classroom clickers, and YouTube. Faculty members also used library technologies and e-reserves (24%), Vocat (19%), a publisher website (19%), and McGraw Hill’s ‘Connect’ (11%).

 

Faculty teaching within a hybrid/online format have concerns that the technology will not function properly and that the necessary technical support will not be available. While 71% of faculty reported that they felt comfortable with the technology they planned to use in their hybrid/online course, in January only 42% of faculty believed that there was sufficient technical resources and support on campus. In May, however, 61% of faculty members felt they received satisfactory technical support from Baruch and 83% reported feeling comfortable with the technology used in their course. While the outcomes exceeded the expectations in terms of technology and support, it will be increasingly important to continue to improve both the technology available as well as the technical support as the number of hybrid/online courses grows.

Conclusions

In the May survey, only three faculty members responded with reasons why they would not want to teach a hybrid again. The reasons given were as follows:

• it was too hard,
• students were not engaged,
• the shift is motivated by economic rather than educational concerns, and
• the experience and content delivery is difficult and limits the ability to develop a rapport with students.

Overall, the faculty response to Baruch’s Spring 2015 hybrid/online classes was very positive. In the January survey, 87% answered that Baruch should continue to expand its hybrid/online course offerings.  And in the May survey, 87% said they would want to teach a hybrid/online course again at Baruch. The convenience of a flexible time and location and the flexibility of pedagogical option were the most regularly cited reasons for why faculty would want to teach another online/hybrid class. Faculty also noted that:

• students in their hybrid/online classes were more engaged and productive,
• students were more responsible for course material and thus learned more, and
• there was greater overall participation online.

Moving forward, the CTL plans to continue working on ways to improve the hybrid/online course experience for faculty. This may include providing increased access to trainings, resources, technology, and support and by continuing to gather information about how to best design and implement hybrid/online courses.

 

The Spring 2015 Faculty and Student Expectations and Experiences surveys conducted by the CTL strongly suggest that both faculty and students support the scaling up of hybrid/online offerings at Baruch: 86% of faculty reported that they would teach a hybrid/online course again and 74% of students indicated that they would take another hybrid/online class. However, it bears repeating that the CTL refrains from drawing conclusive results from these short surveys, which rely entirely upon anonymous and optional self-assessments. Rather, the CTL will use the survey results to inform their future support, training, and outreach initiatives for increasing access to and maintaining the quality of hybrid/online learning at Baruch College.

Improving the Hybrid/Online Experience

Training Seminars and Resources

Between Spring 2014 and Summer 2015, the CTL conducted five hybrid/online seminars; 31 full-time faculty members and 16 part-time faculty from disciplines across the College participated. Increased participation in these seminars will benefit faculty members preparing to teach a hybrid/online course.

Increasing faculty access to training seminars could also help improve student satisfaction with their hybrid/online courses. Faculty who have taken the CTL or the SPS seminars report more confidence in their ability to teach hybrid/online classes, which may enhance faculty engagement with their courses and increase student satisfaction. The experience of having an enthusiastic, committed, and confident instructor often deepens the learning experience for students.

Student satisfaction with hybrid/online courses at Baruch could also be strengthened by bolstering support services for at-risk students and improving communication about hybrid/online initiatives. Given that such a large number of Baruch students transfer from community colleges and may face more academic challenges than those students who begin as freshmen, the College may want to create specific support structures for transfer students in hybrid/online classes. Additionally, the College should consider how best to convey the implications of hybrid/online instruction among faculty and students. Certainly, hybrid/online courses at Baruch should continue to focus on delivering high quality content through course design and faculty development initiatives.

Although the sample size is small, interviews with several faculty alumni from the CTL training seminars and their students reveal deep and meaningful engagement happening in these hybrid/online courses. In the future it may be helpful to collect data about specific hybrid/online courses in order to cross-reference this information with student evaluations. With this information the CTL could work with faculty who may have received low student responses or poor evaluations. In addition to reaching out to these faculty, the surveys suggest several specific areas to target in future training seminars.

In particular, faculty dissatisfaction with assessment practices and their reported struggles with time management are potential areas for further investigation. Faculty requested that future hybrid/online training seminars include:

• Successful hybrid/online course examples, such as course sites, syllabus examples, samples of student work,
• Models for flipping the classroom and translating lectures into online content,
• Ideas for how to better integrate video into courses,
• Help with course design,
• Suggestions for maintaining student engagement in hybrid/online courses, and
• Workshops focused primarily on specific technology, such as Vocat, Blogs@Baruch, and webcast technology for synchronous online sessions.

Faculty also requested better overall communication about services available at Baruch. Two specific suggestions for improving communication about technology, hybrid/online learning, and digital initiatives were 1) a regular newsletter with information about new and advanced technologies and best practices in online/hybrid education and 2) an online discussion forum where hybrid/online instructors could share their experiences. This could serve as a dynamic archive of relevant resources as well as a local network from which a series of best practices could be developed.

Technology

In the May survey, 83% of faculty and 74% of students reported that they felt comfortable with the technologies they used in their hybrid/online courses. However, the results are more nuanced in response to questions about tech support. While only 43% of students agreed that they could find technical support on campus to help with their hybrid/online course, 48% neither agreed nor disagreed. These ambiguous responses could be due to the wording of the question, which asked students to evaluate technical support specifically for their hybrid/online courses. Students may not have been able to differentiate the general technical support they utilized from hybrid/online-specific technical support. However, the high number of non-committal responses could also reflect the need for clearer communication of the range of support that is available, especially for students. Faculty indicated more positive and fewer neutral responses to questions about technical support. In contrast to the student responses detailed above, 61% of faculty members felt that they received satisfactory technical support and only 25% neither agreed nor disagreed.

Short, open-ended responses on the surveys indicate faculty and students’ desire for:

• Faster turnaround on receiving and servicing computers,
• Increased computer availability in classrooms,
• Improved internet access in classrooms,
• Semester-long laptop loan options for students enrolled in hybrid/online classes,
• More access to tech support, specifically:
  • Extended hours for phone support,
  • Hands-on help with Blackboard in terms of both course set-up and ongoing instructional use, and
  • On-call assistance for synchronous sessions.

It should be noted that some of the requests for extensive hands-on support appear to stem from frustrations with Blackboard and, particularly, Blackboard’s synchronous learning platform, Collaborate. Faculty also noted frustration about spending uncompensated time on learning new technologies and some students reported faculty unfamiliarity with the technology, particularly Blackboard, as a drawback to certain hybrid/online courses.

Faculty Incentives

When asked how to incentivize faculty to teach more online/hybrid courses, the overwhelming response was desire for more pay and grading assistance. Faculty wanted to be either compensated for the increased time spent on their hybrid/online courses or to decrease that time. Credit release time was also often cited as a way to give faculty time to adapt their materials for an online/hybrid course and to participate in a training seminar. A smaller number of respondents suggested having smaller class sizes would be a good incentive. There were also a small number of respondents that felt hybrid/online courses shouldn’t be incentivized at all, but rather mandated.

Helping Students Succeed in Hybrid/Online Courses

Improved communication about registering for hybrid/online courses is the most significant and pressing student need that emerges from the surveys. In both the January and May surveys, over half of students (52% and 54%, respectively) reported not knowing that they had registered for a hybrid/online course. Not surprisingly, students believed this lack of awareness negatively impacted their performance in those courses. Clear communication of the class format is an issue that needs to be addressed by the College as a whole. Faculty also noted that students need to be better informed about the hybrid/online class structure and expectations. Additionally, faculty suggested that students in hybrid/online courses have some prior training on the technologies used in the course. One specific idea that emerged from the survey is to have a hybrid/online day right before the semester begins when professors can introduce their courses and the requirements.

In terms of areas that warrant more research, specific needs of students who might face additional challenges in the hybrid/online mode, such as English Language Learners, transfer students, and working students, should be identified and clarified. More specifically, the survey results suggest that some interesting work might be done around whether fewer transfer students enroll in hybrid/online courses, and if transfer students perform comparably in hybrid/online and face-to-face classes. Additionally, since the results from these surveys suggest that working students not only register for hybrid/online courses in higher numbers, but that students who work many hours per week perform better in hybrid/online courses, future investigations should be conducted to verify or refute these findings.

Finally, faculty teaching hybrid/online courses with high failure and bimodal grade distribution rates may consider taking steps to offer struggling students extra help. For example, faculty may want to broaden relationships with existing campus student support services, offer students multiple ways to interact with the instructor, increase communication with at-risk students, scaffold assignments, administer low-stakes practice tests before high-stakes exams, and provide drop-in synchronous online or face-to-face office hours.

The CTL can continue to provide tutorials for both faculty and students on specific technologies for hybrid/online courses, in-class visits for Blogs@Baruch and Vocat, and individual meetings with faculty to resolve issues and challenges that affect students in hybrid/online courses. The CTL can also help faculty design course websites and syllabi, and offer suggestions and models for communicating expectations about hybrid/online course requirements to students.

Based on the data from this survey and our first-hand experiences with faculty and students, the CTL has envisioned ways to improve our role in scaling up the College’s hybrid/online initiatives while maintaining high educational standards. However, successful educational endeavors in the 21st century require widespread collaboration and clear communication. In keeping with the ideals of cooperation and community, the CTL has created and shared several recommendations for improving the hybrid/online learning experiences with relevant departments at the College.

You may download the full text of the “On Hybridization” survey report at this url: On-Hybridization-Survey-Data.