Open-Ended Questions for Distance Student Telephone Survey

May 2011

How could advisement have been improved? (Asked only when students said that advisement services needed improvement)

• More Communication.
• The advisor was not knowledgeable enough about the courses offered.

How could the registration process be improved? (Asked only when students said that registration process needed improvement)

• Needs to be done in a different way besides by Social Security number.
• Access
• Efficiency with holds and fines
• Very complicated (i.e. understanding and viewing detailed schedules)
• Registrar needs to coordinate more efficiently with nursing dept.
• Structure and Restrictions and lack of advisement regarding registering for classes out of order online.
• two day registration, was assigned 2nd day and there was very little selection left, felt like unable to get needed/preferred course. would like to see registration be fair to everyone rather than assigned by arbitrary means.
• Registers at learning support. Misunderstood, but fast service. Seem to know what they are doing.

In what ways were the orientations not helpful in learning to effectively utilize CourseDen? (Asked only when students answered no)

• there were none
• Trial and error. Instructor just went over it briefly.

In what ways were _____________________ not successful when solving your CourseDen problems? (Asked only when students said "not successful at all")

• Prefers online help.
• Could not get into website where classes are. When to instructor, he didn't know, technical people didn't know, she ended up using a different browser and it worked. School itself didn't have a clue and she had to find out herself.

How could student services be improved to distance students? (asked when students said no to question)

• Faculty employees need to be more proactive and friendly.
• Competency in curriculum outside of the particular department.
• Hard to get in contact.
• When she calls for information, nobody knows what is going on. It takes a few calls to get what she needs accomplished.

Explain why you learned more, less, or about the same in online classes compared to traditional courses.

• learning is about the same, but does like when there are photos to put a face to everyone
• A lot of the classes are fairly easy and straightforward.
• For an introductory class, he feels that you would learn more in an easier fashion. Discussions helped greatly.
• She says that it depends totally on the instructor.
• Likes to be in a live classroom over online classes.
• Because it is online so you just find the answers in the book and don't actually learn ig.
• Because classes were more challenging and had his interest more.
• Not enough one-on-one time with the teacher, and teacher was unorganized in structure.
• prefers traditional face to face classes
• Seems to have less trouble, because in classroom teachers are in front of board, and you can't keep up, and teachers are not as thorough in class. Online it is completely detailed.
• Prefer in class face-to-face interaction.
• Learned a lot in one course, and nothing at all in another.

Explain why you interacted with other people more, less, or about the same in online classes compared to traditional courses.

• Less with peers but with the instructor it was just as well.
• The instructor guided the class but interaction with peers made it easier.
• Did not want to explain.
• Conversation over email, but not as much.
• More one on one discussions. Better than classroom.
• Lots of chats.
• Only communicated with instructor when he had no. No communication with other students.
• Talking to instructor via email and online tools it is simpler.
• More of a visual person. But was not much less.
• Never saw any of them or interacted with any of them. Just turned in assignments.
• less because of being online, but okay
• Because it is online you do not get to interact with other students as much. Interacted with teacher.
• Students are more helpful online. Discussion board is really helpful..students actually help each other. It is less intimidating.
• So many discussions and were forced to talk to other students.
• Traditional course offers ability to go up to professor and peers and talk to them. In this course teacher did not respond at all.
• Instructor did not communicate whatsoever. Did not respond to any one email from the beginning of class.

Can you think of any other ways in which our distance courses, programs, and services for distance students could be improved at UWG?

• has taken mostly online and feels it has been a positive experience. Most problems are individual tech problems that are easily fixed.
• felt use of CourseDen was pretty self explanatory
• professors often posted files that were incompatibly formatted for downloading. Would help if consistent formatting that is utilized by all students.
• prefers traditional classroom experience.
• Would like to see more on line courses offered.
• More higher level courses in her major.
• It is really inconvenient when the server goes down.
• Offer more classes.
• Offer more classes online.
• Offering more classes. Mother of two, so during the regular school year it is easy to take classes. In the summer it was hard to find enought online classes to stay a full time student. Would like to see more summer and regular semester courses.
• Improve orientation for students.
• Teachers need to respond sooner, so she wishes the instructors were more available to the students. She would like a response within 24 hours.
• Overall great communication. No changes needed.
• Offer more distance courses.
• Better communication between departments (i.e. Nursing and Registrar)
• Offer more distance courses
• Teachers need to be more accessible and thorough with communicating with students.
• Instructors should be more thorough with orientation and more accessible to students.
• Offer more distance courses.
• Please make accessing passwords for Galileo easier.
• Teacher should be trained to better organize material for online students.
• Likes the way its done now...it works.
• More evening classes need to be offered. Thinking about switching school, due to limited availability. Is not interested in doing eCore because it costs more, and she works during the day, so testing would be an issue.
• More courses would be nice.
• Would like to see more math courses offered, other than that, there is a good number offered. Have group of people in charge of handling things when professor is not available.
• Instructors should use more interactive tools available on CourseDen and online.
• As long as the teacher communicates, there is nothing that needs improvement.
• offer more classes.