Fall 2004 Distance Education Survey (Student Comments)

Question 16: What suggestions would you make for future online courses?

• More chats--less posting of discussions and responses.

• Don't let this guy teach them.

• cant think of any

• Keep workload reasonable. Have online chats more often.

• Meet at least once a week (for interaction). Not to have assignments for every day of the week. Only to sign in on the class day.

• Online learning is a compliment to a classroom setting not a replacement.

• Just a better professor the rest was great.

• A more descriptive course syllabus from the instructor.

• Have a combination of on-line and in person classes during the semester. At least that way the professor might recognize me if they passed me on the street.

• Less work more interaction with the instructor.

• Need more interaction and the professor needs to answer students questions not make them ask other students. What is the professor getting paid for?

• On-line courses still require work - understood. Still they should allow a student more flexibility as to when during the week they complete assignments.

• none

• none

• none

• require meetings at least twice a month

• I do think that for an online class the professor has been very helpful and good at explaining points and answering questions.

• none really.

• the materials for this course were expensive!!! make the work book available by itself maybe we can share discs.

• n/a

• That during the workbook hours there are at least 3 people to help you and that they make themselves noticeable.

• make sure practice exams are up and running to review for the final

• don't know

• have more of them

• None that I can think of

• test

• Making correspondence from the professors to their students mandatory.

• none

• there are not any!!!!!!! They cost more money and for what? I would rather spend my money in gas to be able to see and speak to a live person.

• none

• none

• test

• none

• None

• Nothing.

• Better working mail and maybe a sort of online conferencing system within webct.

• None

• Nothing.

• make sure all deadlines are posted at the beginning of the semester and send emails to help the students remember those deadlines.

• None

• N/A

• nothing

• Every student should be required to take at least one or two online courses during their college career. Also more instructors who teach in the classroom need to utilize the opportunities available to them through online learning to create websites that students can go to for help to obtain assignments to correspond with the instructor etc. I find that MOST of the instructors here at UWG are woefully uneducated when it comes to technology Oh yes they take classes but then they don't put the knowledge into practice. I think many of them are afraid of the technology.

• None

• Offer more

• N/A

• keep it the same

• None.

• if they are like this class then nothing

• none

• Less reading and flexible time line on assignments.

• n/a

• none noted

• none

• everything was great

• NA

• nothing

• Offer more

• More of them!!!!

• More Courses

• Clear assignments

• None

• Live webcams

• nothing

• I feel it is important to offer the students several examples of what is expected of written projects. I felt as though I was a little lost as to what was expected of me during the class.

• I would like to have more of them.

• methods to help students stay on schedule

• Stress the fact that there is a lot of time spent on your own completing each project.

• More detailed instructions

• Make sure it's just as helpful as actually taking the class face-to-face.

• Need further development and refinement

• Be clear & very informative. Answer questions before they need to be asked.

• We only had one face-to-face. I would have liked to have 2 or 3 like my other courses. That seems to be a perfect balance.

• I would suggest a lesser workload. This class required an astounding lot of busywork!

• to have some face to face meeting mixed in with the online class

• Loan students laptops

• To meet at least every other or every third week on campus

• Avoid busy work

• n/a

• Keep putting more classes online.

• refine the way the syllabus and other pages are laid out so the information is easier to read it is on one page or organized to work with the parameters of a computer monitor

• The mailing service... We cannot tell who else received a message we have received. We also cannot select reply and then add more names.

• make sure the syllabus is up and correct before the course begins. Students like to work ahead and changing the course is frustrating.

• I do not feel experienced enough to make a suggestion. I have only had the one course.

• None

• Nothing comes to mind.

• Maybe one more face-to face session. Less busy weekly work.

• develop a better format for the syllabus. It is too hard to read it extends from page to page and the breaks are in places hat make it difficult to read the documents

• face-to-face class time at least once during the semester

• none at this time

• WebCT was often down. Also WebCT logs users off much too quickly.

• none

• Bring back GSAMS

• You need more of them!

• none

• I thought the course was awesome!

• when students make basic postings on the BB write them on the body of the message instead of as an attachment. other professors should take example from the instructor in her organizational skills and the way she made the course outline interactive linking assignment with instructions/evaluations...

• n/a

• N/A

• None

• Include a paper backup of everything on-line.

• Give more time to really read and study sites. Because there was so much required in this course there was not enough time to look at everything available. it would be great if all the information would still be available to those who have taken the course.

• on-line test group projects examples of projects

• NA

• n/a

• Offer more

• N/A

• None

• Bring GSAMS back

• Have more available

• none

• None

• post assignments in stages instead of all at one time

• Sending assignments has to many steps

• test

• none

• None.

• I understand the value of group projects. However I think I would limit it to one group assignment.

• The syllabus needs to be clearer.

• More face-to-face sessions

• NA

• One thing that makes it easier is good communication with the professor. In the past I have had a professor who is extremely slow about communicating with students. In contrast both of my professors this semester are quick to respond.

• n/a

• I do not have any.

• Ensure that the resources available for course work remain available.

• none at this time

• N/A

• None

• None at this time.

• Can't think of anything that would be valuable.

• NA

• maybe allow other ISP to be used in accessing webct not just Bellsouth and bring GSAMS back

• none

• I think that they are going fine. All of the instructors respond to emails in a timely manner.

• None

• none

• test

• Clearer and more consistent instructions

• Make sure the course work is up and correct before the course starts.

• You need to offer more Saturday courses. Even though we have F2F class meetings 3x per semester Atlanta traffic is more difficult during the week than the weekend.

• It would make the course more effective if the professor took an active role in our online chats so that questions and problems could be taken care of quickly.

• none at this time

• N/A

• I don't really have any.

• None

• Weekly discussion questions could be a part of the classes and involve the instructor as well as other students. This could take the place of one of the projects maybe. For example - the instructor posts a list of discussion questions on a topic and each student must comment on one or more - read what others say then hold a virtual discussion on the topics.

• Bring back GSAMS

• Bring back GSAMS or something similar to GSAMS.

• Talk with the professors in regard to what really works on-line. Some classes are more versatile to being on-line and some aren't. This was definitely one that should have had more face to face time.

• Give appropriate assignments using WebCT. We had an on-line debate which was very difficult using the chat room to do.

• More offerings.

• Don't charge as much for all the fees.

• nothing

• Nothing.

• None

• The instructor did a good job of implementing truly collaborative group activities during the face-to-face sessions. The number of optional sessions was also very valuable for students that need more interaction.

• More of them.

• none at this time

• None

• I like them the way they are.

• Needs to be an appropriate amount of work instead of increasing the amount just because it's an online class. This class gave an appropriate amount.

• more independent assignments and less group work

• Have assignments with the choice to do them individually.

• I wouldn't make any. I think that I just prefer being in a classroom with the instructor.

• Better communication.

• None

• N/a

• Have a couple of whole class chats early on

• Treat on line course load as though we where coming to class.

• have two examples of the assignments

• Perhaps a couple of face to face meetings so that you can get to know some of the students in the class.

• Make sure that the class meets in person at least once and the groups are formed early on so the groups can get to know each other a little bit before working the entire semester together.

• Web CT times out much too quickly. While it does give a prompt it doesn't always show up if I'm on another screen.

• more of them

• No suggestions

• no suggestions

• More hands on training for some of the elective classes using cameras.

• Have group work be optional like on this class.

• N/A

• Take the all online.

• Assignments and grades posted in a timely manner.

• Would be helpful if someone went through the steps on accessing the distance learning support service. I thought I had ordered a copy of some articles but only received the abstract. Luckily I didn't need them as resources for my paper after all.

• Have 2 or 3 chat sessions for students to share experiences progress project ideas and share solutions. These as scheduled parts of the course.

• More online chats

• n/a

• Don't have so many places to look for work.

• Sometimes it was confusing going back and forth between course notes and class assignments. I wanted to make sure I didn't miss any information and I wonder if there is a way to combine these two categories.

• keep assignments to the same level as in class limitations. I was on line 24/7. Everyday checking on line for new assignments and information.

• course content was hard to find but the teacher really tried to make it easy...stuff was posted in too many places though....

• more should be offered!!!

• Nothing

• Live chat rooms for classes

• None

• No I think the instructor was great

• n/a

• None.

• None

• A larger variety of assignments.

• I have no suggestions.

• make them shorter since you do more work in them.

• Be prepared for glitches and bugs in the computer. Do your work in advance if any problems arise.

• N/A

• Make sure teachers for on-line courses are as efficient as computers.

• No suggestions.

• I don't have any suggestions. I think that it is well organized I just don't know if online classes are right for me.

• Have at least one class with a teacher a week.

• N/A

• at least every two weeks of classroom instructions.

• Make it more easier for a beginner on an online course.

• With our new MyUWG pipeline it would be nice if the due dates for online assignments were automatically put in our calendar under the main link that would help greatly.

• There were a lot of technical difficulties with our course. The kinks need to be worked out.

• offer more of them

• add spell check to ct web. allow for more non active time on the computer before logging someone out. have a one time class meet.

• none

• If you going to be on line I think weekly chat room discussions.