FACULTY EXPERIENCES IN MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE ...

FACULTY EXPERIENCES IN MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE COURSES (MOOCS)

A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE

REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

IN

LEARNING DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY

MARCH 2021

By

Youxin Zhang

Dissertation Committee:

Christine Sorensen Irvine, Chairperson Michael Menchaca

Seungoh Paek John Casken

Ashley Maynard

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DEDICATION

I would like to dedicate this work to my mom…this is my marathon. I made it! Now it’s your turn…Never give up!

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This dissertation is completed with the assistance of many individuals. Without their

insightful comments, generous help, and continuous encouragement, I would not have been able

to complete my research.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Christine Sorensen Irvine, my life-long

mentor in this rewarding and amazing doctoral journey. I have benefited immeasurably from

your wisdom, abundance of knowledge, vast experience, thoughtful insights, patient guidance,

encouragement, and advice. I am profoundly fortunate to have had an advisor who was

immensely supportive as always whenever I needed you and who cared so much about my work.

I cannot be grateful and thank you enough for your unconditional trust and confidence in me.

I am truly thankful to other committee members, Dr. Michael Menchaca, Dr. Seungoh

Paek, Dr. John Casken, and Dr. Ashley Maynard for their exceptional dedication, guidance, and

encouragement throughout my dissertation. Their professionalism and visions have inspired me

to keep the fire going within me.

I must also thank Dr. Kristin Betts, Dr. Suzannah Evans Comfort, and Dr. Jessica Gall

Myrick, upon whose work this study is based. In particular, I thank them for their permissions to

allow me to use the surveys they developed, which were adapted for this study.

My warmest and heartfelt thanks go to my parents for giving me life and unconditional

love throughout my whole life. Their support, strength, insights, encouragement, solace, and

company have carried me through many difficult times. To them, I owe more than words could

express.

Last, I want to thank myself for years of persistence, hard work, great courage and

determination in the face of various challenges throughout these years when I study abroad

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without my family present in Hawaii. I am proud of being who I am today and so grateful for all

the blessings I received!

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ABSTRACT

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), as an emerging educational innovation in the

field of online education, successfully garnered attention from the academic community since

2012. Studies in MOOCs primarily focused on learner experiences and insights, context and

impact as well as design. Little attention was placed on MOOC instructors.

This convergent parallel mixed methods study employed a web-based survey and semi-

structured interviews to explore the experience of higher education faculty members who had

taught a MOOC or were currently teaching a MOOC from 2013 to 2017 through edX and

Coursera (two primary MOOC platforms in the United States providing thousands of online

courses in a wide range of subjects). The samples (i.e., eighty-nine survey respondents and

twelve interviewees) were drawn from the target population with a criterion sampling strategy.

Findings included: 1) The majority of MOOC instructors were white males with an

average age of 54 years old. Over 75% held a doctorate degree in a given field. More than half

ranked at least assistant professor. Teaching an online or hybrid course was new to about half of

them before teaching a MOOC; 2) MOOC instructors were motivated by both intrinsic and

extrinsic factors to teach a MOOC, but mostly driven by intrinsic motivators; 3) MOOC

instructors perceived their MOOC teaching experience personally rewarding and professionally

beneficial; 4) The intention of teaching a MOOC included but not limited to reaching out to a

wide range of global learners, sharpening skills & expanding knowledge, and increasing personal

and institutional visibility nationally and globally; 5) Based on the four roles identified in

Berge’s Instructor’s Roles Model for online education, the role of a MOOC instructor was

largely pedagogical-oriented, especially at the planning, designing, and delivering stages through

multiple activities. The social role was identified only within a small number of MOOCs. The

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managerial and technical roles were taken over by specialists or assistants; 6) Benefits and

challenges of teaching a MOOC were identified and addressed. Implications for practice,

recommendations, and limitations were discussed to identify and prioritize future research.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DEDICATION ................................................................................................................................ ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................... iii

ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... v

LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................ xii

LIST OF FIGURES ..................................................................................................................... xiii

CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................. 14

Statement of the Problem .......................................................................................................... 15

Purpose ...................................................................................................................................... 16

Research Questions ................................................................................................................... 16

Significance of the Study .......................................................................................................... 17

Conceptual Framework ............................................................................................................. 17

Summary of Methodology ........................................................................................................ 19

Role of the Researcher .............................................................................................................. 19

Limitations ................................................................................................................................ 20

Definition of Key Terms ........................................................................................................... 20

Summary ................................................................................................................................... 21

CHAPTER 2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE ................................................................................ 23

MOOC Overview ...................................................................................................................... 23

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Defining MOOCs .................................................................................................................. 23

Development of MOOCs and MOOC Providers .................................................................. 24

Types of MOOCs .................................................................................................................. 26

MOOC Learners .................................................................................................................... 31

Intentions for Participating in MOOCs ................................................................................. 33

MOOC Experiences .................................................................................................................. 36

Student Learning Experiences in MOOCs ............................................................................ 36

Teaching Experiences in MOOCs ........................................................................................ 38

MOOC Issues ............................................................................................................................ 40

High Dropout Rates .............................................................................................................. 40

Plagiarism ............................................................................................................................. 41

Assessment of Student Work ................................................................................................ 42

Sustainability......................................................................................................................... 44

Quality of MOOCs ................................................................................................................ 44

Motivating Factors for Participation in Online Education and MOOCs .................................. 45

Motivating Factors of Faculty Participation in Online Education ........................................ 45

Instructor’s Roles in Online Education and MOOCs ............................................................... 60

Instructor’s Roles in Online Education ................................................................................. 60

Roles of MOOC Instructors .................................................................................................. 68

Conceptual Framework ............................................................................................................. 70

Self-Determination Theory ................................................................................................... 70

Instructor’s Roles Model ....................................................................................................... 75

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Summary ................................................................................................................................... 78

CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................ 79

Research Questions ................................................................................................................... 79

Research Design ........................................................................................................................ 80

Participants and Context ........................................................................................................... 84

Instrumentation and Procedures ................................................................................................ 86

Data Collection ......................................................................................................................... 90

Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................ 91

Rigor ......................................................................................................................................... 93

Summary ................................................................................................................................... 96

CHAPTER 4. QUANTITATIVE FINDINGS .............................................................................. 97

Demographics ........................................................................................................................... 97

Teaching Background ............................................................................................................... 99

Research Questions ................................................................................................................. 101

Research Question 1 ........................................................................................................... 101



Summary ................................................................................................................................. 112

CHAPTER 5. QUALITATIVE FINDINGS ............................................................................... 114

Demographics ......................................................................................................................... 114

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Qualitative Results .................................................................................................................. 115




Summary ................................................................................................................................. 174

CHAPTER 6. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS ............................................................... 175

Discussion of Findings ............................................................................................................ 175

Finding 1: MOOC Instructors, Who Are They? ................................................................. 176

Finding 2: Intrinsic Motivators and Extrinsic Motivators .................................................. 177

Finding 3: Satisfactory Experience in Teaching a MOOC ................................................. 178

Finding 4: Intention of Participating in a MOOC ............................................................... 179

Finding 5: MOOC Instructor’s Roles ................................................................................. 180

Finding 6: Benefits and Challenges of Teaching a MOOC ................................................ 183

Connection to the Conceptual Framework ............................................................................. 185

Implications for Practice ......................................................................................................... 186

Implications for MOOC Instructors and Higher Education Administrators ....................... 186

Implications for Instructional Designers and MOOC Platform Developers ....................... 188

Limitations .............................................................................................................................. 189

Recommendations for Future Research .................................................................................. 190

Investigate Experience of MOOC Instructors Who Drop Out after Teaching a MOOC .... 190

Investigate MOOC Instructors’ Experience of Delivering a MOOC in Developing Countries

............................................................................................................................................. 191

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Explore Attitudes and Perceptions of Administrators and Faculty from Higher Education

Institutions That Have Offered MOOCs ............................................................................. 191

Investigate MOOC Instructors’ Experience of Delivering a MOOC in a Different Language

Other Than English ............................................................................................................. 192

Conclusion and Summary ....................................................................................................... 192

APPENDIX A: Institutional Review Board Approval ............................................................... 196

APPENDIX B. Recruitment Emails ........................................................................................... 197

APPENDIX C. Consent Forms ................................................................................................... 199

APPENDIX D. Survey Instrument ............................................................................................. 203

APPENDIX E. Permission to Use Survey Instruments .............................................................. 211

APPENDIX F. Interview Protocol .............................................................................................. 215

REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................... 217

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Summary of the Existing Literature Studies on the Roles of Faculty in Online Education

............................................................................................................................................... 65

Table 2. Summary of Six Types of Mixed Methods Research Design ......................................... 82

Table 3. Alignment of Research Questions and Instruments ........................................................ 89

Table 4. Summary of Statistical Analysis Technique ................................................................... 92

Table 5. The Terminology of Rigor in Quantitative and Qualitative Research ............................ 94

Table 6. Summary of Techniques Used to Enhance the Trustworthiness of Qualitative Strand .. 96

Table 7. Demographic Data of Sample Population (N=89) .......................................................... 97

Table 8. Participant’s Teaching Background (N=89) ................................................................... 99

Table 9. Descriptive Statistics for Intrinsic Factors (N=89) ....................................................... 101

Table 10. Descriptive Statistics of Extrinsic Factors (N=89) ..................................................... 103

Table 11. Participant’s Overall Impression of MOOC Teaching Experience (N=89) ............... 106

Table 12. Participant’s Beliefs about MOOC’s Academic Rigor & Online Courses (N=87) .... 107

Table 13. Participant’s MOOC Teaching Background Information (N=89) .............................. 109

Table 14. Role(s) of MOOC Instructor (N=89) .......................................................................... 110

Table 15. Communication Tools Used in MOOCs (N=89) ........................................................ 111

Table 16. Demographic Data of Interviewees (N=12)................................................................ 114

Table 17. Summary of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors Leading to Faculty Choice .................... 116

Table 18. Summary of Subthemes and Categories for Roles and Experiences .......................... 126

Table 19. Sub-steps and Products for Each Step ........................................................................ 175

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1. Conceptual Framework. ................................................................................................ 18

Figure 2. Development of MOOC Providers. Cited from “MOOCs-Massive Open Online

Courses” by Gaebel, 2014, EUA, p.4. .................................................................................. 26

Figure 3. Self-Determination Theory. Adapted from “Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations: Classic

Definitions and New Directions” by Ryan & Deci, 2000, Contemporary educational

psychology, 25, p.61. ............................................................................................................ 73

Figure 4. Instructor’s Roles Model by Berge (2008, p. 409) ........................................................ 76

Figure 5. Prototypical Version of the Convergent Parallel Design. Adapted from “Designing and

Conducting Mixed Methods Research” by Creswell & Plano Clark, 2010, p. 250. ............. 84

Figure 6. Participants’ Beliefs about Fully Online Courses Before and After Teaching a MOOC.

............................................................................................................................................. 108

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CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

Computer technology and the World Wide Web altered the education landscape

(Akdemir, 2008; Dabas, 2018; Herold, 2016; Nickerson, 2020; Selwyn, 2020; Schiffman,

Vignare, & Geith, 2007). Given the rapid development of educational technology, the

unprecedented growth of online education was seen as one of the most dramatic recent

developments in postsecondary education in the United States. Massive Open Online Courses

(MOOCs), the emerging educational innovation in the field of online education, first appeared in

the United States higher education community in 2008 and developed rapidly since 2012

(Barnes, 2013; Deng, Benckendorff, & Gannaway, 2019; Glass, Shiokawa‐Baklan, & Saltarelli,

2016; Jacoby, 2014; Lambert, 2020; Maya-Jariego, Holgado, González-Tinoco, Castaño-Muñoz,

& Punie, 2020; Sandeen, 2013). MOOCs successfully garnered attention from the academic

community since 2010. Many postsecondary institutions adopted MOOCs to help meet the

increased demand for online courses (Allen & Seaman, 2007; Al-Rahmi, Aldraiweesh, Yahaya,

Kamin, & Zeki, 2019; Daniel, 2012; Ebner, Schön, & Braun, 2020; Gaebel, 2014; Len-Urritia,

Cobos, & Dickens, 2018; Liyanagunawardena, Adams, & Williams, 2013; Tschofen &

Mackness, 2012).

Current estimates suggested that the number of postsecondary faculty engaged in online

education was as high as between one-fourth and one-third of all faculty (Allen, Seaman, Poulin,

& Straut, 2016; Marasi, Jones, & Parker, 2020; Mayadas, Bourne, & Bacsich, 2009; Seaman,

2009) prior to COVID-19 pandemic. The Chronicle surveyed 103 professors and found that the

majority of them who taught a MOOC had no prior experience with online instruction

(Kolowich, 2013). Previous studies showed that faculty members who decided to teach online

were not prepared physically or mentally (Bower, 2001; Lichoro, 2015; Outlaw, Rice, & Wright,

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2017; Vang, Martin, & Wang, 2020). Considerable instructors used the same pedagogy and

approaches from their face-to-face classes to teach online courses, as they perceived that

teaching online was merely a change of environment (Choi & Park, 2006; Lichoro, 2015; Outlaw

et al., 2017; Vang et al., 2020). Lacking knowledge of online pedagogy and instructional design

impeded faculty in efforts to create quality online courses (Akdemir, 2008). The experience of

running a MOOC was different from teaching either a face-to-face class or an online class

because the scale and open nature of a MOOC changed the locus of control (Ferguson &

Sharples, 2014; Laurillard & Kennedy, 2017; Walker & Loch, 2014). Managing MOOCs’

massiveness was described as one of the challenging things in the literature (Hokanson &

McCluske, 2014; Ross, Sinclair, Knox, & Macleod, 2014; Walker & Loch, 2014).

While faculty members’ experiences with designing and teaching an online course were

documented in the literature, empirical studies regarding instructors’ experiences in MOOCs

were scarce. This study aimed to explore high education faculty members’ teaching experiences

in MOOCs from three aspects: what factors motivated them to teach a MOOC, what roles they

performed in delivering a MOOC, and what lessons they learned through the MOOC teaching

journey.

Statement of the Problem

Academic research on MOOCs started to emerge in the peer-reviewed literature in 2008,

with an increasing number of papers appearing each year since. A variety of themes concerning

MOOCs had already been widely discussed in recent years. Studies in MOOCs mostly focused

on learner perspectives (Alario-Hoyos, Pérez-Sanagustín, Delgado-Kloos, Parada, & Munoz-

Organero, 2014; Jordan, 2014; Kellogg, Booth, & Oliver, 2014; Kizilcec, Piech, & Schneider,

2013; Perna, Ruby, Boruch, Wang, Scull, Ahmad, & Evans, 2014; Reich, 2014), context and

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impact (Bulfin, Pangrazio, & Selwyn, 2014; Hollands & Tirthali, 2014; Radford, Robles,

Cataylo, Horn, Thornton, & Whitfield, 2014; Subhi, Andresen, Bojsen, Nilsson, & Konge, 2014;

Wang, Paquette, & Baker, 2014) and design (Admiraal, Huisman, & Van de Ven, 2014; Cisel,

Bachelet, & Bruillard, 2013; Guo, Kim, & Rubin, 2014; Kim, Guo, Seaton, Mitros, Gajos, &

Miller, 2014; Yang, Piergallini, Howley, & Rose, 2014). While little attention had been paid to

MOOC instructors’ perceptions and experiences. The lack of empirical research on MOOC

instructors had been presented as a concern in the literature (Veletsianos & Shepherdson, 2016),

however, it had not been fully examined.

Purpose

The primary goal of this convergent parallel mixed methods study was to explore the

experiences of higher education faculty members who had taught a MOOC or were currently

teaching a MOOC via edX or Coursera (two MOOC providers in the United States that had been

providing thousands of online courses in a variety of disciplines). More specifically, this study

strove to identify intrinsic and extrinsic motivators that influenced higher education faculty to get

started with MOOCs, to understand the nature of their roles and the complex issues involved in

running MOOCs, and to learn more about the lessons they gained from the teaching experiences

of MOOCs through edX or Coursera. The findings of this study enriched the current literature

regarding MOOC instructors’ experiences as well as provided best practices, important

implications, and recommendations for future research.

Research Questions

In an effort to gain a deeper understanding of higher education faculty members’

experiences in teaching MOOCs, this research attempted to answer the following research

questions:

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Research Questions for Quantitative Phase

1. What intrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

2. What extrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

3. What are faculty experiences teaching a MOOC?

Research Questions for Qualitative Phase

1. How do higher education faculty describe their decision-making process in terms of

participating in MOOCs?

2. What are the roles and experiences of higher education faculty encounter in delivering a

MOOC?

3. What lessons have higher education faculty learned through the experience of teaching a

MOOC?

Significance of the Study

Of the studies published related to MOOCs, a significant number of studies focused on

learner participation and experience. Little was known about MOOC instructors’ experiences

while designing, developing, and delivering MOOCs. It is critical to explore their experiences

and understand their intentions to participate in teaching MOOCs, how their roles changed

during the MOOC implementation process, and the lessons they learned from their MOOC

teaching. The results of this study contributed to a thorough understanding of MOOC instructors’

teaching experiences with edX or Coursera and can be used to guide stakeholders and inform

administrative decisions as well as help MOOC providers make continuous improvements.

Conceptual Framework

This convergent parallel mixed methods study intended to explore MOOC instructors’

teaching experiences from three perspectives (see Figure 1).

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Figure 1. Conceptual Framework.

Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2017) and Instructor’s Roles Model (Berge,

1995) were employed to guide this research study. Self-determination theory, developed by

Edward L. Deci and Richard M. Ryan, which was widely applied to different disciplines since

the mid-1980s. It elaborated the relationship between human motivation and people’s innate

psychological needs and was used to examine what social-contextual factors facilitated or

undermined human being’s intrinsic motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000). This theory was used to

identify and analyze the impact of intrinsic and extrinsic motivators on MOOC instructors’

psychological activities when they made decisions to teach MOOCs.

Berge (1995) developed a classification framework outlining four roles of instructors in

online education. The model, examining roles of an online instructor (pedagogical, social,

managerial, and technical), was grounded from previous scholars’ work and findings of Berge’s

research that acknowledged instructors performed different roles in various ways while teaching

online. This model was used to help identify the roles of MOOC instructors and shed light on

how these roles were carried out when running a MOOC.

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Summary of Methodology

A convergent parallel mixed methods design was used, and it was a type of mixed

methods design in which quantitative and qualitative data were collected in parallel, analyzed

separately, and then merged at the interpretation stage. The target population of this study was all

MOOC instructors who had taught a MOOC or were currently teaching a MOOC via edX or

Coursera from 2013 to 2017. The samples were taken from the available population based on a

criterion sampling strategy. In this study, a web-based survey was administered to collect data

for the quantitative phase. Semi-structured interviews were conducted for the qualitative phase.

Data from both quantitative and qualitative strands helped the researcher bring valuable insights

into the research problem rather than eliciting information via either type of data alone (Creswell

and Plano Clark, 2007).

Role of the Researcher

I have been working as an instructional designer at a public higher education institution

in the United States. My responsibilities included providing pedagogical and technical support to

instructional faculty in designing, developing, delivering, evaluating online and/or hybrid

classes, and creating instructional materials to achieve various objectives; assisting in assessing

instructional, technical, and production requirements to determine the most appropriate

interactive media for online and/or hybrid courses; implementing institutional instructional

design plans, and so forth. I have been interested in hearing the experiences of instructional

faculty in various teaching environments.

My role as the researcher of this study was a complete stranger to all of the potential

participants as I did not know any of these MOOC instructors personally. Despite this, I might

have some biases due to my educational and professional background that I brought to the

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interpretation of the data results. In an effort to minimize these potential biases, some strategies

were used to ensure rigor in both quantitative and qualitative phases. More details were provided

in the methodology chapter.

Limitations

The first limitation was the drawback of the convergent parallel research design used for

this study. Unequal sample sizes existed in the quantitative and qualitative strands for different

purposes (generalization vs. in-depth understanding) cannot be overlooked. The size of samples

for the quantitative phase in this study was larger than the counterpart for the qualitative phase

that was limited to a small number of interviewees for an in-depth understanding. The findings

derived from this study had limited ability to be generalized to all MOOC instructors. Second,

focusing on edX or Coursera was perceived as limited in scope for a research like this one. Care

was taken in generalizing the results and recommendations. Third, subjectivity was considered as

another limitation in this study. Due to the subjectiveness of interviewing, an interviewee might

bring his/her own biases into the answers. An interviewee might hesitate to reveal his/her

perceptions on a particular topic or subject (Alshenqeeti, 2014; Tashakkori & Teddlie, 2002),

he/she might have inaccurate memories of experiences when recalling, and he/she might be

untruthful or gave socially acceptable responses. However, the interviewer remained non-

judgmental to the responses provided by an interviewee in an effort to reduce a potentially

biasing effect (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 2002).

Definition of Key Terms

Intrinsic Motivation. For purposes of this study, from the definition of Deci and Ryan

(2017), intrinsic motivation was internal factors (e.g., curiosity, intellectual challenge, personal

interest) that drove an individual to behave in a certain way for inherent satisfaction.

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Extrinsic Motivation. For purposes of this study, from the definition of Deci and Ryan

(2017), extrinsic motivation referred to external factors (e.g., monetary rewards, social approval,

avoidance of punishment, financial compensation) that stimulated an individual to take action for

separable consequence.

Faculty Member. For this study, a faculty member referred to an individual who was

“engaged directly in teaching, research or public service and held the academic rank of instructor

and above within American institutions of higher education” (Bowen & Schuster, 1986, p.11),

including part-time and full-time employment. Administrators, librarians, graduate students, and

non-professional staff were excluded from this study.

MOOCs. An acronym for “Massive Open Online Courses,” free online courses without

demanding prerequisite knowledge and formal entry requirements to bring together people who

had the same interest in a particular subject (Radford, Robles, Cataylo, Horn, Thornton, &

Whitfield, 2014).

Motivating Factors. For purposes of this study, motivating factors were factors (including

intrinsic and extrinsic) that encouraged higher education faculty members to participate in a

MOOC teaching activity (Maguire, 2005; Miller & Husmann, 1999; Parker, 2003).

Summary

The rapid growth of technology led to a boom in online education. The number of online

courses, programs, students, and faculty members continued to expand due to the increased

demand. MOOC, as an innovative delivery format of online education, attracted the attention of

many postsecondary institutions and academic communities. Higher education faculty members

who chose to teach a MOOC or had been considering diving in needed support and adequate

training to acquire and develop new skills and knowledge. The literature on instructors’

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experiences in teaching face-to-face or online classes was well established, but little for MOOC.

Through a convergent parallel mixed methods research design, this study intended to identify

intrinsic and extrinsic motivators that encouraged higher education faculty in teaching a MOOC,

to understand their roles in MOOCs compared to traditional instruction, and to learn more about

the lessons they received from the MOOC teaching practices. The results of this study shed light

on the teaching experiences of higher education faculty members in MOOC and hopefully served

as a lighthouse to provide navigational aid for future studies.

In Chapter Two, a review of the literature including a MOOC overview, motivating

factors for faculty participation in online and MOOC environments, faculty roles in online and

MOOC contexts, and a conceptual framework was presented. A description of the methodology,

an explanation of procedures regarding the data collection, and data analysis were included in

Chapter Three. Chapters Four and Five presented an interpretation of quantitative and qualitative

data with details. The discussions of findings, the conclusion of this study, implications,

limitations, and recommendations for future research were stated in Chapter Six.

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CHAPTER 2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE

This chapter covered comprehensive literature and introduced a conceptual framework

that was used to guide this research study. Both the literature review and conceptual framework

were crucial to explore higher education faculty members’ experiences in the context of MOOCs

and to serve as a stepping stone for further investigation on MOOC instructor’s teaching

experience. Content in the literature review included an overview of MOOCs, a review of

MOOC participation and experiences from the perspectives of students and instructors, MOOC

issues, an examination of motivating factors that influenced instructors and institutions to

participate in MOOCs, and roles instructors performed in online education and MOOCs. This

chapter ended with an introduction to the conceptual framework for the study.

MOOC Overview

This section provided an overview of MOOCs including a definition of MOOCs, the

development history of MOOCs and MOOC providers, types of MOOCs, MOOC participants

and their intentions of participating in MOOCs.

Defining MOOCs

“MOOC” was an acronym for “Massive Open Online Course.” This term was first coined

by Dave Cormier from the University of Prince Edward Island (Canada) as a result of a large

online course (i.e., Connectivism and Connective Knowledge, also known as CCK08) ran by

George Siemens and Stephen Downers in 2008 (Al-Rahmi, Aldraiweesh, Yahaya, Kamin, &

Zeki, 2019; Ebner, Schön, & Braun, 2020; Jacoby, 2014; Len-Urritia, Cobos, & Dickens, 2018;

McAuley, Stewart, Siemens, & Cormier, 2010; Richter & Krishnamurthi, 2014; Sangrà,

González-Sanmamed, & Anderson, 2015). MOOCs were free online courses without demanding

prerequisite knowledge and formal entry requirements. Generally, there were no enrollment

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limits for a MOOC (Lineweaver, 2019; Meneses & Mac Fadden, 2020; Muthukumar & Bhalaji,

2020; Gaebel, 2013). Learners’ participation was completely voluntary and dependent on

interested individuals (Liyanagunawardena, Adams & Williams, 2012). The word “massive”

primarily referred to the number of enrollees for the course. In 2012, MOOC providers (e.g.,

Coursera, edX) started collaborating with a variety of public and elite universities, particularly in

North America, to develop and deliver MOOCs across multiple disciplines. The enrollment

number reached up to 50, 000 students per course. The most highly cited example was Stanford

University’s Artificial Intelligence course that attracted 160,000 students in 2011 for one

delivery (Rodriguez, 2012).

Development of MOOCs and MOOC Providers

The first MOOC (also known as cMOOC), was an online course offered through the

Learning Technologies Center and Extended Education at the University of Manitoba in Canada

and facilitated by George Siemens and Stephen Downes in 2008 (Hoy, 2014; Jacoby, 2014;

Joseph, 2020; McAuley et al., 2010; Motzo & Proudfoot, 2017; Pulist, 2020; Sargsyan &

Torrijos, 2017; Richter & Krishnamurthi, 2014; Sangrà et al., 2015; Zhang, 2013). This online

course consisted of 25 paid enrollments (for credit) in Extended Education at the University of

Manitoba with around 2,200 non-credit, non-fee paying students from the general public

(Liyanagunawardena et al., 2012). All course-related resources were available online for students

to access for free. A variety of collaborative tools (blog, threaded discussion, and meeting tools)

were provided for online students to interact with the instructors or their peers. Stanford

University launched three courses (i.e., Introduction into AI, Machine Learning, and Introduction

to Databases) in the fall of 2011 that attracted millions of enrollees (Croxton & Chow, 2015;

Kizilcec, Schneider, Cohen, & McFarland, 2014).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuing_education

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Manitoba

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Manitoba

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MOOCs providers (e.g., Coursera, edX, Udacity) started to appear on the higher

education horizon since 2012 (Gaebel, 2013) (see Figure 2). A company named “Udacity” was

established and launched in February 2012. It was a for-profit Silicon Valley start-up in North

America, led by Sebastian Thrun, David Stavens, and Mike Sokolsky (Gayoung, Sunyong,

Myungsun, Yoomi, & Ilju, 2016). As of August 2020, Udacity had 11.5 million users. A feature

of Udacity to differentiate it from other MOOC companies was that it primarily recruited

freelancing professors and full-time, in-house professionals to design and teach the company’s

offerings (Matthews, 2013). Not coincidentally, another company called “Coursera” was

founded by two other computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller in April 2012.

It was a for-profit Silicon Valley start-up in North America that had at least 118 world-class

university partners including Princeton, Brown, Columbia, Duke, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, etc.

Coursera had registered 47 million enrollees in over 952 courses from at least 118 institutions

and saw 1.4 million course enrollments every month (Cusumano, 2013; EdSurge, 2019;

Liyanagunawardena et al., 2013; Morris, 2013; Stephens-Martinez, Hearst, & Fox, 2014). The

3rd MOOC provider in the market, edX, developed rapidly and evolved as a self-funded non-

profit consortium of universities built by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard

University in May 2012 and mainly led by MIT professors. As of August 2020, 33 million users

were taking courses online from the edX platform. Udacity and Coursera, as the leading MOOC

companies and both founded by Stanford University professors, had each received more than $15

million from venture capital firms (Bento, 2014; Matthews, 2013). EdX, as a not-for-profit

organization, was seeded by $30 million each from Harvard and MIT (Matthews, 2013). By

2014, there were as many as 20 MOOCs providers from other areas all over the world, like Asia,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Institute_of_Technology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_University

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_University

26

Europe, and Australia (Najafi et al., 2015; Gasevic, Kovanovic, Joksimovic, & Siemens, 2014;

Veletsianos & Shepherdson, 2016).

Figure 2. Development of MOOC Providers. Cited from “MOOCs-Massive Open Online

Courses” by Gaebel, 2014, EUA, p.4.

Types of MOOCs

A substantial number of studies discussed the classifications of MOOCs (Admiraal,

Huisman, & Pilli, 2015; Bozkurt, Akgün-Özbek, & Zawacki-Richter, 2017; Clark 2013; Conole

2013; Lane, 2012; Wu & Chen, 2017). The two most widely recognized types of MOOCs were:

cMOOC and xMOOC (Clow, 2013; Conole, 2015; Daniel, 2012; Downes & Siemens, 2011;

García-Peñalvo, Fidalgo-Blanco & Sein-Echaluce, 2018; Hill, 2012; White, Davis, Dickens,

León, & Sánchez-Vera, 2014; Wang, Anderson, & Chen, 2018).

The first cMOOC model (known as Connectivist MOOC) was grounded on connectivism

philosophy (Daniel, 2012; Rodriguez, 2012), and it was a part of the open educational resource

movement that connected people across a common topic or field of discourse (Daniel, 2012;

27

Rodriguez, 2012; Zhang, 2012). Connectivist MOOC focused on knowledge creation and

generation (Daniel, 2012; Siemens, 2012) and emphasized connected, collaborative learning

(Barnard-Brak, Paton, & Lan, 2010; Horn, 2013; Lewin, 2012). Examples of cMOOC included

CCK08 (i.e., Connectivism and Connective Knowledge 2008) facilitated by Siemens and

Downes, Personal Learning Environments, MobiMOOC, and EduMOOC (Rodriguez, 2012).

Educational technologies and the internet were adopted for the early cMOOC model to improve

access to information for online learners and to increase the role of learning through connection

(Weller, Siemens, & Cormier, 2012). Therefore, cMOOC participants were encouraged to create

personal learning networks and a learning community to share materials and collaborate with

peers using any online tools they preferred (Conole, 2015; Means, Bakia, & Murphy, 2014).

However, critics (Kop, Fournier, & Mak, 2011) asserted that cMOOC posed challenges for

novice online learners because of the complexity of the unstructured networks. They believed the

range of topics, platforms, conversations, and assessment options were distracting and requested

more attention from learners. Other scholars (Waite, Mackness, Roberts, & Lovegrove, 2013;

Weller, 2011) argued that cMOOC had a transformative effect on learning because cMOOC

participants stayed and interacted within a constant network.

The second, currently more prevalent MOOC type was the xMOOC (known as extended

MOOC) which was grounded on the theories of behaviorism and cognitivism (Conole, 2015;

Kop, 2011). Extended MOOC stressed knowledge duplication (Daniel, 2012; Siemens, 2012)

and appeared more like a regular postsecondary course with emphasis on video lectures, tests

and quizzes, assignment, and discussion (Barnard-Brak et al., 2010; Conole, 2015; Horn, 2013;

Lewin, 2012; Siemens, 2012) which relied heavily on information transmission, computerized

assignment and peer assessment (Bates, 2012; Roscorla, 2012). Examples of xMOOC included

28

Introduction to Artificial Intelligence facilitated by Stanford University with more than 160,000

enrollees, Machine Learning, Introduction to Databases, and Python Programming and Building

a Search Engine courses (Rodriguez, 2012). The majority of the courses provided on Udacity,

Coursera, and edX were characterized as xMOOC. Jacoby (2014) argued that the design,

structure, and philosophy of xMOOC relied primarily on technology which was the fastest way

to meet learners’ needs and solve most of the problems. Learners from the xMOOC model

received information to build up their knowledge construction through pre-recorded videos,

tutorials, and quizzes developed by professionals in the subject field. They were granted much

autonomy for learning (e.g., go through the course content at their own pace) in the context of

xMOOC (Hew & Cheung, 2014). While critics pointed out that the design of xMOOC was

problematic as the xMOOC model followed a cognitivist-behaviorist approach, which was an

outdated concept of pedagogy (Bates, 2012). The cognitivist-behaviorist approach encouraged

information transmission rather than higher-order thinking. Given the difference between

cMOOC and xMOOC in design, structure, and philosophy, instructors had to tweak strategies to

teach MOOCs in order to meet various needs of MOOC learners.

In the context of cMOOC, course materials and content were defined by learners as the

course progressed (Rodriguez, 2012). The cMOOC instructor provided a course outline to

learners who had the autonomy to determine how much to engage with the cMOOC (Mackness,

Mak, & William, 2010), which resulted in multiple topics had to be examined to satisfy all

learners’ interests at different levels (Hew & Cheung, 2014). While the xMOOC emphasized a

more traditional learning approach through video presentations along with short quizzes and

other formative or summative assessments. Hence, xMOOC instructors appeared to design and

develop their instructions similarly to traditional higher education courses. For example, course

29

content generally consisted of pre-recorded video lectures (3-15 mins long), syllabus, readings,

discussions via online forums, quizzes, essays, group or individual projects, and tutorials

(Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Conole, 2015; Kaul, 2012; Wu & Chen, 2017). Some xMOOC

instructors integrated online simulations (e.g., circuits sandbox) or game-themed topics into their

MOOCs to further engage students (Agarwal, 2012; Frank, 2012). Online office hours (Martin,

2012; Rodriguez, 2012) and video chat rooms (Duneier, 2012) have been used by xMOOC

instructors to answer specific questions selected from a pool developed by students (Martin,

2012; Rodriguez, 2012) and to lead a synchronous seminar-style discussion of course readings

within a small group limited to 6-8 participants while other students may either listen to the live

stream or the recordings in their spare time (Duneier, 2012). Simply put, the cMOOC instructor

behaved more like a discussion moderator (Rodriguez, 2012), and the role of the xMOOC

instructor resembled more a facilitator (Cormier & Siemens, 2010; Chiam, 2016; McAuley et al.,

2010; Yuan & Powell, 2013) who fostered a community for students to connect with their peers

for learning purposes.

Not only MOOC instructors needed to adopt various strategies to prepare and deliver a

course in cMOOC or xMOOC, but MOOC learners also need to adapt themselves in a different

learning environment to reach their full potential and achieve their learning outcomes. Learners

in the cMOOC model were encouraged to build up personal learning networks and community to

collaborate with other learners (Conole, 2015). However, it became difficult for them to have

their work assessed for credits through cMOOC because all participants in the cMOOC were

doing different work (Rodriguez, 2012). Lacking a consistent system to assess student work was

identified as an issue since cMOOC was developed (Admiraal et al., 2015). Further, learners

were getting lost gradually in the decision-making process of determining if the selected course

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was fit for them as course content of cMOOC normally evolved quickly while it was being

developed (Rodriguez, 2012).

Notably, xMOOC learners performed completely different from cMOOC counterparts.

Typically, they read the assigned course materials such as textbooks and articles (mostly digital

and free), attended online discussion forums, viewed the pre-recorded video lectures, took the

online tests and quizzes, and completed assignments (Admiraal et al., 2015; Hew & Cheung,

2014). Learners in xMOOC had the autonomy to determine how they learn and control the pace

of learning (Bates, 2014; Frank, 2012; Kop, 2011). Instructors of xMOOC tended to post their

requests/expectations at least once a week in online discussion forums to engage learners.

Learners could lead the discussion with interesting topics and emailed instructors with their

questions in xMOOC (Kolowich, 2013).

Scholars had argued that simply classifying MOOCs into either cMOOC or xMOOC was

not a scientific approach (Hew & Cheung, 2014) and they provided other alternative methods to

categorize MOOCs. For example, Lane (2012) suggested that MOOCs can be grouped into three

types: network-, task- and content-based. Clark (2013) proposed another typology of MOOCs

with eight types (transferMOOCs, madeMOOCs, synchMOOCs, asynchMOOCs,

adaptiveMOOCs, groupMOOCs, connectivistMOOCs, and miniMOOCs). Conole (2013) offered

another MOOC classification scheme encompassing 12 dimensions: 1) the degree of openness,

2) the scale of participation, 3) the amount of use of multimedia, 4) the amount of

communication, 5) the extent to which collaboration was included, 6) the type of learner pathway

(from learner-centered to teacher-centered and highly structured), 7) the level of quality

assurance, 8) the extent to which reflection was encouraged, 9) the level of assessment, 10) how

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informal or formal it was, 11) autonomy, and 12) diversity. However, this classification scheme

needed more empirical studies to support its efficiency in a long-term development plan.

As noted, each MOOC type served a different purpose. Experts discussed other forms of

MOOCs in the literature. For example, ‘hybrid’ MOOC (Clark, 2013; Conole, 2015; Roberts,

Waite, Lovegrove, & Mackness, 2013; Tomkins & Getoor, 2019; Waite et al., 2013), ‘project’

MOOC (Barak & Watted, 2017; Haavind & Sistek-Chandler, 2015; Holotescu, Grosseck, &

Cretu, 2013), and ‘mini’ MOOC (Frick & Dagli, 2016; Haavind & Sistek-Chandler, 2015;

Touati, 2016). These new forms of MOOCs were used and integrated into traditional classes at

higher education institutions (Zutshi et al., 2013).

MOOC Learners

A considerable amount of research described the diversity of MOOC users regarding age

(Agarwal, 2014; Christensen, Steinmetz, Alcorn, Bennett, Woods, & Emanuel, 2013; Dillahunt,

Wang, & Teasley, 2014; Emanuel, 2013; Ho, Reich, Nesterko, Seaton, Mullaney, Waldo, &

Chuang, 2014; Macleod, Haywoord & Woodgate, 2015), gender (Christensen et al., 2013;

Dillahunt et al., 2014; Emanuel, 2013; Ho et al., 2014; Jiang, Schenke, Eccles, Xu, &

Warschauer, 2018; Seaton, Bergner, Chuang, Mitros, & Pritchard, 2014), origin (Breslow,

Pritchard, DeBoer, Stump, Ho, & Seaton, 2013; Christensen et al., 2013; Dillahunt et al., 2014;

University of Edinburgh, 2013), education (Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Christensen et al., 2013;

Dillahunt et al., 2014; Emanuel, 2013; Ho et al., 2014; Klawe & Schofield, 2014; Koller & Ng,

2013), employment status (Christensen et al., 2013; Emanuel, 2013; Gaebel, 2013; Kizilcec,

Piech & Schneider, 2013) and financial status (Emanuel, 2013). MOOC participants had been

predominantly characterized as well-educated, young, full-time working professionals from

developed countries looking to learn new skills in order to advance their careers (Bento, 2014;

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Chadaj, Allison, & Baxter, 2014; Emanuel, 2013; Luik, Feklistova, Lepp, Tõnisson, Suviste,

Gaiduk, Säde, and Palts, 2019). Among them, males accounted for over 50% (Christensen et al.,

2013; Dillahunt et al., 2014; Ho et al., 2014).

Christensen et al. (2013) surveyed more than 40,000 individuals from 200 countries who

enrolled in 32 MOOC Coursera courses published by the University of Pennsylvania in

November of 2013. In these courses, researchers found that over 40% of active MOOC users

were under 30 years old, with less than 10% over 60. Interestingly, among these participants,

more than half (57%) were male, with a majority from developed countries. The findings also

pointed out that 83% of the learners from all the geographic regions had a two- or four-year

degree, 79% had a Bachelor’s degree or higher and 44% reported education further than a

Bachelor’s degree. Approximately 62% reported being employed full-time or self-employed,

while only 13% revealed being unemployed or retired. The respondents in this survey were from

all geographic regions (the United States, Non-US OECD Countries, BRICS Countries, and

other developing countries). The results suggested that the age of the MOOC students who came

from BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) countries and other non-OECD

countries were significantly younger than their counterparts from OECD (Organization for

Economic Co-operation and Development) countries. The proportion of male students from

BRICS, US, and Non-US OECD countries in MOOCs accounted for 68%, 48%, and 58%

respectively.

Research by Belanger and Thornton (2013) from Duke University analyzed 12,000

enrollees representing 100 countries from their first MOOC course “Bioelectricity” delivered via

Coursera. In matters of education, they found that approximately 37% of enrolled students

reported holding at least a Bachelor’s degree; 27% had a Master’s degree and 8% had a doctoral

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degree, and 18% responded as having some college education. Similar findings were reported by

Kizilcec et al. (2013), who investigated over 94,000 enrolled learners from three computer

science courses published by Stanford University via Coursera. The results indicated that the vast

majority of learners were male and employed full-time. And most learners from the

undergraduate-level computer science course reported that they held a Bachelor’s degree or

higher. Additionally, other scholars like Fowler (2013) and Ho et al. (2014) both identified

similar findings.

MOOCs were widely used by educators as a means of professional development to learn

more about the subjects they were teaching (Newton, 2015). The most engaged and committed

MOOC students tended to be elementary and secondary school teachers, college professors, and

graduate assistants (Velesianos & Shepherdson, 2015). Educators made up the largest portion of

professionals taking MOOCs in developing countries (Wildavsky, 2014).

Intentions for Participating in MOOCs

Much had been written about the benefits of participating in MOOCs from the lens of

MOOC learners (Baker, Nafukho, McCaleb, Becker, & Johnson, 2015; Becker, 2013; Blum,

Stenfors, & Palmgren, 2020; Leon-Urritia, Cobos, & Dickens, 2018; Iniesto, McAndrew,

Minocha, & Coughlan, 2016; Mallon, 2013; Rodriguez, 2012; Sonwalkar & Maheshkar, 2015).

Scholars found that learner’s choices varied to a large extent and depended on various individual

interests and needs. Among reasons, most learners enrolled in MOOCs because of the unique

features of MOOC, such as open access (White et al., 2014; Wilson, Orr, Hansen, Khoja, Bryant,

& Iyer, 2013), free or low cost (Chen, Barnett, & Stephens, 2013; White et al., 2014; Wilson et

al., 2013) and no prerequisites classes required (Vail, 2013). Learners also enrolled in MOOCs

because they were obsessed with elite colleges and well-known faculty. They stated that they

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chose a specific MOOC because it was offered by a prestigious, highly ranked university

(Adamopoulos, 2013) or it was taught by knowledgeable, well-prepared, and organized

instructors (Adamopoulos, 2013; Wilson et al., 2013).

While some individuals signed up for a MOOC for honing their skills (Gaebel, 2013),

enhancing or advancing the current careers, or paving the way for getting a better job in future

(Bento, 2014; Gaebel, 2013; Macleod et al., 2015; University of Edinburgh, 2013). In many

cases, a considerable number of learners who enrolled in a MOOC did so for personal

considerations. For those who didn’t get a chance to attend a higher education institution, getting

college experience was highly cited as one of the benefits of enrolling in a MOOC (Cole &

Timmerman, 2015). Besides that, learners enrolled in MOOCs because of their curiosity about

MOOCs (Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Bento, 2014; Gaebel, 2013; Jacobs, 2013; Kay, Reimann,

Diebold, & Kummerfeld, 2013; Kirschner, 2012; Martin, 2012; Seaton et al., 2014; Weinhardt &

Sitzmann, 2019; Young, 2013; Zheng, Rosson, Shih, & Carroll, 2015). They had the desire to

learn about a certain topic, to increase their knowledge, to update what they had learned or to

learn a “just-in-time” topic (Agarwal, 2012; Allon, 2012; Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Breslow

et al., 2013; Fini, 2009; Kaul, 2012; Kolowich, 2013; Rice, 2013; University of Edinburgh,

2013). Other individuals expressed that they wanted to challenge themselves to see if they could

make it through the advanced levels of classes (Breslow et al., 2013; Wilson et al., 2013).

Interestingly, earning a certificate (Macleod et al., 2015; University of Edinburgh, 2013) or

winning as many course certificates as possible became one of the incentives for learners to sign

up for MOOCs as well (Young, 2013).

MOOCs were not only professionally beneficial to learners but to MOOC makers as well

as their institutions (Chea, 2016; Doo, Tang, Bonk, & Zhu, 2020; Evans & Myrick, 2015;

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Hollands & Tirthali, 2014; Zheng, Wisniewski, Rosson, & Carrol, 2016). The analysis of

published literature suggested that 83% of institutions planned to partner with a MOOC provider,

such as edX, Coursera, or Udacity. Compared to the intentions of students for registering for

MOOCs, the purposes of instructors to teach MOOCs and institutions to offer MOOCs were

different.

Three primary reasons stood out to explain why instructors chose to teach MOOCs. First

and foremost, the instructors themselves were obsessed with MOOCs. They wanted to connect to

a large number of diverse participants to generate rich resources and informative data (Agarwal,

2012; Bonk, Zhu, & Sari, 2018; Lowenthal, Snelson, & Perkins, 2018; Mackness et al., 2010;

Roth, 2013; Sari, Bonk, Zhu, 2019; Watson, Loizzo, Watson, Mueller, Lim, & Ertmer, 2016) and

to gain teaching experience from MOOCs with vast anonymous online learners to enrich the

pedagogy in their regular on-campus classes typically with a small group of homogeneous

students (Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Doo, Tang, Bonk, & Zhu, 2020; Kolowich, 2013; Roth,

2013). Second, egoism was cited as one of the reasons for teaching MOOCs (Hew & Cheung,

2014). Through MOOCs, they could establish themselves as either the expert in a particular field

to increase their reputation or be the first one among their colleagues to increase their earnings or

get tenured (Kolowich, 2013). Third, the last reason for instructors to choose teaching MOOCs

was to increase student access to higher education throughout the world (Kolowich, 2013).

Wakefield et al. (2018) described that MOOCs became a channel for those online participants

who didn’t get a chance to attend college to get a higher education institution experience.

Besides looking at individuals’ intentions, empirical studies were conducted to

investigate the intentions of higher education institutions to offer MOOCs (Hollands & Tirthali,

2014; White et al., 2014). The analysis of published literature suggested that 83% of institutions

36

planned to join MOOC providers, such as edX, Coursera, or Udacity; 43% of schools considered

offering MOOCs (Afshar, 2013). Despite MOOC’s popularity, only a small portion of higher

education institutions engaged with MOOCs, and adoption levels seemed to be plateauing (Allen

& Seaman, 2016). These intentions for higher education institutions offered MOOCs included

strategic growth (Len-Urritia, Cobos, & Dickens, 2018; Marshall, 2013), marketing (Dellarocas

& Alstyne, 2013; Hollands & Tirthali, 2014), strategic collaboration (University of Edinburgh,

2013), organic growth or evolution (Hollands & Tirthali, 2014; Yuan & Powell, 2013), response

to learners (Castells, 1996; William et al., 2011), learner analytics (Barber & Sharkey, 2012;

Breslow et al., 2013; De Liddo, Shum, Quinto, Bachler, & Cannavacciuolo, 2011), educational

enhancement (Hollands & Tirthali, 2014; White et al., 2014), and researching teaching and

learning (Hollands & Tirthali, 2014).

MOOC Experiences

The following literature reviewed the student learning experience in MOOCs and the

instructor teaching experience in MOOCs.

Student Learning Experiences in MOOCs

Researchers have commented on the scarcity of empirical studies documenting the

learning experiences of enrollees who participated in MOOCs (Alario-Hoyos, Estévez-Ayres,

Pérez-Sanagustín, Kloos, & Fernández-Panadero, 2017; Adams, Yin, Madriz, & Mullen, 2014;

Eriksson, Adawi, & Stöhr, 2017; Gregori, Zhang, Galván-Fernández, & Fernández-Navarro,

2018; Jacoby, 2014; Saadatdoost, Jafarkarimi, Sim, & Hee, 2019; Sun, Guo, & Zhao, 2020;

Wang & Baker, 2018). Participant’s learning data had been collected in quantitative and

qualitative ways, such as surveys, self-report instruments, semi-structured interviews, and big

data tracked at the MOOC sites (Adams et al., 2014). The findings from published scholarly

37

articles revealed that blog/discussion forums had been designed as a way for MOOC participants

to record their learning experiences online (Adams et al., 2014; Guo, Sun, Wang, Gao, & Feng,

2019; Zutshi, O’Hare, & Rodafinos, 2013). The majority of participants responded that they

enjoyed online learning through MOOCs even if they did not complete the course. Grainger

(2013) adopted a rating scale with five-choices (poor, fair, good, very good, excellent) and asked

respondents to rate their learning experience with MOOCs in his study. The result indicated that

almost 66% of MOOC participants rated their learning experience as “Good”, and 44% rated it

as “Fair.” University of Edinburgh (2013) reported that more than 97% of participants rated the

MOOCs at the University of Edinburgh as satisfactory, which was interpreted as these courses

meeting most of the learners’ expectations to a certain extent. However, San Jose State

University implemented six-month high-profile experimentation to compare online learners

taking the Udacity courses with regular students who were not taking courses from Udacity. The

result suggested that online students who joined the Udacity courses did significantly worse than

their in-class peers (Rivard, 2013).

Although empirical studies suggested that most students’ learning experiences with

MOOCs were satisfactory (Khalil & Ebner, 2013), it was pointed out that students still faced

some challenges and needed some skills to survive in MOOCs. Self-guided and self-regulated

learners were more suitable for an online learning environment in the form of MOOCs (Kay et

al., 2013).

Studies showed that not only regular university students were intrigued by MOOCs, but

professional scholars were interested in taking MOOCs to test the water. Park, Jung, and Reeves

(2015) explored the experiences of three educational technology scholars who took MOOCs as

regular learners and proposed a refined Carroll model, which stressed “the degree of learning or

38

achievement is a function of the ratio of the time spent on learning to the time needed to learn”

(p.26). This study revealed that hundreds or even thousands of learners’ diverse needs could be

met if the MOOC design was flexible enough for individuals who came from different cultural

backgrounds, ability levels, and expectations (Park et al., 2015).

Teaching Experiences in MOOCs

Although the total number of empirical studies focused on MOOC instructors was

limited, the existing literature depicted a general picture of what a typical MOOC instructor

looked like and provided some evidence for a better understanding of who MOOC instructors

were. For example, Kolowich (2013) surveyed 103 instructors who had taught a MOOC and

found that about two-thirds of respondents were tenured faculty who had taught in college for at

least a decade. Of the 103 respondents, the majority of them were white and male. Another study

examined 142 MOOC instructors regarding their motivations to teach MOOCs and career

development needs (Doo, Tang, Bonk, & Zhu, 2020). Of 142 respondents, 64.43% self-identified

as male, and 35.57% self-identified as female. The age range of participants was from under 30

(2.01%), to 30s (16.11%), 40s (26.17%), 50s (28.19%), 60s (18.79%), and 70 or older (8.72%).

They came from different countries, such as “the United States, the United Kingdom (UK),

Canada, Australia, China (including Hong Kong), Spain, Germany, France, New Zealand,

Switzerland, Italy, Czech Republic, Mexico, Russia, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark, Romania,

South Africa, Korea, and Singapore.” More than half of the respondents (52.82%) had taught at

least one MOOC, 19.72% had taught two MOOCs, 7.04% had taught three MOOCs, about

6.34% had taught four MOOCs, and 14.08% had taught more than five MOOCs. Additionally,

Zhu & Bonk (2018) investigated 139 MOOC instructors’ experience in designing MOOCs and

found that they had not had extensive experience in designing online courses before participating

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in MOOCs. The majority of respondents (N=85, 61.2%) reported they had no experiences related

to designing fully online/hybrid courses before designing a MOOC, while 42 (30.2%) had some

experience.

Studies revealed that instructors’ teaching experiences in the context of MOOCs were

rewarding (Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Blackmon, 2018; Khalil & Ebner, 2013). Most MOOC

instructors were happy with their first MOOC experience. MOOC instructors reported that they

liked to connect with students via Discussion Forums to share, exchange, and discuss course-

related subjects. Teaching MOOCs brought professional benefits to MOOC makers, including

“opportunities to show leadership” in their subject areas and greater recognition for their

research work as well as making them reflect on ways of teaching the traditional face-to-face

classes (Blackmon, 2018).

While, the most widely cited challenging thing in teaching MOOCs was that it required a

significant amount of time to prepare the course (e.g., develop the video lectures and upload

them to MOOC platforms) than instructors had expected (Belanger & Thornton, 2013;

Blackmon, 2018; Head, 2013). Developing video lectures, participating in course planning,

designing course activities, assessing student learning outcomes, and troubleshooting problems

took the instructor’s attention away from focusing on engaging with the students (Belanger &

Thornton, 2013). The demands of time and energy required for getting MOOCs ready posed

potential problems for higher education faculty, particularly for those who were not tenured or

had no funding to support their MOOCs.

In addition to time management, most MOOC instructors expressed their concerns about

other issues, such as the technology glitches and being unfamiliar with new features of MOOC

platforms (Belanger & Thornton, 2013; Blackmon, 2018; Hew & Cheung, 2014); the lack of a

40

real audience of students with immediate feedback (Allon, 2012; Roth, 2013); the lack of student

responses in online discussion (Allon, 2012; Breslow et al., 2013; Koutropoulos, Gallagher,

Abajian, Waard, Hogue, Keskin, & Rodriguez, 2012); the lack of protocols to integrate for

MOOC teaching (Kolowich, 2013); and assessment of student work with large numbers of

students (Head, 2013; Wang, Fang, Jin, & Ma, 2019; Xiao, Qiu, & Cheng, 2019).

MOOC Issues

Given the hype of MOOCs, most attention focused on discussing the potential of

MOOCs, even though some challenges became evident (Li, 2019; Sari, Bonk, & Zhu, 2020;

Siemens, 2013; Zhang, Bonk, Reeves, & Reynolds, 2019). An extensive literature review

identified five major issues, namely high dropout rates, plagiarism, assessment of student work,

sustainability, and the quality of MOOCs.

High Dropout Rates

One particular concern about MOOCs was the extremely low rate of completion reported

by numerous researchers and studies (Adamopoulos, 2013; Asiri, 2014; Clow, 2013; Daniel,

2012; Downes, 2010; Gaebel, 2013; Hu, 2020; Lewin, 2013; Liyanagunawardena et al., 2013;

Hoy, 2014; Kizilcec, 2013; Kolowich, 2013; Malan, 2013; North, Richardson, & North, 2014;

Reich & Ruipérez-Valiente, 2019; Sahami, 2013; Vilkova, 2019; Yang, Sinha, Adamson, &

Rosé, 2013). MOOC providers, such as Coursera and edX, pointed out the average completion

rate of MOOCs was under 10% (Jordan, 2013), often closer to 5% (Koller et al., 2013). “Circuits

and Electronics” (6.002x) developed by MIT and Harvard, offered via edX, was launched in

2012, attracting 155,000 registered students. Fewer than 5% of the students who signed up at any

one time completed the course in the end (Breslow et al., 2013). Moreover, universities, like

Harvard and MIT, during 2012-2013, found that only 5% of the people enrolled for the first 17

41

edX courses completed the courses (Klawe & Schofield, 2014). The Graduate School of

Education at the University of Pennsylvania revealed that 4% of one million users of their

MOOCs earned a certificate of completion (Klawe & Schofield, 2014). In Fall 2012, Duke

University offered a “Bioelectricity” MOOC with 12,175 enrollees. However, only about 313

students finished the course at the end (Catropa, 2013; Jordan, 2013). Stanford University and

the University of California Berkeley both experienced high dropout rates with their MOOC

offerings (Yuan & Powell 2013). Consequently, the MOOC dropout rate was estimated from

91%-93%.

Researchers put a great deal of time and effort in modeling and predicting MOOC

dropout behavior in order to understand dropouts in MOOCs (Alamri, Alshehri, Cristea, Pereira,

Oliveira, Shi, & Stewart, 2019; Chen, Sonnert, Sadler, Sasselov, Fredericks, & Malan, 2020;

Feng, Tang, & Liu, 2019; Xie, 2019). In examining the issue of low completion rates in MOOCs,

Haber (2013) claimed that merely calculating the total number of students that received

certificates by the end of a course when analyzing MOOCs might be inappropriate. Some

students might just click “enroll” on the platform due to their curiosity or interest in an intriguing

topic or a specific professor from an elite university. Parr (2013) argued that many learners still

benefited from MOOCs although they were defined as MOOC non-completers. Therefore,

Koller et al. (2013) suggested considering the MOOC student completion rate from the

perspective of student intentions and commitments.

Plagiarism

Plagiarizing was discussed as a potential threat in MOOCs because alleged incidences of

plagiarism were rife in MOOCs (Bento, 2014; Dyumin, Voznenko, Gridnev, & Andrianova,

2018; Gibbs, 2012a; North et al., 2014; Young, 2012; Zhang, 2012). Cheating online was hard to

42

detect, thereby plagiarism-detection software became more used in detecting plagiarism (Belli,

Raventós, & Guarda, 2020; Parry, 2012; North et al., 2014). Two possible ways to eliminate

plagiarism were introduced by Hew & Cheung (2014): Signature Track and proctored

assessment. These two options were not free to students but demanded them to pay certain fees.

Both Udacity and edX partnered with Pearson’s testing centers to validate students taking

proctored tests (Bento, 2014; Kolowich, 2012; Parry, 2012).

Studies on exploring the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of plagiarism were

conducted with large culturally diverse samples of population (Hussien, Khalid, Hussin, &

Baharuddin, 2019; Kocdar, Karadeniz, Peytcheva-Forsyth, & Stoeva, 2018; Memon & Mavrinac,

2020). The concept of plagiarism, however, was not the same in all cultures (Adhikari, 2018).

Students in certain Asian countries did not view plagiarism as a serious ethical offense of

academic dishonesty, but a way to show their respect to the original author (Wilkinson, 2008).

Research suggested universities needed to clarify the principles of academic integrity at the very

beginning of a course and provide supporting services, not just incorporate the plagiarism

detection software in MOOCs without detailed explanations (North et al., 2014).

Assessment of Student Work

Given the “massive” nature of MOOCs, researchers claimed that many MOOC models

lacked high-quality assessments (Driscoll, 2001; Radenkovic, Krdžavac, & Devedžić, 2010;

Strither, 2002; Ren, 2019; White et al., 2014). The types of assessment varied across programs,

including multiple-choice responses (Conole, 2015) and short essays (Admiraal et al., 2015;

Comer & White, 2016). Shermis and Hammer (2012) conducted a study to compare more than

16,000 middle school test essays graded by human beings and computers. The results indicated

that computers were capable of scoring essays as well as people do. Based on that fact, some

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics

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experts believed that the era of the computer-grading system had arrived. However, Perelman

proposed a counter-argument that some automated essay-grading tools set a restriction on

judging what good writing is (Winerip, 2012). Nevertheless, educators suggested using peer-

reviewed assessment as a means to replace computer assessment (Cooper & Sahami, 2013;

Meek, Blakemore, & Marks, 2017). Despite some courses incorporating “peer-grading (peer

assessment)”, an adequate level of understanding about learner’s assessment couldn’t be assured

(Garcia-Loro, Martin, Ruiperez-Valiente, San Cristobal, & Castro, 2020; Meek, Blakemore, &

Marks, 2017; O’Toole, 2013). Furthermore, not receiving effective feedback was cited as another

challenging aspect of the learning process in the MOOC learning environment. Some MOOC

learners took the peer grading responsibility seriously and provided constructive feedback but

others (usually the majority) were hardly engaged at all (Krause, 2013). Some reported that

guidelines for evaluation or rubrics used for peer-reviewed assessments were not offered by the

instructors in the MOOC, which led to students’ lack of accountability in the process of grading

(Krause, 2013).

Two innovative examples, “assessment bank” (Levine, 2013) and “open badges”

(Conole, 2015) regarding MOOC assessment, deserved attention. In one example, students were

encouraged to collectively create course assignments and save them into an assessment bank.

These assignments were labeled based on a difficulty scale from 1-5. Participants were granted

the privilege to choose assignments from the assessment bank based on their preferences and

levels. ‘Open badges’ was another interesting innovation in MOOCs. Each badge was associated

with certain criteria. In order to receive a badge, learners were expected to demonstrate how they

met the criterion (complete one aspect of MOOC) and validated the process by peers (Conole,

2014).

44

Sustainability

Reviewers (Marginson, 2012; Young, 2012) drew parallels between MOOCs and other

successful business models (e.g., Google, Facebook, eBay) in terms of business sustainability.

They found that these Silicon Valley companies implemented common business strategies,

making early investments, providing free services, and making a substantial profit (White et al.,

2014). The top MOOCs usually attracted large investments, and thus, a higher rate of return was

expected in the long run. For example, Harvard and MIT invested $60 million in edX. Coursera

and Udacity were funded with $22 million and $16 million respectively (Ferriman 2013). A few

strategies were discussed in the study of Homes (2013) to monetize MOOCs. Ptascynsky (2012)

encouraged universities to develop and run MOOCs by themselves without the involvement of

third parties because some of these companies suffered in the dotcom bubble, which might cause

them to be unable to provide sufficient support (Weston, 2012). On the other hand, the findings

on the sustainability of learners’ participation deserved attention as well. Costs might be covered

by institutions, governments, and prospective employers as this novel sustainable business model

targeted high numbers of students to enroll and they paid for assessment and certification

(Lawton & Katsomitros, 2013).

Quality of MOOCs

The quality of MOOCs was another challenge that remained to be resolved in the

literature. Many reviews suggested that MOOCs lacked student engagement, as well as student-

instructor support. For example, Jacobs (2013) reported that the interactions with his professors

in 11 MOOCs in which he enrolled was little. Others reported that MOOC students had no

chance to work with professors or teaching assistants offline (Hew & Cheung, 2014). Student-

instructor interaction, as a form of student-instructor support, was seen as an essential part of

45

online learning because it provided opportunities for students to have their questions answered

by instructors directly (Martin, 2012). Meanwhile, peer interaction, as another crucial support in

MOOCs, generated a series of extracurricular activities that encouraging students to discuss and

exchange ideas of a particular topic, and broadening students’ understanding (Hew & Cheung,

2014). An interesting finding from Davidson (2013) suggested seminar discussions could be

reproduced successfully in a web-based environment. However, Hew & Cheung (2012) argued

that the mere presence of a discussion forum did not automatically foster active interaction.

Certain factors need to be taken into consideration in order to promote a robust learning

community in MOOCs. Notably, the research focus in recent years shifted to explore how to

enhance the MOOC leaners’ experience and improve quality of MOOCs (Conole, 2016; Hood &

Littlejohn, 2016; Stracke, 2017; Stracke & Tan, 2018).

Motivating Factors for Participation in Online Education and MOOCs

During the past decade, considerable research had been done regarding faculty

participation in online education. Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) presented itself as an

innovative form of online delivery where research had been conducted. The following review of

the literature provided an overview of intrinsic and extrinsic motivators that influenced the

participation of higher education faculty members in online education. Additionally, motivating

factors for institutional participation in MOOCs were examined in the subsequent section.

Motivating Factors of Faculty Participation in Online Education

Based on previous studies (Betts, 2014; Bruner, 2007; Chapman 2011; Cook, 2019;

Cook, Ley, Crawford & Warner, 2009; Gautreau, 2011; Green, Alejandro & Brown, 2009;

Hoffman, 2013; Huang & Hsia, 2009; Kampov-Polevoi, 2010; Lesht & Windes, 2011; Orr,

Williams, & Pennington, 2009; Osika, Johnson, & Buteau, 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray,

46

2006; Schroeder, 2008; Shea, 2007; Stevenson, 2007; Ulmer, Watson, & Derby, 2007), a

substantial number of motivating factors regarding faculty participation in online education have

been identified in both intrinsic and extrinsic form. The intrinsic motivators cited in the literature

included faculty opinions and beliefs about online courses (Hoffman, 2013; Walters, Grover,

Turner, & Alexander, 2017), the intellectual challenge (Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009;

Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008), and one’s personal motivation to use

technology (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008; Schulz, Isabwe, &

Reichert, 2015; Sharma & Srivastava, 2019; Stevenson, 2007), opportunities to develop new

ideas about teaching and the learning processes (Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray,

2006; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007), opportunities to improve and enhance online teaching

skills (Chapman, 2011; Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006;

Stevenson, 2007), opportunities to learn and use technology (Chapman, 2011; Green et al., 2009;

Schroeder, 2008), opportunities to use personal research as a teaching tool (Pinkerton, 2008;

Schroeder, 2008), opportunities to share knowledge with others and develop new competencies

(Green et al., 2009), as well as opportunities for scholarly pursuit, career exploration, and

opportunities for career development (Chapman, 2011; Green et al., 2009; Lesht & Windes,

2011; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008).

The literature also identified several factors that could be considered as extrinsic

motivators, such as the ability to reach new audiences who weren’t able to attend classes on

campus (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008;

Stevenson, 2007), greater course flexibility (Betts, 2014; Chapman, 2011; Hoffman, 2013; Lesht

& Windes, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007), a

variety of support including technical support, pedagogical support, and institutional or

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departmental support (Betts, 2014; Bruner, 2007; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray,

2006; Schroeder, 2008), and financial rewards (Betts, 2014; Bruner, 2007; Chapman, 2011;

Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Lesht & Windes, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006;

Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007).

Intrinsic motivators for faculty participation in online education. As noted, intrinsic

motivators played a critical role in faculty decisions to participate in online education. Intrinsic

motivators were grouped into three categories (personal factors, professional development, and

career consideration) and were discussed in the following sections.

Personal factors. A spectrum of intrinsic factors had been found to influence faculty

participation in distance education. The range of factors included faculty opinions and beliefs

about online course delivery (Koenig, 2010; Regan, Evmenova, Baker, Marci, Spencer, Lawson,

& Werner, 2012; Styron, Wang, & Styron, 2009; Ward, Peters, & Shelley, 2010), the intellectual

challenges (Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder,

2008), and one’s motivations to use technology (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008;

Stevenson, 2007).

Although online courses had become more prevalent in higher education, a recent

nationwide report indicated that faculty acceptance of online education remained low (Allen &

Seaman, 2016). Higher education faculty members were reluctant to “accept the value and

legitimacy of online education (Allen & Seaman, 2016, p.26)” or harbored negative perceptions

(Koenig, 2010; Regan et al., 2012; Styron et al., 2009; Ward et al., 2010). Considering the

important role faculty played in distance education, the impact of faculty opinions and beliefs on

participation was important and had been studied (Cook et al., 2009; Osika et al., 2009; Panda &

Mishra, 2007; Styron et al., 2009; Wickersham & McElhany, 2010). For example, faculty

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members with a moderately positive attitude towards online education were more likely to adopt,

use and recommend online courses to their students (Mandernach, Mason, Forest & Hackathorn,

2012; Panda & Mishra, 2007). A negative perception of online education was identified as the

primary inhibitor for faculty involvement (Oskia, 2009). Cook et al. (2009) found that faculty

concerns about the quality of online courses inhibited their participation. A positive or negative

perception regarding the quality of online education was found to be critical in determining

faculty acceptance and participation.

Teaching online had been perceived as an intellectual challenge by faculty (Cook et al.,

2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008). In a study by

Schopieray (2006), the “intellectual challenge of learning a new way of teaching” had been rated

among the top four motivating factors for teaching online. Similarly, Schroeder (2008) found

several facilitating factors that motivated adjunct faculty to participate in online instruction.

“Intellectual challenge” received a high score and ranked in third place among these motivating

factors. In a study by Pinkerton (2008), the intellectual challenge was found to be an intrinsic

motivation that affected the decisions of faculty to teach online. Cook et al. (2009) arrived at a

similar conclusion when stating that for faculty at four different institutions of higher education,

the intellectual challenge was the motivating factor when considering online teaching. Results

from a survey administered by Green et al. (2009) agreed with the aforementioned findings

suggesting that faculty members (including part-time, full-time non-tenured, tenure-track, and

tenured faculty) were all motivated to teach online courses because it was an intellectual

challenge for them.

A considerable amount of literature had been published examining the relationship

between faculty participation in distance education and their motivation to use technology (Betts,

49

2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007). For instance, in

her recent institutional study, Betts (2014) found that personal motivation to use technology was

rated highly rated solely by those faculty members who had participated in distance education.

This finding was consistent with what Stevenson (2007) claimed in his dissertation that personal

motivation to use technology was embraced by faculty participants who had previously taught an

online class. Similarly, Cook, et al. (2009) argued that faculty participation in distance education

was positively tied to the extent a faculty member personally desired to use technology.

Likewise, Schroeder (2008) stated that adjunct faculty members were highly motivated by the

personal motivation to use technology in online teaching practices. In reviewing all the above

studies, the personal desire to use technology was recognized as being a critical and intrinsic

motivating factor underlying an instructor’s willingness to participate in online teaching.

Professional development. Studies had indicated that opportunities for professional

growth (development) had a positive impact on increasing faculty participation in online

education (Betts, 2014; Chapman, 2011; Conceição, 2006; Elliott, Rhoades, & Jackson, 2015;

Hiltz, Kim, & Shea, 2007; Kampov-Polevoi, 2010; Lesht & Winders, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008;

Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007; Wasilik & Bolliger, 2009). These

professional development considerations included opportunities to develop new ideas about

teaching and learning processes (Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006;

Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007), opportunities to improve and enhance online teaching skills

(DiPaola & Wagner, 2018; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006), opportunities

to learn how to use new technologies (Chapman, 2011; Li & Wong, 2019; Killion, 2016),

opportunities for scholarly pursuit (Lesht & Windes, 2011), opportunities to develop new

50

competencies (Hoffman, 2013), and opportunities to share knowledge with others and to use

personal research as a teaching tool (Schroeder, 2008).

Compared to brick-and-mortar classrooms on campus, distance education offered faculty

a variety of opportunities to incorporate different ideas into their daily teaching with a wide

range of distant learners with different backgrounds (Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006;

Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007). Stevenson (2007) conducted a study with two different

groups of faculty members (a participator group and a non-participatory group) at two

institutions of higher education. His study indicated that faculty who answered “currently

participating” or “previously have participated” in the survey were more likely to be motivated

with opportunities to incorporate different ideas into their pedagogy (p.73). One of the appealing

aspects of participating in online education was to develop new ideas. Pinkerton (2008) found

that faculty members with and without prior online teaching experience cited online teaching as

helpful in forming new ideas. Similarly, Schroeder (2008) concluded that adjunct faculty rated

the opportunity to develop new ideas as a key factor that motivated them to participate in online

instruction. Interestingly, Schopieray (2006) noted that faculty who had not previously taught an

online course would consider the opportunity to develop new ideas as a motivating factor in their

decision to participate in online education.

Traditional faculty models required instructors to possess different skills in many diverse

areas to meet learner needs at all levels (Tucker & Neely, 2015). Therefore, faculty who engaged

in online education were expected to have opportunities to hone their teaching skills in order to

facilitate student learning (Chapman, 2011; Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton,

2008; Schopieray, 2006; Stevenson, 2007). Given that expectation, opportunities to improve or

enhance online teaching skills became an important factor for faculty when considering teaching

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online (Chapman, 2011; Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray,

2006; Stevenson, 2007). Green, Alejandro, and Brown (2009) examined the factor of

opportunities to improve or enhance online teaching skills with four faculty groups (tenured,

tenure-track, full-time non-tenured, and adjunct/part-time) across the United States. The results

indicated that this factor had a positive impact on faculty members’ proclivity to be involved in

distance education. In other words, faculty members were highly motivated by opportunities to

improve or enhance their online teaching skills through online education. Findings from a study

conducted by Chapman (2011) agreed with Green, Alejandro, and Brown’s findings, which

suggested that both tenured/tenure-track and contingent faculty identified the opportunity to

improve or enhance online teaching skills as an intrinsic motivating factor when choosing to

participate in online education.

With the growth, popularity, and accessibility of technology in educational settings, a

considerable number of instructors began to integrate technology into their teaching practice

(Allen & Seaman, 2010; Baran, Correia, & Thompson, 2013; Benson & Ward, 2013; Hero,

2019; Niess, 2011; Regan, Evmenova, Sacco, Schwartzer, Chirinos, & Hughes, 2019; Tatli,

Akbulut, & Altinisik, 2019). The existing body of research suggested that previous experiences

in using technology in the physical classroom would influence faculty’s perception and

motivation to participate in online education (Huang & Hsia, 2009; Kampov-Polevoi, 2010;

Osika et al., 2009; Ulmer et al., 2007; Wasilik & Bolliger, 2009). Therefore, opportunities to

learn and use technology had been identified as a highly motivating factor in stimulating faculty

to participate in online teaching (Chapman, 2011; Green et al., 2009; Schroeder, 2008). For

example, a quantitative study with 64 adjunct faculty members at a midwestern university

suggested that respondents were intrinsically motivated to teach in distance education courses if

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the opportunity to learn new technology was offered (Schroeder, 2008). Similarly, Chapman

(2011) concluded that the opportunity to learn new technology played an important motivational

role in the faculty’s decision to participate in online classes. This finding was supported by

Green, Alejandro, and Brown (2009) with a survey administered across the United States. The

survey revealed that faculty members were motivated to teach online courses as a result of the

opportunity to learn and use new technology.

Previous research had established that the initial planning, designing, and development of

an online course took more time and effort away from faculty than they planned to spend on

conducting research (Akdemir, 2008; Bailey & Card, 2009; Bussmann, Johnson, Oliver,

Forsythe, Grandjean, Lebsock, & Luster, 2017; Clark-Ibanez & Scott, 2008; Fein & Logan,

2010; Hoffman, 2012; Hsieh, 2010; Li & Irby, 2008; Lowery & Spector, 2014; Orr et al., 2009;

Salimi, 2007). Additional evidence found that faculty might prefer to teach an upper level or

graduate course in their area of expertise, rather than a general undergraduate course (Ortagus &

Stedrak, 2013). As a result, the opportunity for scholarly pursuit through online teaching

practices was documented as a critical motivating factor for faculty participating in online

instruction (Lesht & Winder, 2011). Pinkerton (2008) studied full-time faculty who had

participated and those who had not participated in online teaching at a community college. Both

groups agreed that the opportunity for scholarly pursuit was a critical factor for them to consider

when making decisions to participate in online teaching. This result was consistent with

Schroeder’s (2008) findings with a population of adjunct faculty. The findings suggested that the

opportunity for scholarly pursuit was one of the intrinsic motivating factors that encouraged

faculty to consider engaging in online education. Furthermore, Schopieray (2006) assessed this

factor with instructors who had not previously taught courses online. The results showed that the

53

opportunity for scholarly pursuit had been a key factor when instructors considered teaching a

future online course.

Additionally, a few other intrinsic factors documented in the literature had been found to

have an impact on faculty decisions to participate in online education. For example, the

opportunity to use personal research as a teaching tool was considered as an intrinsic motivator

by different groups of faculty members (Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008). Green et al. (2009)

illustrated that a majority of the instructors in their study indicated that they were more likely to

participate in online classes if they received the opportunity to share knowledge with other peers.

Moreover, the opportunity to develop new competencies was ranked with a higher score in

Chapman’s (2011) study. Both contingent and tenured/tenure-track faculty who taught distance

courses at a public university found that the opportunities to develop new competencies were

essential to boost their motivation to teach online courses.

Career considerations. Online education was seen by faculty as an opportunity to carve

out a niche for their career and increase their visibility and reputation across states and at the

national levels (Bruner, 2007; Lowenthal, Snelson, & Perkins, 2018; Hoffman, 2013).

Opportunities for career development or advancement had been identified as one of the intrinsic

factors encouraging higher education faculty to consider participating in online education

(Chapman, 2011; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008). Chapman (2011) attempted to identify the

incentives and motivators that would encourage online education participation between

contingent and tenured/tenure-track instructors. The results indicated that the opportunity for

career advancement was selected by both groups as a critical factor in motivating instructors to

engage in online education. This finding was also supported by what Green et al. (2009) found in

their quantitative study. Green et al. (2009) examined many factors within a survey that

54

encouraged or discouraged faculty involvement in teaching online courses. The study results

showed that all respondents agreed that they were more likely to be motivated to participate in

online education if they had the opportunity to develop their careers. The majority of participants

in this study had a positive attitude towards distance education and embraced the potential

benefits it would bring to their careers. Pinkerton (2008) collected responses from a community

college evaluating 29 possible factors that might impact faculty participation in teaching online

courses. She described that the opportunity for career exploration had a strong positive influence

on faculty with and without prior online teaching experience.

Extrinsic motivators for faculty participation in online education. Although much of

the literature had supported the vital role of intrinsic motivators for faculty to decide to

participate in online teaching, the topic of extrinsic motivators had received considerable

attention as well. Extrinsic motivators documented in the literature, such as the ability to reach

new audiences, the greater course flexibility, support, and financial rewards were discussed in

the following sections.

The ability to reach new audiences. Literature was abundant regarding the inherent

strengths of implementing online courses in distance education. Greater course flexibility (Betts,

2014; Chapman, 2011; Sheail, 2018; Schopieray, 2006; Veletsianos & Houlden, 2019) and the

ability to reach new audiences who were unable to attend classes physically (Bakayev,

Vasilyeva, Kalmykova, & Razinkina, 2018; Cook et al., 2009; Dumford & Miller, 2018;

Schroeder, 2008) were cited as the biggest strengths of teaching online.

The ability to reach new audiences could influence faculty perception and participation in

online education (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder,

2008; Stevenson, 2007). Efforts had been made by researchers to investigate the influence. The

55

results showed that the ability to reach a new audience unable to attend physical classes on

campus positively influenced faculty participation (Betts, 2014; Schroeder, 2008). Faculty with

online teaching experiences at George Washington University stated that the ability to reach new

students through teaching online highly motivated them to participate in online education (Betts,

2014). This finding was supported by other studies (Cook et al., 2009; Dumford & Miller, 2018;

Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008). It was not surprising to see that the majority of researchers

categorized the ability to reach new audiences as an extrinsic motivator in this domain.

Interestingly, Stevenson (2007) put this factor as an intrinsic motivator in the literature review of

his dissertation. His study suggested that reaching a wide audience received a higher score

among the top five motivating factors by faculty who had online teaching experience but not by

faculty who did not have online teaching experience.

Greater course flexibility. Online education provided greater flexibility than a traditional

face-to-face classroom in terms of time, location, and faculty schedule. For example, flexibility

was seen in less time spent on driving to campus (Schroeder, 2008; Sheail, 2018; Veletsianos &

Houlden, 2019), less money spent on fuel for commuting (Schroeder, 2008), and flexible work

scheduling (Betts, 2014; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007).

These strengths allowed online faculty to have greater flexibility to deliver classes.

Empirical studies had identified the flexibility of teaching online as a powerful

motivating factor encouraging faculty to participate in online education (Betts, 2014; Chapman,

2011; Green et al., 2009; Hoffman, 2013; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008;

Stevenson, 2007). Most of the participants from these studies claimed that they valued the

flexibility of time and location through online teaching. These participants also expressed that

flexible working conditions were critical to their decision-making process (Betts, 2014; Green et

56

al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006). The flexible schedule afforded by online

education offered greater flexibility for faculty to juggle teaching, research, community services,

and other commitments (Duncan, 2009; Johnson, Stewart, & Bachman, 2015; Lesht & Windes,

2011).

Furthermore, course flexibility for students was identified in the literature as a key factor

influencing faculty decisions to teach online (Lesht & Windes, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008). Betts

(2014) pointed out that greater course flexibility for students had an impact on faculty

participation in online teaching practices. Participants in her study who had prior online teaching

experience were more likely to consider course flexibility for students when they planned for

future online teaching development. Additionally, adjunct faculty in a study rated greater course

flexibility for students as the highest facilitating factor motivating them to participate in online

courses (Schroeder, 2008). The notion that greater course flexibility for students appeared to

influence faculty was supported from an administrative perspective. Lesht and Windes (2011)

reviewed a series of facilitating and inhibiting factors in terms of online course teaching from an

administrative perspective. Responses from administrators in the study indicated that the

flexibility of online education provided to students associated closely with faculty participation

in teaching online.

Support. Technical support (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Porter &

Graham, 2016; Schopieray, 2006), pedagogical support (Bruner, 2007; Porter & Graham, 2016;

Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008), and other forms of support from institutional or

departmental levels (Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006) had been documented as significant

extrinsic motivators in the literature. Previous studies suggested that effective technical support

would facilitate faculty in accomplishing some of the goals they set for their courses (Betts,

57

2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006). Lacking technical support was

documented as a major issue for faculty attempting to teach in an online environment (Betts,

1998; Schifter, 2004). Betts (2014) identified the lack of technical support as the primary

inhibiting factor by three groups of respondents from two different educational settings in a

comparison study. Her findings suggested that quality technical support would motivate faculty

participation in online education. Similarly, in Schopieray’s (2006) study, the majority of

respondents emphasized the importance of technical support and quality technical support as the

highest motivator for teaching online courses. This study stressed that the continued technical

support fostered an environment for faculty to seek help when confronted with technology

problems. As a result, it helped maintain their motivation to continue to teach online. Pinkerton’s

(2008) findings also supported the notion that technical support was an important motivator in

faculty decision to teach online. The responses from faculty members who had taught and who

had not taught in distance education courses indicated that faculty members were more likely to

be motivated to participate in online teaching if sufficient technical support was offered in place.

Along with technical support, equipment provided by colleges to assist faculty in online teaching

had also been discussed (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Schopieray, 2006). Faculty without prior

online teaching experience ranked equipment provided by their college as one of the highest

motivators in considering teaching a distance course (Schopieray, 2006). Interestingly, the results

from the same study revealed that female faculty who had not taught online previously gave a

higher score for this particular item in the survey than males.

In order to provide quality online programs, faculty members needed to have the

technical and pedagogical expertise to effectively facilitate student online learning (Brinkley-

Etzkorn, 2018; Wang, Gould, & King, 2009). To develop quality online teaching activities,

58

instructors sought out advice and pedagogical support from specialists whom they could turn to

(Boettcher, J. V., & Conrad, 2016; Orr, Williams, & Pennington, 2009). The demand for greater

pedagogical support within universities had been increasingly expanding as enrollment for online

courses had increased exponentially in recent years (Seaman, Allen, & Seaman, 2018; Shea,

2007).

Instructors appeared to be aware that they needed pedagogical training and support to

acquire knowledge and develop skills for online teaching. Their willingness to embrace training,

professional development and support at the institutional level largely influenced the success or

failure of distance education programs (Allen & Seaman, 2012; Bruner, 2007; Major, 2010; Ray,

2009). Receiving training in online education (including pedagogy and technology) was seen as

one of the highest-rated motivating factors for considering teaching online by faculty without

any online teaching experience (Pinkerton, 2008; Schmidt, Tschida, & Hodge, 2016).

Furthermore, training for teaching in online education programs was recognized as an essential

extrinsic motivator (Bruner, 2007; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008). This

was the case not only for faculty but also for administrators to consider (Lesht & Windes, 2011;

Schmidt, Tschida, & Hodge, 2016).

Empirical studies also identified that support and encouragement from colleagues, deans,

and other administrators were seen as important as other motivating factors (Betts, 1998a, 2014;

Pinkerton, 2008; Schifter, 2000; Schroeder, 2008). Pinkerton (2008) found that more than half of

the respondents in the study agreed that receiving support and encouragement from colleagues,

deans, and other administrators would encourage faculty to join the online teaching movement.

Similarly, Schroeder (2008) confirmed Pinkerton’s findings that support and encouragement

from peers and administrators had a positive impact on instructors and specifically on adjunct

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faculty. This was the case since adjunct faculty worked mostly on a part-time basis and they

were not as closely connected to campus life as other full-time faculty.

Financial rewards. The majority of faculty members were inherently motivated to help

students (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008; Stevenson, 2007).

However, financial rewards had an impact on influencing faculty participation in online teaching

practices (Betts, 2014; Bruner, 2007; Chapman, 2011; Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009;

Herman, 2013; Lesht & Windes, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008;

Stevenson, 2007). A variety of financial incentives were adopted at different institutions to

encourage faculty participation in distance education, for example, the use of departmental funds

for materials and expenses (Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006), merit pay (Betts, 2014; Bruner,

2007; Cook et al., 2009; Hoffman, 2013; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008;

Stevenson, 2007), increase in salary (Betts, 2014; Cook et al., 2009; Green et al., 2009; Hoffman,

2013; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008; Shea, 2007; Stevenson, 2007), stipends during

summer (Bruner, 2007), and other forms of financial support for participation (Betts, 2014;

Hoffman, 2013; Shea, 2007; Stevenson, 2007).

Studies had been conducted to examine the relationship between financial rewards and

faculty participation in online education (Betts, 2014; Bruner, 2007; Chapman, 2011; Cook et al.,

2009; Green et al., 2009; Lesht & Windes, 2011; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder,

2008; Stevenson, 2007). Bruner (2007) found that younger faculty between the ages of 30-39

were more likely to teach online courses if additional pay was offered. Interestingly, Cook et al.

(2009) reported similar findings for second-generation distance education faculty who were more

likely to be motivated by merit pay and salary increases. Although merit pay had been rated as

one of the top motivators by faculty in some studies (Pinkerton, 2008; Stevenson, 2007), Betts

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(2014) pointed out that merit pay did not significantly influence faculty who have taught online

courses in her research.

Instructor’s Roles in Online Education and MOOCs

This section reviewed the literature in terms of instructors’ roles in the online education

and MOOC environment. The subsequent section discussed the numerous roles instructors

performed while teaching in the MOOC context.

Instructor’s Roles in Online Education

The growth of online education was seen as one of the most dramatic recent

developments in postsecondary education in the United States. Given the rapid development of

educational technology, the demand for online education increased rapidly over the past decade

(Seaman, Allen, & Seaman, 2018; Allison, 2015; Bell & Federman, 2013). More and more

universities were offering different online courses and programs to meet online learners’ needs at

different levels (Allen & Seaman, 2008; Han, Ryan, & Manley, 2019; Seaman, Allen, &

Seaman, 2018; West, Waddoups, & Graham, 2007; Young, DeMarco, Nyysti, Harpool, &

Mendez, 2019; Zakharov & Maybee, 2019). The number of postsecondary faculty were engaged

in online education was listed as high as between one-third and one-fourth from the estimates

(Allen, Seaman, Poulin, & Straut, 2016; Marasi, Jones, & Parker, 2020; Mayadas, Bourne, &

Bacsich, 2009; Seaman, 2009). Notably, nearly all educators had to teach online or remotely

during the COVID-19 pandemic (Bao, 2020; Basilaia & Kvavadze, 2020; Daniel, 2020;

Moorhouse, 2020). As the number of online faculty increased rapidly, the awareness of roles

faculty performed in online teaching increased as well. Studies addressing online faculty roles

showed that faculty members played a key role in the following domains, such as the student’s

satisfaction (Fedynich, Bradley, & Bradley, 2015), the success of distance learning (Major,

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2010), the determinant on whether online learning would become an enduring part of higher

education’s instructional mission (Major, 2010), the learning community building (Compton,

2009), the successful design, development, and delivery of online instruction (Wright, 2014), the

success of online teaching (Allen & Seaman, 2013; Johnson, Hewapathirana, & Bowen, 2019;

Maquire, 2005; Seaman, 2009), and the reflection on current trends and issues in an online

learning environment (Lee, 2011). Moreover, it was widely agreed that faculty roles were critical

in managing instruction and in leading learners to achieve learning goals, explanations on the

instructor’s role in detail were essential (Goold, Coldwell, & Craig, 2010; Keengwe & Kidd,

2010; Lim & Lee, 2008; McQuiggan, 2007; Tao & Yeh, 2008).

Over the years, different taxonomies and models had been created to specify numerous

online faculty roles that needed to perform while teaching online. Researchers documented

numerous online faculty roles in the literature using different classification approaches. Although

literature showed variety in the context regarding online teacher’s roles, commonalities were

found to address these roles that online instructors assumed as they teach.

An effective online course expected faculty to possess a multi-dimensional role and a

varied and wide range of competencies (Albrahim, 2020; Davidson, 2019; Lee, 2011). Over the

years, numerous roles and functions had been assumed by instructors: administrator (Bawane &

Spector, 2009; Goodyear, Salmon, Spector, Steeples, & Tickner, 2001; Martin, Budhrani,

Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019), coach (Alvarez, Guasch, & Espasa, 2009; Bonk, Wisher, & Lee,

2004; Collins, 2006; Volman, 2005; Lim & Lee, 2008; Zhu, Valcke, & Schellens, 2010),

community organizer (Siemens, 2008), consultant (Bonk, Wisher, & Lee, 2004; Goodyear et al.,

2001; Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019), counsellor (Bawane & Spector, 2009;

Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019), evaluator (Bawane & Spector, 2009), facilitator

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(Alvarez et al., 2009; Aydin 2005; Berge, 2008; Bonk, Wisher, & Lee, 2004; Lim & Lee, 2008;

Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019; Zhu, Valcke, & Schellens, 2010), helper (Lim &

Lee, 2008; Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019; Zhu, Valcke, & Schellens, 2010),

instructional designer (Aydin 2005; Chang, Shen, & Liu, 2014; Egan & Akdere, 2005; Marcelo,

2006; Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019; Williams, 2003), mediator (Alvarez et al.,

2009), mentor (Berge, 2008), moderator of learning (Alvarez et al., 2009; Collins, 2006;

Volman, 2005), observer (Berge, 2008), professional (Bawane & Spector, 2009), researcher

(Bawane & Spector, 2009; Goodyear et al., 2001), supervisor (Zhu, Valcke, & Schellens, 2010),

supplier of resources (Berge, 2008; Bonk, Wisher, & Lee, 2004), technologist (Bawane &

Spector, 2009; Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019), tutor (Alvarez et al., 2009) in

which the debates were more frequent and intense. To a certain extent, these roles overlapped in

terms of their functions and tasks in online teaching practice. Given that, some researchers

separated teaching-related tasks and proposed an individual role for every single task. For

instance, a technologist for providing technological help to learners (Bawane & Spector, 2009),

an instructional designer for designing course contents (Baran, Corriea, & Thompson, 2011), a

career coach for identifying a personal goal and developing leadership skills (Barrett, 2012).

Conversely, other researchers grouped relevant teaching tasks to have one role for multiple tasks,

such as facilitating and sustaining student’s participation and motivation (Bawane & Spector,

2009).

To create a successful online course, instructors had to shift roles. The expansion of

online education at this extremely rapid rate resulted in a dramatic evolution in instructor roles.

The instructor’s role in online learning shifted from the ‘sage of the stage’ to the ‘guide on the

side (Chiasson, Terras, & Smart, 2015).’ In other words, they were no longer an information

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dispenser, but a cheerleader (Mazzolini & Maddison, 2007; Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, &

Ritzhaupt, 2019) or a course facilitator (Burkle & Cleveland-Innes, 2013; Chiasson et al., 2015;

Martin, Budhrani, Kumar, & Ritzhaupt, 2019; O’Neil, 2006). These new roles brought faculty

into a new venue that they lost a certain autonomy commonly existed in which didactic learning

occurred, but became a member of a team, asking probing questions to guide students to find

answers independently.

One of the early models dealing with instructors’ roles in online education was put forth

by Berge. He developed the Instructor’s Roles Model in 1995 and identified the online

instructor’s roles in four areas (pedagogical, social, managerial, and technical). The pedagogical

role mainly focused on facilitating effective learning, keeping the discussion on track,

contributing insights, and maintaining group harmony (Berge, 1995; Berge, 2008). The

pedagogical role was ranked as the top one among eight comprehensive roles by a group of

experts with multicultural backgrounds in a study conducted by Bawane and Spector (2009).

Social role dealt with creating a friendly social environment for online learners to promote

human relationships, develop group cohesiveness, maintain the group as a whole and help team

members to achieve the success of any online learning activities (Guasch, Alvarez, & Espasa,

2010; Major, 2010). The managerial role involved all the work related to agenda setting,

objective setting, procedural rules making, decision making, and interaction managing (Guasch

et al., 2010). Sometimes, the managerial role was tied to establishing rules and regulations to

function as the administration role (Bawane & Spector, 2009). The technical role was expected

to ensure the technology (hardware and software) was accessible to online learners and provide

help when learners needed it. However, most of the technical issues were handled by technology

support specialist or staff in many universities as online education expand rapidly and grow

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maturely. Some functions and roles overlapped or could be placed in more than one category

because they were not always neatly fit into one in teaching practice. These roles were defined

within the online discussion context and were suggested at a time when online education just

grew up. Therefore, changes in the roles for this model were needed to update and reflect the

current needs. Berge (2008) advocated making changes in his model to focus more on “informal,

collaborative, reflective learning, with user-generated content” (p.412).

Researchers used Berge’s finding guiding different studies with various approaches and

populations (Coppola, Hiltz & Rotter, 2002; Klein, Spector, Grabbowski, & De la Teja, 2004;

Martin, Wang, & Sadaf, 2018; Oyarzun, Martin, & Moore, 2020; Williams, 2003). However,

researchers explored other necessary faculty roles that students perceived as significant in an

online learning environment. For example, Alvarez et al. (2009) reviewed existing studies via

several databases (ERIC, ICYT, and ISOC) and summarized five categories of instructor’s role:

planning and design role, social role, cognitive role, technical role, and managerial role. The

cognitive role was first addressed in focusing on dealing with mental processes in terms of

learning, perception, information storage, memory, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills.

A list of competencies for each faculty role category was discussed and included in the study to

guide teacher training directions. Moreover, Lee (2011) collected responses via a survey from

384 university students in Korea and found five instructor’s roles, namely pedagogical,

managerial, technical, affective, and differentiating roles, were perceived as critical in a

multicultural online learning environment. It’s worth noting that affective differentiating roles

were not addressed in previous research. They were rated as important as pedagogical,

managerial, and technical roles by participants in Lee’s study. The affective role stressed the

relationship between instructors and students, which appeared like the social role in Berge’s

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model. While the differentiating role focused on adopting multiple strategies to teach students

with different abilities and interests to help them achieve their learning goals.

Sfard (1998) identified two different models (acquisition model and participation model)

to examine the instructor’s changing role from knowledge dispenser to facilitator through the use

of information technology. Acquiring pre-specified knowledge and developing an understanding

of predetermined concepts were the two main foci in the acquisition model. Therefore, the

primary role of an instructor in this model was to deliver, suggest, and clarify concepts. On the

other hand, learning through interaction and student-centered was seen as the core value in the

participation model. Instructors were described as facilitators, mentors, expert participants, and

guardians of practice/discourse.

Except for the roles aforementioned, additional peripheral roles were highly considered

by instructors for quality teaching. Table 1 presented online instructor roles as suggested in the

literature. This table was adapted from Bawane and Spector’s (2009) study, a literature review of

online instructor roles (Muñoz-Carril, González-Sanmamed, and Hernández-Sellés, 2013), and

other studies focusing on faculty roles in online teaching practice (Baran et al., 2011; Chang et

al., 2014; Lee, 2011).

Table 1. Summary of the Existing Literature Studies on the Roles of Faculty in Online Education

Studies Roles

Chang et al., 2014 Content expert, instructional designer, learning assessor,

administrative manager

Lee, 2011 Pedagogical, managerial, technical, affective, differentiating

Guasch et al., 2010 Design/planning, social, instructive, technological, managerial

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Bawane & Spector, 2009 Professional, pedagogical, social, evaluator, administrator,

technologist, advisor/counselor, researcher

Berge, 2008 Pedagogical, social, managerial, technical

Varvel, 2007 Administrative, personal, technological, instructional design,

pedagogical, assessment, social roles

Marcelo, 2006

Advisor, counselor, tutor, designer-planner/instructional

designer/organizer, manager/administrator/administrative

manager, course manager, technological expert/technologist

Aydin, 2005

Content expert, process facilitator, instructional designer,

advisor/counselor, technologist, assessor, material producer,

administrator

Egan & Akdere, 2005

Designer-planner/instructional designer/organizer, evaluator/

assessor/evaluation specialist, facilitator/site facilitator-

proctor/process facilitator, graphic designer, direct instructor/

Instructor/instructor-facilitator/pedagogical, leader/change

agent, librarian, manager/administrator/administrative manager,

course manager, media publisher, editor, systems expert,

technician, technological expert/technologist, trainer

Salmon, 2004

Knowledgeable about online processes, content expert,

interpersonal communicator/communicator, personal (personal

qualities and characteristics), technological expert/technologist

Williams, 2003

Administrative manager, instructor/facilitator, instructional

designer, trainer, leader/change agent, technology expert,

graphic designer, media publisher/editor, technician, support

staff, librarian, evaluation specialist, site facilitator/proctor

Coppola et al., 2002 Cognitive, affective, managerial

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Anderson et al., 2001 Instructional design, facilitating discourse, direct instruction

Goodyear et al., 2001 Process facilitator, advisor/counselor, assessor, researcher,

content facilitator, technologist, designer,

manager/administrator

Salmon, 2000 Knowledgeable about online processes, content expert,

interpersonal communicator/communicator, personal (personal

qualities and characteristics), technological expert/technologist

Wiesenberg & Hutton,

1996

Direct instructor/instructor/instructor-facilitator/pedagogical,

manager/administrator/administrative manager, course

manager, social/discourse facilitator, technological

expert/technologist

Berge, 1995 Pedagogical, social, managerial, technical

Thach & Murphy, 1995

Designer-planner/instructional designer/organizer,

evaluator/assessor/evaluation specialist, facilitator/site

facilitator-proctor/process facilitator, graphic designer, direct

instructor/instructor/instructor-facilitator/pedagogical, librarian,

manager/administrator/administrative manager, course

manager, media publisher, editor, support staff, technician,

technological expert/technologist

Several aspects of instruction, including assessment strategies, course content,

communication, methods, interaction, and teacher roles, all had been changed because of online

education (Burkle & Cleveland-Innes, 2013; Chang et al., 2014; Johnson & Meehan, 2013).

Online education presented many opportunities and challenges for instructors. Adapting to new

roles had been cited as one challenge for instructors to transit from traditional brick and mortar

classrooms to online teaching (Allison, 2015; Holly, Legg, Mueller, & Adelman, 2008). While

some instructors welcomed this challenge in online teaching, some felt lost and uncertain about

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how to support students in an online learning environment. Literature is abundant regarding the

secret of success in teaching online but a relative paucity of research deeply exploring

instructor’s perceptions about their roles in the online context.

There were 277 instructors from 20 universities in Taiwan with experience in teaching

online courses that had been surveyed (Chang et al., 2014). Change et al. (2014) explored the

perceptions of these e-instructors towards their roles in online teaching activities. They found

that “content expertise” and “instruction designer” were considered as the most important two

roles of e-instructors. Moreover, “learning assessor” and “administrative manager” were rated as

the third and fourth most important role. Interestingly, they found gender made significant

differences in instructor’s perception toward the roles in online instruction. Female instructors

held a more positive attitude than males toward their online teaching roles. However, from the

quantitative results of this study, no significant differences were found among the participants

with different rank, experiences, and training support. In other words, ranks, length of teaching

experiences, and training support did not affect the instructor’s perception of their roles in online

instruction.

Roles of MOOC Instructors

Studies of instructors’ roles in the MOOC environment derived from traditional online

courses. Early research of online learning focused on student achievement and outcomes (Dell,

Low, & Wilker, 2010; Jahng, Krug, & Zhang, 2007; Lei, 2010), and dynamic interaction (Cho &

Kim, 2013; He, 2013; Zimmerman, 2012). As MOOCs emerged, the role and responsibility of an

instructor for engaging learners in MOOCs continued to be questioned as to the instructor’s role

in MOOCs differed from the regular online learning environment (Haavind & Sistek-Chandler,

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2015). Empirical research regarding instructors’ roles in MOOCs was relatively scarce compared

to their counterparts in other modalities.

Each MOOC type served a different purpose regardless of a variety of classifications that

had emerged to describe MOOCs. Existing studies of teacher typology were discussed mostly in

cMOOC and xMOOC as these two MOOC modalities represented the primary forms of the

current MOOC practice. The core value of cMOOC was embodied in the student-centered

pedagogy, advocating facilitating student’s self-directed learning and offering more opportunities

for students to connect (Barnard-Brak et al., 2010; Daniel, 2012; Horn, 2013; Joksimović,

Dowell, Poquet, Kovanović, Gašević, Dawson, & Graesser, 2018; Lewin, 2012; Rodriguez,

2012; Zhang, 2012). The instructor’s role in cMOOC was highly interactive, even if the contact

between the instructor and student was low and indirect (Haavind & Sistek-Chandler, 2015). The

instructor in cMOOC was expected to instruct less and facilitate and guide students through self-

directed learning. A few empirical studies interviewed MOOC instructors and investigated their

perceptions of their roles in cMOOC (Haavind & Sistek-Chandler, 2015). Ultimately, terms such

as “captain of a ship” and “working on a nest in a forest” had been used by interviewees to

describe their instructor experience in cMOOC.

While the goal of xMOOC was set mainly to deliver content and broadcast, which

emphasized in lecture-centered (Bates, 2012; Barnard-Brak et al., 2010; Conole, 2015; Horn,

2013; Lewin, 2012; Roscorla, 2012; Siemens, 2012). Therefore, the instructor’s role in the

xMOOC was more like a designer and content producer (Haavind & Sistek-Chandler, 2015),

which differed from that of a traditional online course instructor. “Distant academic celebrity”

(Ross, Sinclair, Knox, Bayne, & Macleod, 2014, p. 60) and “actor-producer” (Rodriguez, 2012,

p.7) were two cited examples to describe instructor’s roles in xMOOC by researchers.

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Conceptual Framework

A compilation of two theories formed a conceptual framework by which faculty

participation in MOOC could be analyzed. Deci and Ryan’s (1985) Theory of Self-

Determination provided a great perspective for understanding how intrinsic and extrinsic factors

affected human being’s motivation to engage in activities. Berge’s (1995) Instructor’s Roles

Model provided a framework to examine the roles that instructors performed in different stages

of teaching practice in the context of MOOC. Each of these theories was leveraged to develop a

conceptual framework for gaining a better understanding of MOOC instructors’ teaching

experience in this study.

Self-Determination Theory

Self-Determination Theory (SDT) had been one of the predominant motivational theories

since its formal introduction made by Dr. Edward Deci and Dr. Richard Ryan in 1985. SDT

espoused that human beings were intrinsically motivated to engage in activities that would

satisfy innate psychological needs under specific conditions. SDT was specifically developed to

look at how and what social-contextual factors facilitated or undermined human being’s intrinsic

motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000).

Autonomy, competence, and relatedness were the three basic psychological needs SDT

identified as influencing human beings' health and well-being (Ryan & Deci, 2017). Autonomy

described a perceived locus of control over the process of making choices. Competence

described a perceived capacity to effectively complete tasks and manage the environment.

Relatedness described the sense of belongingness and connectedness to significant others, social

groups, culture, and community (Ryan & Deci, 2000; Ryan, 1995). An example of relatedness

would be the perceived sense or feeling of acceptance by faculty who participated in online

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education when recognized by peers, colleagues, and the institution. These three needs were

regarded as universal for the development of self-determined motivational behaviors and were

observed in individuals from different cultures (Ryan & Deci, 2017). SDT asserted that the

satisfaction of the three basic psychological needs would facilitate intrinsic motivation and

promote the internalization of extrinsic motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2017).

There were six mini-theories developed within SDT: Cognitive Evaluation Theory

(CET), Organismic Integration Theory (OIT), Causality Orientations Theory (COT), Basic

Psychological Needs (BPN), Goal Contents Theory (GCT), and Relationships Motivation Theory

(RMT). Among them, CET exclusively focused on intrinsic motivation and OIT addressed

extrinsic motivation. Consequently, these two mini-theories could be used as the basis for

guiding the present study.

Intrinsic motivation. The concept of intrinsic motivation was addressed in the Cognitive

Evaluation Theory (CET) which was a sub-theory of the Self-Determination Theory. CET was

primarily concerned with how social and environmental factors (e.g., rewards, evaluations, or

feedback) influenced intrinsic motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2017). Initially, scholars struggled to

reach consensus in defining intrinsic motivation as a result of two dominant and competing

behavioral theories in the field of psychology between 1940 and 1960: Learning Theory &

Operant Theory. The Learning Theory (Hull, 1943) posited that all human behavior was

motivated by their innate psychological needs. As a result, researchers defined intrinsic

motivation as the innate satisfaction of gratifying individual psychological drives. While, the

Operant Theory (Skinner, 1953) maintained that all human behavior was motivated by external

rewards. Therefore, Skinner defined intrinsic motivation as an activity being interesting because

the reward was in the activity itself. Given that Ryan and Deci (2000) focused primarily on

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human psychological needs, they defined intrinsic motivation as “the doing of an activity for its

inherent satisfactions rather than for some separable consequence” (p. 56).

It had been found that the intrinsic motivation of human beings increased when their

basic psychological needs were satisfied (Deci & Ryan, 2000; Ryan, 1995). Within the area of

Cognitive Evaluation Theory (CET), Ryan and Deci reviewed a substantial number of studies

and laboratory experiments. As a result, they pointed out several social and environmental

factors that promoted or detracted from the intrinsic motivation of people. For example, it was

found that competence accompanied by autonomy facilitated intrinsic motivation, and that

intrinsic motivation was enhanced by positive performance feedback. It was further found that

choice and the opportunity for self-direction appeared to have an impact on intrinsic motivation

as well. By comparison, it was claimed that extrinsic rewards, such as tangible rewards, threats,

deadlines, directives, and competition pressure, could diminish intrinsic motivation because

these factors would shift a person’s perceived autonomy from internal to external.

Ryan and Deci (2000) noted that different levels of motivation were developed through a

specific process that fell along a continuum of regulations ranging from controlled to

autonomous (see Figure 3). The transformation process of going from a regulation that was

driven by external factors to a completely autonomous internal regulation was theorized as being

that of Internalization and Integration.

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Figure 3. Self-Determination Theory. Adapted from “Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations: Classic

Definitions and New Directions” by Ryan & Deci, 2000, Contemporary educational psychology,

25, p.61.

Based on degrees of autonomy or self-determination, Ryan and Deci (2000) grouped

three types of motivation (amotivation, extrinsic motivation, and intrinsic motivation) into two

categories: controlled motivation and autonomous motivation. Not a surprise, the graph depicts

intrinsic motivation as being the most autonomous of the three.

Extrinsic motivation. As another major construct within Self-Determination Theory

(SDT), Organismic Integration Theory (OIT) primarily focused on extrinsic motivation. Whereas

intrinsically motivated people were governed by personal interest, it was found that extrinsically

motivated behaviors were directed by external incentives. People were extrinsically motivated to

engage in an activity because of the incentives’ instrumental value and obtain additional

outcomes (Ryan & Deci, 2000).

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Ryan and Deci (2000) found that extrinsic motivation varied greatly based on the degree

of autonomy. Therefore, they divided extrinsic motivation into four major types of motivational

regulation: external, introjection, identification, and integration.

First, external regulation was identified as being the least autonomous type of extrinsic

motivation. At this level, human behaviors were perceived as being ‘controlled’ because they

were dependent on external contingency (e.g., reward or punishment). The control power of

rewards and punishments placed on people's behavior resulted in two major problems of external

regulation: ineffectiveness and lack of maintenance. Individuals would participate in activities

and sustained their behaviors overtime only when the contingency was in place (Ryan & Deci,

2000; Ryan & Deci, 2017).

Second, although introjection regulation was seen as being barely autonomous, in terms

of the degree to act with self-determination, it was more autonomous than external regulation.

OIT suggested that efforts to avoid a sense of guilt or to maintain a feeling of approval were the

major reasons for individuals to take action in activities at this level (Ryan & Deci, 2000; Ryan

& Deci, 2017).

Third, identification regulation was characterized as having more autonomy than either

external or introjection regulation. People performed acts at this level because they realized the

value and importance of actions that would help them progress toward their ultimate goals (Ryan

& Deci, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2017).

Fourth, integration regulation was the last type of extrinsic motivation identified and the

one found to be the most autonomous within OIT. With this type of motivation, individuals saw

the connection between psychological needs, values, identifications, and activities. People used

high-order reflection to conduct self-examinations and to bring new values into congruence with

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other needs in order to internalize their reasons for actions. This regulation remained an extrinsic

motivation because the reasons for the activity were based on presumed instrumental value, and

the outcomes of the behaviors were separated from the behavior itself (Ryan & Deci, 2000; Ryan

& Deci, 2017).

Depending on an individual’s prior experience and situational factors, people didn’t need

to go through each stage of internalization according to the continuum. Ryan and Connell (1989)

found that an inter-correlated relationship existed among these four types of regulations that to a

large extent served to provide the evidence necessary for explaining the control-autonomy

continuum. The theory of self-determination has been applied to different domains (e.g.,

education, business, athletics, health care, and religion) in order to analyze the issue of human

needs, as well as to gain a better understanding concerning the central issue of people’s

behaviors as motivation.

Instructor’s Roles Model

Instructor’s Roles Model, put forth by Zane L. Berge (1995), was one of the early models

dealing with instructor’s roles in online education. This model was initially developed to identify

the roles and functions of the online instructors in the context of computer conferencing,

particularly for online discussion in Berge’s (1995) study. Berge’s model categorized teacher

roles into four areas (pedagogical, social, managerial, and technical) when they facilitate online

discussions (see Figure 4).

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Figure 4. Instructor’s Roles Model by Berge (2008, p. 409)

Pedagogical role. The pedagogical role mainly revolved around facilitating effective

learning, keeping the discussion on track, contributing insights, and maintaining group harmony

(Berge, 2008). The pedagogical role was ranked as the top one among eight comprehensive roles

by a group of experts with multicultural backgrounds in a recent study conducted by Bawane and

Spector (2009).

Social role. Social role dealt with creating a friendly social environment for online

learners to promote human relationships, develop group cohesiveness, maintain the group as a

whole and help team members to achieve the success of any online learning activities (Guasch et

al., 2010; Major, 2010; Tang, Wang, Qian, & Peck, 2016).

77

Managerial role. The managerial role involved all the work related to agenda setting,

objective setting, procedural rules making, decision making, and interaction managing (Guasch

et al., 2010; Tang, Wang, Qian, & Peck, 2016). Sometimes, the managerial role was tied to

establish rules and regulations to function as the administration role (Bawane & Spector, 2009).

Technical role. The technical role was expected to ensure the technology (hardware and

software) was accessible to online learners and provide help when learners need. However,

technology support specialist or staff in many universities handled most of the technical issues as

online education grew maturely and expanded rapidly (Berge, 2008).

Some functions and roles in this model overlapped or could be placed in more than one

category because they were not always neatly fit into one in teaching practice. These roles were

defined within the online discussion context and were suggested at a time when online education

just grew up. Therefore, changes in the roles for this model were needed to update and reflect the

current needs. Berge advocates making changes in his model to focus more on “informal,

collaborative, reflective learning, with user-generated content” (Berge, 2008, p.412).

The instructor’s roles model was founded based on Berge’s research experience and other

scholars’ work (Gulley, 1968; Hyman, 1980; Mason, 1991). They all acknowledged the fact that

instructors performed pedagogical, social, and managerial roles in various ways when they

taught online. Whereas, Berge added the fourth one “technical role” in his model as he found the

instructor role tied closely with technology integration in an online learning environment. He

advocated that the use of technology was secondary in the process of developing and delivering

online instruction.

Although some researchers pointed out that Berge’s roles model failed to link the

instructor’s roles to defined competencies (Feeler, 2012; Parker, 2014), Berge’s model had been

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widely applied to a myriad of empirical studies to identify faculty perceptions and experiences in

terms of their roles in the development of online instruction as well as provide guidance

regarding facilitation skills for online courses. This model had set a foundation for future

research to look at the online instructor’s competencies in higher education and pave a path to

reshape the instructor’s roles in online teaching and learning compared to the traditional teaching

modality.

Summary

The rise of MOOCs reshaped online teaching. Although MOOCs’ potential and MOOC

learners’ experience had been widely discussed, there remained a paucity of empirical studies on

investigating MOOC instructors’ teaching experiences in MOOCs. Chapter Two reviewed

literature including an overview of MOOC, MOOC experiences, MOOC issues, motivating

factors for participation in online education and MOOCs, instructor’s roles in online education

and MOOCs, and the conceptual framework used to guide this study. In Chapter Three, a review

of the methodology used in this study was included along with a detailed description of the

research design. Both the participants and context were addressed with a sampling plan. Data

collection, including procedures for the survey instrument and interview protocol, was explained.

Data analysis procedures were outlined with details for each of the data types. Rigor measures,

including validity, reliability, dependability, credibility, transferability, and confirmability were

discussed.

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CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY

This mixed methods study focused on MOOC instructors’ experiences. A convergent

parallel research design was employed, and it’s a type of design in which quantitative and

qualitative data were collected in parallel, analyzed separately, and then merged at the

interpretation stage. In this study, a web-based survey and semi-structured interviews were used

to identify the intrinsic and extrinsic motivators that influenced MOOC instructors to teach a

MOOC, understand the nature of roles performed in teaching MOOCs, and to learn more about

the lessons MOOC instructors received from the MOOC teaching experience. Collecting both

quantitative and qualitative data helped the researcher bring greater insights into the research

problem than eliciting information through either type of data separately (Creswell and Plano

Clark, 2007). This chapter reviewed the research questions and described the research

methodology, including the research paradigm, participants and context, instrumentation and

procedures, data collection and analysis, and strategies to ensure rigor in both quantitative and

qualitative strands.

Research Questions

The goal of the study was to explore the experiences of higher education faculty members

who had previously taught a MOOC or who were currently teaching a MOOC via edX or

Coursera from 2013 to 2017. The following research questions were addressed in this study.

Research Questions for Quantitative Phase

1. What intrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

2. What extrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

3. What are faculty experiences teaching a MOOC?

Research Questions for Qualitative Phase

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1. How do higher education faculty describe their decision-making process in terms of

participating in MOOC?

2. What are the roles and experiences higher education faculty encounter in delivering a

MOOC?

3. What lessons have higher education faculty learned through the experience of

teaching a MOOC?

Research Design

A convergent parallel mixed methods research design was used in this study. Creswell

and Plano Clark (2007) defined mixed methods research as:

“Mixed methods research is a research design with philosophical assumptions as well as

methods of inquiry. As a methodology, it involves philosophical assumptions that guide

the direction of the collection and analysis and the mixture of qualitative and quantitative

approaches in many phases of the research process. As a method, it focuses on collecting,

analyzing, and mixing both quantitative and qualitative data in a single study or series of

studies. Its central premise is that the use of quantitative and qualitative approaches, in

combination, provides a better understanding of research problems than either approach

alone (p.5).”

The mixed methods approach was grounded in psychology and was widely used by

researchers in the late 1980s because they recognized the limitations of single methods brought

to the study and the biases caused by these limitations (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2010). The

mixed methods research approach incorporated many of the strengths of the two main research

paradigms (i.e., quantitative and qualitative) to address complex social inquiries in diverse areas

of social science, including health, education, nursing, sociology, and immigration (Hudson,

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2013). Creswell and Plano Clark (2007) stated that the blended design of quantitative and

qualitative strands could help better understand a research problem than either approach alone.

The rationale for the utilization of mixed methods research included: a) its capability of

providing answers to research questions that the other methods cannot supply, b) its capability to

make stronger inferences and c) its capability to present a greater diversity of divergent views

(Creswell & Plano Clark, 2010). The advantages of the mixed methods design had been widely

discussed and well-documented in the literature (Collins & O’Cathain, 2009; Symonds &

Gorard, 2010).

The rationale behind employing a mixed methods approach for this study was threefold.

First, the research of MOOC instructors’ experiences was a complex phenomenon in social

science affected by a multitude of factors. The quantitative or qualitative method might not

thoroughly examine the problem and answer the research questions. A mixed methods approach

provided strengths that could make up for the weakness of using one approach alone (Creswell

and Plano Clark, 2007). Second, with the complexity of the research problem addressed,

different points of view toward this phenomenon were needed for the analysis and interpretation.

Mixed method research advocated “the use of multiple worldviews or paradigms (i.e., beliefs and

values) rather than the typical association of certain paradigm with quantitative research and

others for qualitative research (Creswell and Plano Clark, 2007, p.13).” Diversity of divergent

views were approached by using the combination of two different research paradigms. Finally,

the quantitative method was to generalize from the sample in its nature. While the qualitative

method tended not to do so but to develop an in-depth understanding of a small number of

people. The inferences made from two different methods converged were stronger than using

either one alone.

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Creswell and Plano Clark (2011) classified mixed methods research into six types:

convergent parallel design, explanatory sequential design, exploratory sequential design,

embedded design, transformative design, and multiphase design (see Table 2).

Table 2. Summary of Six Types of Mixed Methods Research Design

Type of

Design

Purpose Priority of the

Strands

Data Collection Data

Analysis

Convergent

Design

To corroborate,

compare or relate

two sets of findings

of a topic

Equal emphasis One phase,

concurrent

Merging

analysis

Explanatory

Design

To explain

quantitative results

Quantitative

emphasis

Two distinct

phases

Sequential

analysis

Exploratory

Design

To test or measure

qualitative

exploratory

findings

Qualitative

emphasis

Two distinct

phases

Sequential

analysis

Embedded

Design

To gain a more

complete

understanding of an

experimental trial

Either quantitative

or qualitative

emphasis

Either concurrent

or sequential

Merging

or

sequential

analysis

Transformative

Design

To identify and

challenge social

injustices

Equal, quantitative

or qualitative

emphasis

Either concurrent

or sequential

Merging

or

sequential

analysis

Multiphase

Design

To implement

multiple phases to

Equal emphasis Multiphase

combination

Merging

or

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address a program

objective

sequential

analysis

Convergent Parallel Research Design

This study adopted a convergent parallel design to acquire complementary quantitative

and qualitative data with equal weight (i.e., the same level of priority) on the same topic to

produce a more thorough and in-depth understanding of higher education faculty members’

teaching experiences in MOOCs. The convergent parallel design had been called by other names,

such as simultaneous triangulation (Morse, 1991), parallel study (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998),

convergence model (Creswell, 1999), and concurrent triangulation (Creswell, Plano Clark, et al.,

2003). It had been widely used across different disciplines such as education, social science,

psychology, business, and nursing (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2010). This research design aimed

at corroborating, comparing, or relating two sets of data through collecting quantitative and

qualitative data concurrently during the same phase of the research. As shown in Figure 5, the

results from quantitative and qualitative strands were compared to determine convergence,

divergence, or a combination of the two. An overall interpretation was made based on the

completion of the analysis.

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Figure 5. Prototypical Version of the Convergent Parallel Design. Adapted from “Designing and

Conducting Mixed Methods Research” by Creswell & Plano Clark, 2010, p. 250.

Participants and Context

The target population for the quantitative phase in this study was all MOOC instructors

who were currently teaching or had previously taught a MOOC from 2013 to 2017 via edX or

Coursera in the following subject areas (edX: Computer Science, Business and Management,

Engineering, Social Sciences, Humanities, Science, Data Analysis and Statistics, Economics and

Finance, Biology and Life Science, and Physics; Coursera: Arts and Humanities, Business,

Computer Science, Data Science, Life Sciences, Math and Logic, Personal Development,

Physical Science and Engineering, Social Sciences, and Language Learning). These subjects or

categories ranked as the top disciplines that provided the largest number of course offerings on

edX or Coursera (two primary MOOC providers in the United States with a massive number of

enrolles from all over the world).

A criterion sampling strategy was used to draw the samples. The samples were taken

from those who were currently affiliated with a higher education institution and spoke English.

Email was the primary means to reach out to these potential participants. Based on the

information on the websites of edX and Coursera, the researcher generated a list containing all

eligible participants’ names, email addresses, institutions, position titles, and other pertinent

information.

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While for the qualitative phase, prospective interviewees (from the same pool of the

target population) who had the knowledge and experience to provide information about the area

being studied and with all characteristics needed for the nature of this study were considered.

Criteria for selecting the interviewees included: 1) the willingness to participate in the interview;

2) ability to speak English; 3) currently teaching or had taught a MOOC via edX or Coursera; 4)

MOOC taught by him/her was delivered in English; 5) currently affiliated with a higher

education institution. The researcher gave priority to those who were currently teaching a MOOC

via edX or Coursera in 2017 because these MOOC instructors might have a fresh memory than

those who taught in early years.

IRB approval (see Appendix A) was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of the

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa prior to the recruitment of participants for this study. Potential

participants for quantitative and qualitative phases were reached out by recruitment emails (see

Appendix B) based on the list of names and email addresses the researcher compiled. The

recruitment email clearly stated the purpose of the study and provided instructions on how to

participate. The researcher created two consent forms (see Appendix C) for both quantitative and

qualitative strands. For the quantitative phase, the consent form was shared and embedded in the

landing page of the web-based survey. For the qualitative phase, the consent form was sent via

email to the interested interviewees ahead of the interviews asking them to sign and return the

digital form to the researcher before or on the scheduled interview date. The consent form for

interviewees outlining the purpose of the study, time commitment, benefits and risks, as well as

confidentiality and privacy terms. Interested individuals’ participation for both strands was on a

completely voluntary basis in this study.

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Instrumentation and Procedures

The instruments for collecting responses from survey participants and interviewees were

a web-based survey and semi-structured interviews. Items in the web-based survey were drawn

from the work of previous studies and adapted to the purpose and scope of this research. An

interview protocol (Appendix F) was developed and used to guide all interviews.

Quantitative Instrument

A web-based survey enabled a researcher to reach out to thousands of potential

participants located in different geographical regions in a short amount of time (Taylor, 2000;

Yun & Trumbo, 2000), helped a researcher save time on collecting data (Llieva, Baron, &

Healey, 2002), and reduced the cost compared to a traditional paper and pencil survey (Couper,

2000; Llieva et al., 2002; Yun & Trumbo, 2000). Survey items in this study were synthesized

and adapted based on two pre-developed instruments from the works of Dr. Kristen Betts (1998)

and Drs. Suzannah Evans and Jessica Gall Myrick (2015). Dr. Betts created a survey for her

dissertation study at George Washington University, aiming to elicit information from faculty

and administrators concerning what factors motivate and inhibit faculty participation in distance

education. Her instrument encompassed four sections: demographic, distance education

background, faculty self-assessment, and faculty response. A variety of studies used Dr. Betts’

survey to identify the motivators and inhibitors of faculty participation in distance education

(Adams, 2016; Ball, 2013; Baker, 2020; Collins, Weber, & Zambrano; DiSanto & Guevara,

2019; Hoffman, 2013; Hunt, Davis, Richardson, Hammock, Akins, & Russ, 2014; Mamun,

Danaher, & Rahman, 2015; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006; Schroeder, 2008; Song, 2019;

Stevenson, 2007; Walters, Grover, Turner, & Alexander, 2017; Windes & Lesht, 2014). Given

the MOOC context, questions were modified to fit the theme.

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The second instrument was developed by Drs. Evans and Myrick in a 2015 published

journal article entitled How MOOC instructors view the pedagogy and purpose of massive open

online courses. They looked at the instructors’ perceptions of MOOCs, their beliefs, satisfaction,

and experiences. Permissions (see Appendix D) were obtained from Drs. Betts, Evans, and

Myrick via email to use and adapt their questions from the two instruments aforementioned. The

web-based survey (see Appendix E) used for this study included five sections: introduction,

teaching background, MOOC background, self-assessment, and demographic.

Section I: Introduction. Section one provided an overview of the study (e.g., purpose,

type of questions, time needed for completion, researcher’s contact, etc.) and a consent form.

Section II: Teaching Background. Section two included five questions investigating the

participant’s previous teaching experience in postsecondary education with a focus on online

education.

Section III: MOOC Background. This section aimed to collect information from

participants understanding their previous MOOC teaching experiences. Thirteen items in this

section were drawn from the instrument developed by Drs. Evans and Myrick in a study focusing

on the MOOC instructor’s perceptions of MOOCs.

Section IV: Self-Assessment. This section was completely pulled from Dr. Betts’ survey

(section III, part 1) and was modified accordingly to fit the context of MOOC. The information

yielded from this part helped the researcher gain insights into the intrinsic and extrinsic

motivators that affected faculty participation in MOOC teaching. The original survey from Dr.

Betts was comprised of two parts with 53 variables on a five-point Likert Scale basis (‘1’

representing maximum disagreement and ‘5’ indicating maximum agreement). The first part with

34 items (9 intrinsic factors, 21 extrinsic factors, and 4 unidentified factors) focused on

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motivating factors. The second part with 19 items focused on inhibiting factors that were not

considered and included in this study. Given the purpose and scale of this study, only part one of

Dr. Betts’s instrument was adopted in this study. The researcher measured intrinsic motivators

using the 9 variables from Dr. Betts’ survey and 3 additional ones derived from a synthesis of

previous studies. Twenty-three extrinsic motivators were drawn directly from Dr. Betts’ survey.

Section V: Demographics. Section five focused on the participant’s demographic data,

such as gender, age, ethnicity, and etc.

A Cronbach’s alpha reliability coefficient showed the internal consistency for the entire

survey was .82 with the values for individual sections on intrinsic and extrinsic motivators and

beliefs about fully online courses equalled to .92 and .78 respectively.

Qualitative Instrument

The qualitative data was collected through semi-structured interviews that were widely

used as they offered greater opportunities for the researcher to explore a broader range of topics

than structured interviews (Hawkins, 2011; Heyl, 2001; Watson, 2014) and they were good for

interviewees to openly share their insights (Esterberg, 2002; Schopieray, 2006). The semi-

structured interview included sixteen open-ended questions developed based on previous studies

and literature. An interview protocol (see Appendix F) was developed and reviewed by the

researcher’s committee. Necessary adjustments to the interview protocol were made after the

committee’s review. Interviewees were encouraged to share their stories, experiences, opinions,

or anything related to their teaching in MOOCs through the interviews. Given the semi-

structured nature, the researcher had the opportunity to ask probing questions for seeking

clarification as needed.

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Table 3 (see below) outlined the relationships among the research questions, instruments,

survey questions, and sources.

Table 3. Alignment of Research Questions and Instruments

Research Questions

(Quantitative Strand)

Instruments Items/Questions Source/Original

Authors

RQ1: What intrinsic factors

motivate higher education

faculty to teach a MOOC?

A web-based

survey

Question #19 Dr. Bett

1998

RQ2: What extrinsic factors

motivate higher education

faculty to teach a MOOC?

A web-based

survey

Question #19 Dr. Bett

1998

RQ3: What are faculty

experiences teaching a MOOC?

A web-based

survey

Question #6 to #18 Drs. Evans &

Myrich,

2015

Research Questions

(Qualitative Strand)

RQ1: How do higher education

faculty describe their decision-

making process in terms of

participating in MOOC?

Semi-structured

Interviews

Question #3 to #5 Previous studies

RQ2: What are the roles and

experiences higher education

faculty encounter in delivering

a MOOC?

Semi-structured

Interviews

Question #1 to #2

Question #6 to #11

Previous studies

RQ3: What lessons have higher

education faculty learned

through the experience of

teaching a MOOC?

Semi-structured

Interviews

Question #12 to #15 Previous studies

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Data Collection

This study adopted the convergent parallel design that was designed for collecting

quantitative and qualitative data concurrently with equal priority given to both strands. A

research protocol was submitted and approved by the Institutional Review Board of the

University of Hawaii (UH IRB) prior to the data collection.

Quantitative Phase

The researcher generated a list including prospective MOOC instructors’ names, email

addresses, institutions, position titles, and so forth. These names were obtained from the websites

of edX or Coursera and were sifted through the criteria aforementioned. The researcher then used

Google to search these names and verify their email addresses one by one.

According to the list, the researcher reached out to all potential participants via email.

The recruitment email stated the purpose of the study and included a brief introduction of the

researcher, a link to the web-based survey, and instructions on how to participate. The web-based

survey remained active for four weeks. The researcher sent out two reminder emails within the

four-week timeframe. The researcher used Google Forms to administer the web-based survey

and stored responses for later analysis.

Qualitative Phase

Data for the qualitative phase was collected concurrently through semi-structured

interviews while quantitative data collection was in process. An interview protocol was

developed including sixteen open-ended questions for interviewees to share their teaching

experiences of MOOCs. The researcher asked some probing questions during the interviews that

helped elicit additional information regarding the topic.

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Recruitment emails were sent out to all prospective interviewees at the same time when

the open call for survey participants was made. Interviewees were drawn from the same pool of

the target population based on a first-reply-first-picked basis. Once the prospective interviewee

responded to the recruitment email, the researcher would send out a follow-up email inviting to

schedule a time for the interview along with a digital consent form. The consent form explained

to the interviewees about their rights, benefits, and risks. Prospective interviewees were asked to

sign and return the form to the researcher prior to or on the scheduled interview date. Each

interview took about an hour (on average) and was recorded by a video-conferencing tool named

Zoom. The recordings were stored in a secure space for later word-for-word transcription and

analysis. Interviewees’ names, departments, institutions where they were employed, and any

additional identification information were coded for confidentiality. The researcher also took

notes to record non-audible responses and wrote memos based on the interviews and statements

made by the interviewees that might be helpful to the later analysis.

Data Analysis

Quantitative Phase

Responses from the web-based survey were exported from Google Forms and entered

into a statistical analysis software (i.e., SPSS version 22.0) for analysis. All data entry errors or

incomplete data were removed. A codebook was developed to document variables, numbered

responses, definitions, and the names assigned to the variable. The researcher read the data

thoroughly to look for trends and distributions. Descriptive statistics were utilized as the

statistical analysis technique (see Table 4) for data representation. Frequencies and percentages

were determined for categorical variables and reported in tabular format. Means and standard

deviations were used on ordinal and ratio variables.

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Table 4. Summary of Statistical Analysis Technique

Section Questions Data type Statistical Analysis Technique

Section 2

Teaching Background

Q1-5 Nominal & Ordinal Descriptive statistics

Section 3

MOOC Background

Q6-18 Nominal Descriptive statistics

Section 4

Self-assessment

Q19 Scale Descriptive statistics

Section 5 Demographic Q20-25 Nominal & Ordinal Descriptive statistics

Qualitative Phase

Interview recordings were transcribed and checked for accuracy before being analyzed.

Following a thematic synthesis method developed by Thomas & Harden (2008), the researcher

coded the transcriptions and combined similar codes to develop categories that helped develop

relevant themes. Thomas and Harden’s thematic synthesis included three stages: free line-by-line

coding, the development of free codes into related categories, and the generation of analytic

themes. More specifically, the researcher read the transcriptions line-by-line first and combined

the analytic memos took during the interviews to develop a codebook for initial theme

development. Labels and colors were assigned to different codes. Codes were grouped into

categories and then merged into themes. The researcher used specific quotes from interviewees

to address each theme. Numbers were assigned to each interviewee during the qualitative

analysis to ensure confidentiality. Data interpretation was made based on the discussion of the

qualitative findings, research questions, the conceptual framework, and literature stated in

Chapter 2.

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Rigor

Rigor in both quantitative and qualitative strands was ensured through the following

techniques in this study.

Validity & Reliability

Validity and reliability are critical to all research. Poor measurement of validity and

reliability can result in ambiguous, inconsistent, and useless data (McMillan & Schumacher,

1989). Rigor for the quantitative phase in this study was addressed in several ways, including the

use of previously developed and published instruments. The reliability and validity of the

instruments had tested with different techniques. For example, Dr. Betts conducted a Delphi

study, several interviews, and pilot tests to ensure the rigor of her instrument. In addition, she

formed a group of educators to reflect on the survey items, definition, instrument direction, and

item consistency to enhance the content validity. Cronbach Alpha was used to measure the

internal consistency in her study. The second instrument used in this study was developed by

Drs. Evans and Myrick, which had no statistical reliability values reported in their study.

However, the researcher emailed Drs. Evans and Myrick and was told that all items in their

instrument were descriptive and the scales in their instrument were developed based on previous

measures.

The items used in the web-based survey were reviewed by the researcher’s committee

chair first and forwarded to the remaining committee members for additional reviews to establish

validity. In an effort to enhance the content validity (Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2011), the

web-based survey was sent to a group of doctoral students in different disciplines at the

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa as an additional measure for collecting insights in terms of the

definitions, directions, item clarity, and etc. The survey was revised based on their feedback and

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returned to the same group of individuals for the second review before going out to the target

population. Proper revisions were made in response to address the additional feedback received.

Reliability concerned precision and accuracy. It dealt with dependability, consistency,

and replicability over time, instruments, and respondents. There were three major types of

reliability in a quantitative study: stability, equivalence, and internal consistency. Measures of

internal consistency were in two main forms: the split-half technique and the alpha coefficient.

The reliability of the web-based survey instrument in this study was established by using the

alpha coefficient (also called Cronbach’s alpha). Cronbach’s alpha measured the internal

consistency among items. It provided “a coefficient of each item with the sum of all the other

relevant items” (p. 201). It was suggested that an instrument reliability level of .70 or higher was

acceptable (Gall, Gall & Borg, 2003). SPSS was utilized to run the Cronbach’s alpha and

indicated the constructs and overall reliability of the web-based survey.

Dependability, Credibility, Transferability, and Confirmability

While, in qualitative research, different terminology (see Table 5) was suggested by

Lincoln and Guba (1985) to replace “reliability” and “validity” because the nature of knowledge

within the quantitative (rationalistic) paradigm was different from the knowledge in qualitative

(naturalistic) paradigm (Guba & Lincoln, 1981). Hence, the qualitative researchers argued that

the quality of a study in each paradigm should be evaluated by new criteria (Altheide & Johnson,

1998; Davies & Dodd, 2002; Healy & Perry, 2000; Leininger, 1994; Rubin & Rubin, 1995).

Table 5. The Terminology of Rigor in Quantitative and Qualitative Research

Qualitative Approach Quantitative Approach

Dependability Reliability

Credibility Internal Validity

Transferability External Validity

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Confirmability Objectivity

A parallel term for rigor in the qualitative study, “trustworthiness,” was developed by

Guba and Lincoln (1981), including four elements: dependability, credibility, transferability, and

confirmability. These four approaches had been used as the new criteria and fundamental

standards to evaluate the quality of qualitative inquiry. The concept of dependability, often

compared to the reliability in quantitative research, was based on the assumption of replicability,

and it referred to the stability of the data (Graneheim & Lundman 2004; Tobin & Begley, 2004;

Shah & Corley, 2006; Rolfe, 2006). Credibility meant whether the findings represented the

original views drawn from the perspective of the participant in the research (Graneheim &

Lundman, 2004; Lincoln & Guba, 1985). It could be examined in two processes: whether the

research was conducted believably and whether the credibility was addressed in the research or

not (Houghton, Casey, Shaw, & Murphy, 2013). Transferability discussed the degree to which

the results of the qualitative research could be generalized or transferred to other contexts or

settings (Leininger, 1994). Confirmability, closely linked to dependability, referred to the degree

to which the results could be confirmed or corroborated by others (Baxter & Eyles, 1997;

Houghton, Casey, Shaw, & Murphy, 2013).

Specific methodological strategies were adopted by qualitative researchers to ensure the

“trustworthiness” of the findings. For example, negative case analysis, peer debriefing,

prolonged engagement, persisted observation, audit trails, member checks, structural

corroboration, and referential material adequacy (Guba & Lincoln, 1981; Lincoln & Guba, 1985;

Guba & Lincoln, 1982). In order to achieve greater credibility in the qualitative strand, as semi-

structured interviews were adopted as the primary approach for data collection, the following

strategies (see Table 6) were utilized to enhance the trustworthiness of my study.

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Table 6. Summary of Techniques Used to Enhance the Trustworthiness of Qualitative Strand

Qualitative (Interview) Techniques

Dependability Code-recode

Credibility Reflexivity (field journal)

Transferability Thick, rich description

The researcher used a code-recode strategy when coding the interview data, left it along

for a few weeks, then recoded and compared the coding results to ensure consistency. Keeping a

reflective journal also helped enhance the credibility and confirmability of the study. Providing a

detailed description of the interviewees and using quotes from them helped increase the

thickness of the data interpretation and providing a rich understanding of the study.

Summary

Chapter Three described the methodology used to achieve the purpose of the study. It

was comprised of the research design, participants and context, instrumentation and procedures,

data collection, data analysis, and rigor. A web-based survey and semi-structured interviews

were employed to solicit information from the target population. The survey instrument was a

compilation of two pre-developed instruments and was grounded in the theoretical framework

and literature review described in Chapter Two.

The results of the study had the potential to provide information for informing

administrative decisions about MOOCs, assisting instructional designers to consider proper

trainings and supporting resources, offering MOOC platforms opportunities to improve the

services, enabling new and veteran MOOC instructors to expand the open and free educational

opportunities to a wide range of learners who were seeking convenient and flexible access to

(free) educational resources.

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CHAPTER 4. QUANTITATIVE FINDINGS

This chapter described the quantitative findings of this study. It began with demographics

and teaching background of survey participants, followed by descriptive statistics to answer the

three research questions for the quantitative phase.

Quantitative data were collected from July to November in 2018 by administering a web-

based survey, to MOOC instructors who were currently teaching a MOOC or had taught a

MOOC previously via edX or Coursera over the course of 2013-2017. The quantitative data was

analyzed using SPSS, a statistical analysis software. Descriptive statistics and frequencies were

used to identify trends and characteristics of the given datasets. The web-based survey was sent

to a pool of 1,807 MOOC instructors selected from edX and Coursera who met the participating

criteria (see Chapter 3). Of the 1,807 participants who were invited to take part in, 89

respondents completed the survey in its entirety, and one participant provided incomplete data.

Although the 89 survey respondents only represented a small proportion of the target population,

the samples achieved a certain degree of representativeness of the target population in this study

because they matched demographically the previous findings regarding MOOC instructors.

Demographics

Participants were asked to specify their gender, age, ethnicity, educational background,

and academic rank. Table 7 provided the breakdown of survey respondents by demographic

variables and percentages.

Table 7. Demographic Data of Sample Population (N=89)

Demographic Variable % Gender Female 32.6 Male 66.3

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Other 1.1 Agea 30-39 12.6 40-49 20.7 50-59 32.3 60-69 25.3 70-79 8.0 80 & above 1.1 Ethnicitya Asian 9.3 African American 1.1 Latino 2.3 Caucasian 83.9 Other 3.4 Education Master 13.5 Doctorate 76.4 Professional Degree 10.1 Academic Rank Distinguished, Endowed or University Professor 10.1 Professor (Full Professor) 34.8 Associate Professor 22.5 Assistant Professor 6.7 Instructor 7.9 Lecturer 13.5 Other 4.5

a The total number of responses received for these items was 87.

Of the 89 respondents, two declined to provide demographic information related to age

and ethnicity. Among the respondents, 59 (66.3%) self-identified as male and 29 (32.6%) were

female. One participant (1.1%) selected “Other” to this question. The age of participants ranged

from 30 years old to 80 years, with the average age being 54 years.

There were no respondents who self-identified as being American Indian/Alaska Native or

Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander. The majority self-identified as Caucasian (N= 73, 83.9%),

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followed by Asian (N= 8, 9.2%), Latino (N= 2, 2.3%), and African American (N= 1, 1.1%).

Additionally, three (3.4%) respondents selected “Other;” one self-identified as being Agnostic

Catholic, another as being Middle Eastern, and one wrote in “Asian and White.”

The majority of respondents (N= 68, 76.4%) had earned a doctoral degree, while 12

(13.5%) had completed a Master’s degree, and 9 individuals (10.1%) claimed they had a

professional degree, for instance, MD (Doctor of Medicine). Out of 89 respondents, 31 (34.8%)

stated they were full professors, 20 (22.5%) said they were associate professors, 12 (13.5%)

reported as being lecturers, 9 (10.1%) indicated distinguished, endowed or university professors,

7 (7.9%) described themselves as instructors, 6 (6.7%) were assistant professors, and 4 (4.5%)

responded “Other,” for instance, senior teaching fellow or clinical professor.

Teaching Background

Table 8 provided information regarding participants’ teaching background.

Table 8. Participant’s Teaching Background (N=89)

Variable % Years of teaching experience in postsecondary educationa 1 - 10 years 26.2 11 - 20 years 28.6 21 - 30 years 23.8 31 - 40 years 15.5 41 - 50 years 6.0 Level of courses they teachb Undergraduate 12.6 Master 4.6 Doctorate 1.1 Undergraduate, Master, and Doctorate 44.8 Undergraduate and Master 20.7 Master and Doctorate 13.8 Undergraduate and Doctorate 1.1

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Other 1.1 Previous experience of teaching an online/blended course before MOOC Yes 49.4 No 49.4 Other 1.1 Previous experience of taking an online course Yes 47.2 No 52.8 Previous experience of receiving an online degree/certificatec Yes 15.2 No 84.8 a The total number of responses received for this item was 84.

b The total number of responses received for this item was 87.

c The total number of responses received for this item was 79.

About a quarter of the respondents indicated they had 1-10 years of teaching experience

(N= 22, 26.2%), 11-20 years of experience (N= 24, 28.6%), or 21-30 years of experience (N= 20,

23.8%) in postsecondary education. About 13 MOOC instructors claimed they had more than 30

years but less than 40 years of experience, and only 5 reported having more than 40 years of

teaching experience. Thirty-nine respondents (44.8%) indicated they had taught courses at all

levels: undergraduate, master, and doctorate. Eighteen participants (20.7%) said they taught

undergraduate and master’s. Twelve (13.8%) stated master’s and doctorate courses were the

primary course types they had offered. Eleven participants (12.6%) taught undergraduate courses

only. Four (4.6%) claimed they offered master’s courses only. One respondent (1.1%) identified

doctorate-level, another (1.1%) checked undergraduate and doctorate, and one (1.1%) selected

‘Other’ and indicated “public audiences” as the answer.

When asked about their previous teaching experience in online courses, results were

equally divided with 44 respondents (49.4%), having taught online or blended courses before

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participating in a MOOC, and 44 respondents (49.4%) with no such experience before joining a

MOOC. One participant (1.1%) selected ‘Other’ and indicated this question was not clear. Forty-

two respondents (47.2%) stated they had taken online courses before, and forty-seven (52.8%)

reported they had not taken any online course. Participants were asked to indicate whether they

received any online degree or certificate in the past. Sixty-seven respondents (84.8%) said they

had not received any online degree or certificate themselves and twelve (15.2%) reported that

they had.

Research Questions

Three research questions for the quantitative phase were addressed with associated

frequencies statistics in the following section.

Research Question 1

What intrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

Participants were asked to respond on a Likert scale from 1 to 5 (strongly disagree =1,

strongly agree =5) what intrinsic factors best described their motivations to teach a MOOC. The

results were shown in Table 9.

Table 9. Descriptive Statistics for Intrinsic Factors (N=89)

Intrinsic Variable % Strongly

Disagree

% Disagree

% Neutral

% Agree

% Strongly

Agree

Mean SD

1. Opportunity to share

knowledge with others

2.2 1.1 3.4 32.6 60.7 4.48 0.81

2. Opportunity to develop

new ideas about teaching

the learning processes

2.2 5.6 6.7 51.7 33.7 4.09 0.91

3. Personal motivation to

learn and use technology

2.2 6.7 7.9 53.9 29.2 4.01 0.92

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4. Intellectual challenge 1.1 4.5 13.5 49.4 31.5 4.06 0.86

5. Opportunity to improve

and enhance online

teaching skills

3.4 4.5 13.5 46.1 32.6 4.00 0.98

6. Develop new

competencies

4.5 3.4 13.5 56.2 22.5 3.89 0.95

7. Overall job satisfaction 4.5 2.2 21.3 57.3 14.6 3.75 0.90

8. Opportunity to

influence social change

9.0 7.9 21.3 40.4 21.3 3.57 1.18

9. Career

exploration/development

11.2 7.9 25.8 44.9 10.1 3.35 1.13

10. Opportunity for

scholarly pursuit

5.6 13.5 29.2 43.8 7.9 3.35 1.00

11. Opportunity to use

personal research as a

teaching tool

10.1 23.6 25.8 30.3 10.1 3.07 1.17

12. Faculty opinions and

beliefs about online

coursesa

9.1 28.4 35.2 22.7 4.5 2.85 1.02

a The total number of responses received for this item was 88.

Among the 12 intrinsic variables being measured in the self-assessment, over 75% of

respondents strongly agreed or agreed that six factors intrinsically motivated them to teach a

MOOC the most: opportunity to share knowledge with others (93.3%), opportunity to develop

new ideas about teaching the learning processes (85.4%), personal motivation to learn and use

technology (83.1%), intellectual challenge (80.9%), and opportunity to improve and enhance

online teaching skills (78.7%), and develop new competencies (78.7%).

Between half and three-quarters indicated the following four motivated them to teach a

MOOC: overall job satisfaction (71.9%), opportunity to influence social change (61.7%), career

exploration/development (55%), and opportunity for scholarly pursuit (51.7%).

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Fewer than half suggested an opportunity to use personal research as a teaching tool

(40.4%) and faculty opinions and beliefs about online courses (27.2%) were important

motivators to help make their decisions to teach a MOOC.

Research Question 2

What extrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

In the survey, all participants were asked to indicate their agreement on a Likert scale

from 1 to 5 (strongly disagree =1, strongly agree =5) for additional 23 extrinsic motivators.

Frequencies and descriptive statistics were calculated for each variable (see Table 10).

Table 10. Descriptive Statistics of Extrinsic Factors (N=89)

Extrinsic Variable % Strongly

Disagree

% Disagree

% Neutral

% Agree

% Strongly

Agree

Mean SD

1. Ability to reach new

audiences globally

2.2 3.4 0.0 28.1 66.3 4.56 0.77

2. Technical support

provided by the

institution

1.1 11.2 9.0 37.1 41.6 4.07 1.03

3. Greater course

flexibility for studentsa

3.4 8.0 11.4 39.8 37.5 4.00 1.06

4. Opportunity to

diversify program

offeringsa

4.5 12.5 11.4 53.4 18.2 3.68 1.06

5. Support and

encouragement from

institutional

administrators

3.4 6.7 23.6 33.7 32.6 3.85 1.06

6. Support and

encouragement from

6.7 11.2 27.0 30.3 24.7 3.55 1.18

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school dean or

department chair

7. Support and

encouragement from

school or departmental

colleagues

7.9 13.5 27.0 31.5 20.2 3.43 1.19

8. Professional prestige

and status

12.4 19.1 18.0 39.3 11.2 3.18 1.23

9. Visibility among

colleagues within their

disciplinea

9.1 15.9 26.1 42.0 6.8 3.22 1.09

10. MOOC training

provided by the

institution

13.5 18.0 23.6 25.8 19.1 3.19 1.31

11. Grants for MOOC

materials/expenses

19.1 19.1 20.2 27.0 14.6 2.99 1.35

12. Monetary support for

participation (stipend,

overload)

23.6 20.2 20.2 23.6 12.4 2.81 1.36

13. Recognition and

awards

19.1 15.7 32.6 27.0 5.6 2.84 1.19

14. Expectation by

university that faculty

participate

12.4 18.0 40.4 22.5 6.7 2.93 1.09

15. Visibility for jobs at

other

institutions/organizationsa

19.3 20.5 37.5 18.2 4.5 2.68 1.12

16. Job security 24.7 27.0 30.3 13.5 4.5 2.46 1.14

17. Credit toward

promotion and tenure

37.1 21.3 23.6 11.2 6.7 2.29 1.26

18. Royalties on

copyrighted materials

37.1 25.8 20.2 12.4 4.5 2.21 1.20

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19. Requirement by

departmenta

39.8 22.7 26.1 8.0 3.4 2.13 1.13

20. Merit payb 39.1 25.3 24.1 8.0 3.4 2.11 1.13

21. Release time 42.7 18.0 31.5 4.5 3.4 2.08 1.11

22. Reduced teaching

loada

47.2 22.5 22.5 5.6 2.2 1.93 1.06

23. Increase in salarya 38.6 26.1 30.7 3.4 1.1 2.02 0.97 a The total number of responses received for this item was 88.


Of 23 extrinsic variables, more than 75% of respondents strongly agreed or agreed that

three factors extrinsically motivated them to teach a MOOC the most: ability to reach new

audiences globally (94.4%), technical support provided by the institution (78.7%), and greater

course flexibility for students (77.3%).

Between half and three-quarters indicated the following five motivated them to teach a

MOOC: opportunity to diversify program offerings (71.6%), support and encouragement from

institutional administrators (66.3%), support and encouragement from school dean or

department chair (55%), support and encouragement from school or departmental colleagues

(51.7%), and professional prestige and status (50.5%).

About one-quarter and half suggested visibility among colleagues within their discipline

(48.8%), MOOC training provided by the institution (44.9%), grants for MOOC

materials/expenses (41.6%), monetary support for participation (36%), recognition and awards

(32.6%), and expectation by university that faculty participate (29.2%) were important extrinsic

motivators to making their decisions to teach a MOOC.

Less than a quarter reported that the following nine played an integral role when

considering teaching a MOOC: visibility for jobs at other institutions/organizations (22.7%), job

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security (18%), credit toward promotion and tenure (17.9%), royalties on copyrighted materials

(16.9%), requirement by department (11.4%), merit pay (11.4%), release time (7.9%), reduced

teaching load (7.8%), and increase in salary (4.5%).

Overall, five intrinsic motivators (sharing knowledge, developing new teaching ideas,

motivation to use technology, intellectual challenge, improving online teaching skills) had a

mean score above 4.0 while three extrinsic motivators (reach new audiences, technical support,

course flexibility) had scores above 4.0. Among the twelve intrinsic factors, only one item had a

mean score below 3.0 (faculty opinions about online courses). Thirteen of the twenty-three

extrinsic factors had scored below 3.0.

Research Question 3

What are faculty experiences teaching a MOOC?

Participants were invited to share impressions of their MOOC teaching experience in the

survey. The results were shown in Table 11.

Table 11. Participant’s Overall Impression of MOOC Teaching Experience (N=89)

Item % Yes % No % Other

Satisfaction teaching first MOOCa 88.5 11.5 0.0

Willingness to teach a MOOC again 78.7 15.7 5.6

Teaching a MOOC inspired change in teaching in general 65.2 23.6 11.2 a The total number of responses received for this item was 87.

Of 89 responses, about 88.5% stated that they felt satisfied having taught their first

MOOC. Over 75% of respondents reported that they would consider teaching a MOOC again.

Five participants (5.6%) indicated their uncertainty with provided answers like “unsure,”

“depends on subject matter and compensation,” and “depends on who is in charge of the

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organization of it.” More than half of participants (65.2%) claimed that the experience of

teaching a MOOC had inspired them to change the way they teach in general.

Participants were asked in the survey to indicate their agreement on whether MOOCs

were academically as rigorous as traditional classes. The table below showed the results.

Table 12. Participant’s Beliefs about MOOC’s Academic Rigor & Online Courses (N=87)

Item % Beliefs that MOOCs are as academically rigorous as traditional classes Yes 42.5

No 43.7 Other 13.8

Results were approximately equally divided with 37 participants (42.5%) said “Yes,” and

38 (43.7%) chose “No.” About 13.8% of respondents selected “Other.” Examples of their

answers included: “the material was as rigorous, but the MOOC used less than half the material,”

“the learning is as rigorous, the assessment is not,” “it is not an academic course,” “yes, for those

that do the capstone. No, for those that are just listening to lectures,” “tough question, is the

content the same? Yes. Is the experience as rigorous? No.”

Participants were invited to share their beliefs about fully online courses, specifically

before and after teaching a MOOC, on a 4-point Likert scale (1= very skeptical, 4= very

enthusiastic). The results were summarized in the figure below.

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Figure 6. Participants’ Beliefs about Fully Online Courses Before and After Teaching a MOOC.

Data showed that a quarter of participants (25.8%, N= 23) were very enthusiastic about

fully online courses before teaching a MOOC, and this number increased to 33.7% (N= 30) after

they completed delivering a MOOC.

About 37.1% of participants (N= 33) were somewhat enthusiastic about fully online

courses before getting involved in MOOC teaching activity. This number went up to 41.6% (N=

37) after teaching a MOOC. In addition, for those respondents who were somewhat skeptical, the

number dropped from 30.3% (N= 27) to 19.1% (N= 17) after they taught a MOOC. The

percentage of respondents who indicated that they were very skeptical about fully online courses

before participating in a MOOC slightly decreased from 6.7% (N= 6) to 5.6% (N= 5) after

teaching a MOOC.

Data concerning the MOOC teaching history of participants was obtained and could be

viewed in table 13 below.

33.7%

41.6%

19.1%

5.6%

25.8%

37.1%

30.3%

6.7%

Very enthusiastic

Somewhat enthusiastic

Somewhat skeptical

Very skeptical

BEFORE AFTER

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Table 13. Participant’s MOOC Teaching Background Information (N=89)

Item % Years of teaching MOOC via edX/Courseraa Less than 1 year 2.3

1 - 5 years 90.8 6 - 10 years 6.9 Student enrollment of your first MOOCb 1 - 1,000 16.0 1,001 - 10,000 46.9 10,001 - 100,000 34.6 100,001 - 1,000,000 2.5 Had taught/were teaching MOOC(s) via other providers (edX/Coursera excluded)c

Yes 11.6 No 88.4

a The total number of responses received for this item was 87.


c The total number of responses received for this item was 86.

When asked how many years of experience in teaching MOOC they had via edX or

Coursera, 87 out of 89 participants responded. Most respondents, 79 participants (90.8%) stated

they had at least 1-5 years of experience in delivering MOOC, six participants (6.9%) said ‘6 to

10 years’ and two participants (2.3%) replied with ‘less than 1 year.’

Participants were asked about the student enrollment of their first MOOC. Thirteen

respondents (16%) stated they had less than 1,000 students in their first MOOC. Thirty-eight

respondents (46.9%) said the number of students for their first MOOC ranged from 1,001 to

10,000. Twenty-eight participants (34.6%) had the enrollment of their first MOOC resided

between 10,001 to 100,000. There were two remaining respondents (2.5%) claimed that they had

more than 100,001 students for their first MOOC offering.

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Results indicated that edX or Coursera appeared to be the sole MOOC platform used by

76 participants (88.4%) in delivering a MOOC, no one was cross-teaching between these two

platforms. Ten respondents (11.6%) stated that they had taught a MOOC via a third MOOC

provider, for example, Stanford Online, eCollege.com, Canvas, and Swayam.

Participants were asked to identify their role(s) in delivering a MOOC. More than one

response option was allowed in this question. Table 14 showed the results of this question.

Table 14. Role(s) of MOOC Instructor (N=89)

Role(s) of MOOC Instructor % of Multiple Responses Primary instructor 41.2 Primary designer 20.6 Co-instructor 18.6 Co-designer 11.3 Work behind the scene 4.1 Other 4.1

As noted, “Primary instructor” received the highest scores of multiple responses,

approximately 41.2%. “Primary designer” and “Co-instructor” seemed to have the second and

third highest responses of 20.6% and 18.6%, respectively. The responses of “Co-designer”

accounted for 11.3% of the whole. The remaining responses “Work behind the scene” and

“Other,” made up 4.1% of each.

The answers from those who indicated “Other” included “I did everything above,” “I

wrote up about the material, participated in the taping, and have been involved only marginally

in interacting with the participants,” “I supervise a staff of 4 MOOC developers/instructors and

also develop content and teach MOOCs,” and “co-instructor/designer in one; primary

instructor/designer in the other.”

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Participants were asked to describe the communication tool(s) they offered to students in

their MOOC(s). This closed-ended question made it possible for participants to select more than

one answer as appropriate. The results were shown in the table below.

Table 15. Communication Tools Used in MOOCs (N=89)

Communication Tools % of Multiple Responses

Online message board/Discussion forum 41.5 Email 31.7 Video conferencing tools 11.3 None 9.2 Virtual office hours 3.5 Other 2.8 Phone 0.0 Instant messenger 0.0

The top three communication tools used most by the respondents were online message

board/discussion forum (41.5%), email (31.7%), and video conferencing tools (11.3%). “None”

was in 9.2% of the responses, followed by virtual office hours (3.5%). About 2.8% of responses

aligned with “Other” stating that they used Piazza, social media (e.g., Facebook, Wechat), and

webinars to interact with learners. Phone and Instant messenger were not used at all by

participants.

The top two tools (i.e., online message board/discussion forum, and email) most

commonly used to engage students were asynchronous. Tools that provided for synchronous

interactions were only used by 11% or fewer MOOC instructors.

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Summary

Chapter four presented the quantitative findings of this study including demographics of

participants, teaching background, and descriptive statistics to address the three research

questions listed below.

RQ 1. What intrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

RQ 2. What extrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

RQ 3. What are faculty experiences teaching a MOOC?

Twelve intrinsic and twenty-three extrinsic motivators were examined and evaluated by

89 participants on a Likert scale measurement. Faculty’s experience of teaching a MOOC, which

included their overall impression, beliefs that MOOCs were as academically rigorous as

traditional classes, the roles performed, communication tools used, and MOOC teaching

background were examined.

In terms of who responded, the majority were mid-career aged 30 years old to 60 years

(85.6%), Caucasian (83.9%), males (66%), holding a doctorate (76.4%), and serving as an

associate or full professor (57.3%). About a quarter of the respondents each reported teaching 1-

10, 11-20, or 21-30 years in postsecondary education with most teaching both undergraduate and

graduate courses (65.5%). There was about a 50 to 50 split on whether they had taught online or

blended courses before teaching a MOOC. The majority had not taken an online course

themselves (52.8%) and had no online degree or certificate (84.8%).

In describing their experiences in teaching a MOOC, most had been teaching MOOCs for

1-5 years (90.8%) and the majority had taught courses with enrollments of 10,000 or less

(62.9%). The majority were teaching MOOCs for only one provider (88.4%). Most served in a

pedagogical role as a primary instructor or co-instructor (59.9%) with roles as primary or co-

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designer reported by about a third (32.9%). Primary communication tools that were used in

MOOCs included online message boards or discussion forums (41.5%) and email (31.7%),

asynchronous tools.

Overall, respondents were satisfied with their MOOC experience (88.5%), willing to teach

a MOOC again (78.7%) and said teaching a MOOC changed their teaching approaches in

general (65.2%). The opinion was split on whether MOOCs were as rigorous as traditional

classes (42.5% yes, 43.7% no). The level of skepticism about MOOCs was reduced and

enthusiasm for MOOCs increased after teaching a MOOC.

Intrinsic motivators appeared to play a more significant role in the decision making to

teach a MOOC compared to extrinsic ones. Intrinsic motivators cited by more than 80% of

respondents included an opportunity to share knowledge with others (93.3%), opportunity to

develop new ideas about teaching and learning processes (85.4%), personal motivation to learn

and use technology (83.1%), and intellectual challenge (80.9%); only one extrinsic motivator

was cited by more than 80% of respondents, ability to reach new audiences globally (94.4%).

However, one might argue that the extrinsic one seemed similar to the intrinsic one of “the

opportunity to share knowledge with others.” In Chapter Five, qualitative findings with

associated categories and themes were presented.

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CHAPTER 5. QUALITATIVE FINDINGS

This chapter described the qualitative findings of this study. It began with demographics

of interviewees, followed by the qualitative results, and concluded with a summary. Qualitative

data were captured through semi-structured interviews, with twelve interviewees who were

teaching MOOCs or had previously taught MOOCs via edX or Coursera. The interviewees were

from diverse higher education institutions and varied geographical regions. The findings were

derived from the interview transcriptions and responses obtained from two open-ended questions

(see below) in the web-based survey. The two open-ended questions received eight-nine and

forty-one responses respectively.

1. Would you teach a MOOC again? Please specify your reason(s).

2. What else would you like to share with me (optional)?

Demographics

The following table described the interviewees’ demographic data.

Table 16. Demographic Data of Interviewees (N=12)

Demographic Variable N % Gender Female 5 41.7 Male 7 58.3 Academic Position Lecturer 2 16.7 Research Faculty 1 8.3 Associate Professor 3 25.0 Professor 6 50.0 Working Location United States 9 75.0 Asia 2 16.7 Europe 1 8.3 Institution Type

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Public 5 41.7 Private 7 58.3 MOOC platform used edX 7 58.3 Coursera 5 41.7

Among the 12 respondents, five (41.7%) were female, and seven (58.3%) self-identified

males. About half self-identified as professor (N=6, 50%), followed by associate professor (N=3,

25%), lecturer (N=2, 16.7%), and research faculty (N=1, 8.3%). The majority of respondents

(N=9, 75%) were employed in the United States, while two (16.7%) were in Asia, and one

(8.3%) was in Europe at the time of the interview. More than half of the participants (N=7,

58.3%) indicated they worked for private institutions, while the remaining five (41.7%) were

affiliated with public ones. As shown in the table, seven respondents (58.3%) reported using edX

to deliver their MOOCs, and five (41.7%) stayed with Coursera.

Qualitative Results

Qualitative results were reported in the sequence of three research questions. For the sake

of confidentiality, interviewees’ real names, departments, institutions, and any identifying

information were not reported, and respondents from the survey were identified by numerical

numbers or anonymous in the quotations appeared in this chapter. Twelve interviews were

transcribed, coded, and categorized into themes using thematic analysis (Thomas & Harden,

2008). Open-ended responses from the web-based survey were also coded. Themes and

categories were presented in the following sections.

Research Question 1

How do higher education faculty members describe their decision-making process in terms of


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When interviewees were asked about how they got started teaching a MOOC, a significant

number of factors stood out through their responses. These factors were thoroughly examined,

coded, and categorized into groups under two main themes. Qualitative analysis revealed that

faculty members were driven to participate in MOOCs either because of intrinsic motivators

(theme 1) or due to extrinsic motivators (theme 2). Within these two main themes, associated

categories and reasons as to why faculty members chose to teach a MOOC were summarized in

table 17 as follows.

Table 17. Summary of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors Leading to Faculty Choice

Factors Leading to Faculty Choice to Teach a MOOC

Intrinsic Factors

(Theme 1)

1. The desire to reach a wider audience 2. A desire to showcase/share expertise 3. Passion for teaching with technology

Extrinsic Factors

(Theme 2)

1. Institutional decisions/MOOC partnerships 2. Others invited/encouraged participation 3. External rewards

Intrinsic Factors.

Interviewees indicated that they chose to teach a MOOC due to internal factors or intrinsic

motivation. These intrinsic motivators included: 1) the desire to reach a wider audience; 2) a

desire to showcase or share expertise such as research, experts, programs, personal visibility; and

3) passion for teaching with technology.

The desire to reach a wider audience.

Due to the rapid development of technology in the world, MOOCs received worldwide

attention and inspired many educators in different ways. Interviewees identified the desire to

reach a wider range of learners as being the most predominant motivator for the majority of them

to teach a MOOC. Comments of survey participants and interviewees in this regard were

provided below.

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Anonymous survey participant: I was happy with the product, and so far, we have reached

>27,000 learners from 182 countries. I never thought that we could have such reach.

Interviewee 02: The other motivation was you get onto a platform like edX, and you

deliver MOOCs, um, you reach a hugely that I would call a heterogeneous audience from

several countries. Um, for example, the MOOCs that I run has thousands of, ah,

enrollments. Um, they are from hundreds of countries, um, ah, the age group from 20 to

50, undergraduates to doctors, PhDs.

Interviewee 07: And I feel that in order to get our research strengths out there to people

that one of the best ways to do it is MOOC because it has a global reach.

Several interviewees further explained that teaching MOOCs enabled them to connect

with learners that in reality they would not be able to physically meet due to geographical

limitations. This became an intrinsic motivation for them to expand their reach through teaching

a MOOC. Their comments were provided below.

Interviewee 06: So, a lot of the motivation came from reaching an audience that we

otherwise would not be able to reach.

Interviewee 08: The first, the first reason is that I think that at [institution’s name], like all

of, you know, universities especially ‘A-one’ universities, we understand that providing

MOOCs is really a way, ah, first to reach out to communities beyond our local geography.

Interviewee 10: Um, because I, I didn’t know a lot about MOOCs, but I knew enough to

know that the material and the content would reach a lot more people if it was delivered

through an online course content program.

A desire to showcase or share expertise.

It was found in this study that MOOCs were orientated to showcase expertise in research

and programs, share experts, and enhance a faculty member’s visibility. A desire to share

expertise with others seemed to give interviewees a strong incentive to teach MOOCs.

By doing a MOOC, an instructor received the opportunity to share his/her latest research

findings or a successful program in a subject area. Examples of interview comments are provided

below.

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Interviewee 06: Okay, so um, a big part of that has to do with the fact that we want to

share our research results with the world, and how we think about the topic is somewhat

different than how other people in my research area think about it. So, in part, we created

the Massive Open Online Course to educate people to think the way we do so we can then

better share with them more advanced ideas of ours which actually we’re now doing

through a progression of Massive Open Online Courses um, which builds on the first one.

Interviewee 07: And I wanted people all over the world to know, get to know [institution’s

name] is a research hub in this area. So that’s the reason why I did it.

Interviewee 08: So, we thought that it would be a good idea to leverage this strength and

really put out our brand of [subject’s name] in um, cyberspace, or whatever. And so, um,

at the time I was the lead [subject’s name] coordinator, and so to me, it seemed like a

natural next step [mm-hmm] to teach this course. I really felt like this is our opportunity to

share, you know, our way of understanding user-centered design with the world.

It comes as no surprise to see that teaching MOOCs enhanced the personal exposure of the

instructor or the social image of the institution where he/she worked. Examples of interviewee

comments in this regard are provided below.

Interviewee 02: Um, at a very personal level, um, I think I am a lot more, can I use the

word, ah, visible and known? And I get, as a result of this, I get invitations to come and

talk in-in conferences, in forums, not just on technology in education, but on my course

subject of [subject’s name].

Interviewee 05: The other motivation was that, well, it increases our visibility obviously.

People get to know about us um, eh, who would otherwise not notice that we exist. So we

decided to get um, all the big names on board that we were aware of in [country’s name]

at that time when we planned the project to create a MOOC, and we have the one

pronounced expert in a specific footage of the chapters of the, of the MOOC. So, it would

be fairly fundamental, and each chapter would be something, would be one chapter on

speech, for example, one chapter on-site [subject’s name] um, and so forth. So that’s fairly

different um, ah, sub-domains. So, we wanted to come, join forces across [country’s

name] and, so that there’s more interaction between university and also that the entire

topic just gains more visibility.

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Passion for teaching with technology.

Keeping an eye on the development of digital platforms and possessing a passion for

teaching intrinsically motivated two interviewees to engage in MOOCs.

Interview 01: Well, um, it was, it’s always been the case I-I’ve been, my earliest training

is I was a computer scientist by training a million years ago. And I had a, I’ve always

maintained an eye on the use of digital platforms to support learning. So, I’ve been

following the development of MOOCs and curious about them.

Interviewee 03: I teach a lot, and so I do many different kinds of teaching. I do um,

integrated courses where you put [subject’s names] together. I do online courses where

you do a boot camp for three weeks of teaching, and then you send them off online for a

year, and then they come back for three weeks, and they go off for a year, and then they

come back for three weeks, and they get a masters at the end of that. Um, I do flipped

courses where they watch the films, and then they come in and you discuss them. Um

again, a degree program, a degree program course. Um, I do, I guess that’s sort of that’s

flipped. And then I do, I guess they’re calling the ones where you do them in person and

then they go online like I think they call those hybrid courses, [mm-hmm] when you

combine the two.

Extrinsic Factors.

In addition to these intrinsic motivators, the findings of the qualitative analysis suggested

that the choice of higher education faculty members to take part in a MOOC was influenced by

several extrinsic motivators including 1) institutional decisions/MOOC partnerships; 2) others

invited/encouraged participation; and 3) external rewards.

Institutional decision/MOOC partnership.

A few interviewees noted that the final decision to offer MOOCs was made by their

institutions rather than by them. The institutions’ interests in running MOOCs happened to be a

‘catalyst’ potentially accelerating the change and encouraging interested faculty to jump in on a

MOOC. Their opinions are provided below.

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Interviewee 03: So, I’m involved in whatever the school is teaching because I want to

teach. And so, if there’s if they’re changing the format, then I’ll try the format. They were

just coming into the edX program, and we’re actually the second edX that was done in the

first from the [school’s name]. And so, my colleague, who was asked to do the edX

program, just said to me you want to do some lectures? And I said sure. I mean, you

know, it’s the same material, that I would teach in front of students, um, except I just film

it. I mean I just go ahead and record it. So, it doesn’t matter to me if he needed somebody.

I-I do clinical trials, so I tend to do lectures on clinical trials and interpret clinical trials.

And so, um, you know I was more than willing to help out and I was sort of curious as to

what it would be.

Interviewee 07: Ah, I think they really need to um, have access to deep pockets at their

institution. They need to have access to money, and then also facilities, and institutional

will. If I were teaching anywhere else, there’s no way I would have done, been able to do

this MOOC, you know. And when I knew that we were doing, we were going to do

MOOCs from [institution’s name], it was an institutional decision, it wasn’t my decision.

So, anyone who wants to do a MOOC, it can’t be an individual decision, it has to be an

institutional will, it has to be a group decision.

Interviewee 12: Ah, yes. A few years ago, [university’s name], [university’s name] got

very interested in, in MOOCs and was encouraging faculty members to create, create

MOOCs and they were really looking primarily at the, at topics that would have both, well

obviously that would appeal to a broad population, but topics that they also thought would

be important for people in general to understand.

Several interviewees admitted a fact that a pre-existing partnership between their

institutions and a MOOC provider was a crucial determinant, extrinsically and explicitly leading

to the decision making. Given that, faculty members have no autonomy or flexibility in the

selection of choosing a preferred MOOC provider over another. They commented,

Interviewee 01: Another is our university who’s an active collaborator with edX, and we

have a very, very serious office of academic innovation at the university level and they

were active.

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Interviewee 05: Um, that’s very simple, because two of the contributing universities that

have an exclusive contract with edX. So that both, there’s two, two of the four universities

in [country’s name] they have an online learning department basically that has a contract

with edX, so they eh, and it happened to be edX in both universities, so that there was no

discussion about this.

Interviewee 10: Um, [institution’s name] has a contract with Coursera, and so all the

courses are running through Coursera.

Interviewee 11: So, we chose Coursera as the platform. [institution’s name] already had a

relationship with Coursera.

Others invited/encouraged participation.

It turned out that the best way for recruiting universities/colleges/schools or individuals to

make MOOCs was to send invitations through a MOOC provider. For instance, interviewee 01

said,

Um, at that time, [person’s name] at edX was beginning to recruit universities to be

partners in experimenting with the MicroMaster concept. And so they asked the [school’s

name] and my Dean asked me is there some way that we can build on the success of this

first course which we hadn’t even built yet, we just got the money for it, and develop a

MicroMaster’s program which would be five courses um, that met the standards for

graduate education at the [institution’s name], that if students completed successfully they

would actually get graduate credit at the [institution’s name].

Exciting conversations regarding what subjects were appropriate to be offered as a MOOC

or what programs could be designed and delivered through MOOCs happened through social

networking opportunities. For example, one interviewee had a social dining experience with a

Coursera representative introduced to him by his dean. Their interactions/discussions helped

craft a general plan of running a MOOC in the subject of social media marketing. Interviewee 09

explained,

And then when he was getting ready to leave, he got, he had a call from Coursera who

said we need a [subject’s name] program. So just as a quick aside, they, the people came

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in from Coursera and we had dinner, and I started talking, and you know the guy, one of

the Coursera folks, said what do you do? I said well, I teach [subject’s name]. And so, we

started talking and he started writing things down on his napkin. And it turned out he then

sent out an RFP that said basically they wanted the course just like mine. So that’s how I

got to do the bigger one which is [subject’s name] MOOC.

While, for those interviewees who didn’t buy in at the early stage, they were inspired or

invited to get involved in MOOCs by different parties such as the head of an institution,

colleagues or a former supervisor/co-worker who tried MOOCs, or even by students’ requests.

Several interviewees explained,

Interviewee 02: Okay. Um, I got started on this about four years ago. Um, the then head of

our institution, ah, used to teach at the [institution’s name]. Um, so when he came and

joined us, um, he connected with edX because he had been working with them earlier.

And he asked myself and two or three of my colleagues to actually travel to [city’s name]

to get the experience of ah, you know, what, what is MOOCs all about and how is it

benefit a large community of students. So, we attended the workshop, we interacted with

the faculty at [institution’s name] and [institution’s name].

Interviewee 03: And so, my colleague, who was asked to do the edX program, just said to

me you want to do some lectures? And I said sure. I mean, you know, it’s the same

material, that I would teach in front of students, um, except I just film it. I mean I just go

ahead and record it. So, it doesn’t matter to me if he needed somebody. I-I do clinical

trials, so I tend to do lectures on clinical trials and interpret clinical trials. And so um, you

know I was more than willing to help out and I was sort of curious as to what it would be.

Interviewee 05: Umm-hmm, so, the, the original instigation to start the project um, was by

my former Ph.D. supervisor, a professor um, [person’s name] is his name in, he is at

[institution’s name]. And his idea, so he had several, several, ah, um, aspects that

motivated him to, to instigate the project.

Interviewee 10: Um, and at the end of the second summer, um, I got a phone call from the

director of the online learning, um, platform at [institution’s name], at [institution’s name]

asking me if I would be interested in teaching a MOOC um, with another professor who

was at [institution’s name] um, on the topic of um, how to create an [subject’s name].

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Interviewee 02: Um, I also had the opportunity to talk to a lot of the students, ahem, in

some of the universities ah, where the faculty had used the, ah, what we called the flipped

classroom. So, they watched the videos before coming to class, and then, you know, use

that learning in the classroom. So, as I-I was quite clued onto-to this. And, and then when

I got back here, ah, I talked to some of my students. They said, um-um, look, whatever we

don’t understand when the teacher/instructor teaches us in the class, we anyway go back

to our homes or hostels, dorms, and we just look for the subject and they get videos and

we watch them and that’s the way we learn. So, my motivation was, if students can watch

other videos to learn what I teach and why don’t I produce my own videos and, that

founded the basis for the students to learn.

Interviewee 09: And so, I think that I always keep that in mind is that, there are some

people out there that are killing themselves to get to the education that we’re putting out

there. And so, it just amazes me you know, that they have that much drive to do it. But

they do, and therefore I as an instructor should at least give back that amount of effort.

And so that drives me. I mean it’s like you know this is really life-changing for people and

it’s something that they don’t, you know I mean if you came to [institution’s name] you

have to spend what thirty thousand a year, you know and they don’t have that. And they

don’t have to spend anything, but I give them the same quality of education because they

deserve it.

External rewards.

External rewards, such as funding, grants, and support of the Dean, were reported as being

significant motives for interviewees in this study.

The Dean’s involvement in providing sufficient and pertinent pre-training to get MOOC

instructors prepared made a huge difference in their decision-making process. Interviewees

found it very inspiring if they could receive support from their supervisors. Several of their

comments are given below.

Interviewee 01: And so, the-the motivation was um, through um, two things. One is our

dean’s office, about three things actually, one is our dean’s office, um, we had a new dean

who was interested to get into this space.

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Interviewee 09: When ah, two, two Deans’ ago if you will, ah, we hired a Dean, his

name’s [person’s full name]. And [person’s first name] came in and ah, basically pulled

the whole faculty together and said you know we’re way behind times, we aren’t into

videos, we aren’t into audio, and you’re gonna all get there. So, he actually made the

faculty come to classes on Saturdays, and what he did is he gave us a video camera and

we learned how to edit and shoot video. He gave us audio. We had to go out and record

interviews and edit those down. And so, um, as he got going, he was putting together, um,

the first MOOC that I was involved in. So, I, my Dean pulled me into it and, and uh, I was

really you know really impressed with his ah, you know wanting to go cutting-edge. And

so, I did that. I suddenly saw you know that social was taking off. And so, I took my class

which was essential, it was the essentials of [subject’s name] and moved it over into

[subject’s name]. And then I’ve been keeping it cutting edge. I rewrite the course every,

every quarter, and then I ah, I changed my, I swap out my videos all the time.

Interviewee 10: Um so, I checked with my Dean, and she said, I said you know can I do

this; it would technically be an overload for me, and she said sure. And so, I got

permission and so I proceeded to go ahead and, and um say yes and to start um, ah, getting

ready to do the MOOC.

Financial support was an integral role in the decision-making process when MOOC

instructors decided whether to join. The design, development, and implementation of one single

MOOC called for a large amount of money to recruit a team of experts from different subject

areas to collaborate closely together for a period of time. Ideally, a content expert, an

instructional designer, a technology specialist, and a video producer would be considered to have

in this group. Without monetary support, creating a quality MOOC was challenging. Three

interviewees mentioned that they received financial support in their MOOCs. Their comments

are as follows:

Interviewee 01: And an opportunity presented itself, to work with our university to

develop a, to write a grant program to Microsoft to develop one MOOC in um, leading

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change in education. And we applied for that grant and received it. We were going to

develop one course.

Interviewee 06: So, the [institution’s name] decided to buy into the edX partnership. And

as part of that the [institution’s name] was willing to give a few groups money to develop

initial MOOCs to then be offered on the edX platform. So that then gave us the seed

money and the ah, incentive to actually put the first Massive Open Online Course together

and that’s how we ended up with our first course.

Interviewee 11: So back in 2016, we had an opportunity to be funded by the

[organization’s name] to get all of our security courses online, or a good majority of the

computer security courses online. At that time actually, I actually taught two out of the

nine that they wanted to put online.

Furthermore, one interviewee shared that when he offered to do a MOOC, he was very

fortunate to have an academic network with a third-party organization that financially helped

him form the team and paid everyone on the team. Interviewee 01 stated,

And so, I said, um, certainly and I was very interested in that, and again I have this

appointment with the [foundation’s name] and I asked if they would be interested in

supporting this and I recruited a whole bunch of other people to help. And um, so we said

we’ll do that… And then it was my interest in my work with the [Foundation’s name] they

gave us the content and the substance for this program. So, it was those three things I

would say working together.

Research Question 2

What are the roles and experiences higher education faculty encounter in delivering a MOOC?

When interviewees were asked to share their roles and experiences in teaching a MOOC,

findings concerning this question were coded for two themes. These themes included roles

higher education faculty performed in teaching a MOOC (theme 1), and experiences they

encountered in delivering a MOOC (theme 2). The sub-themes and categories are outlined in

Table 18.

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Table 18. Summary of Subthemes and Categories for Roles and Experiences

Themes Subthemes & Categories

1. Roles higher education faculty

performed in teaching a MOOC

o Solo designer and lecturer

o Lead designer and lecturer

o Shared designer and lecturer

o Lecturer only

2. Experiences higher education

faculty encountered in delivering

a MOOC

o More support was needed to do MOOCs

o Training and feedback

o Content support

o Video production

o Assistants (GA/TA)

o Specific competencies were required to do

MOOCs

o Commitment (Time and Effort)

o Content expertise

o Understanding of online teaching context

o Camera presence

o Language accessibility

o Instructional design was essential to MOOCs

o Attention span

o Supplemental materials

o Engagement and interaction

o Challenges faced in delivering MOOCs

o Feeling overwhelmed

o One size does not fit all

o Understanding copyright and fair use

o Assessment

o High enrollment and low completion rates

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Roles higher education faculty performed in teaching a MOOC.

An online instructor is expected to possess multi-dimensional roles and varied

competencies to craft engaging online courses for students. Interviewees discussed the roles they

performed while teaching in the MOOC context. As a result, four pedagogical roles were

identified, namely solo designer and lecturer, lead designer and lecturer, shared designer and

lecturer, and lecturer only.

Solo designer and lecturer.

Two interviewees said they preferred to design and run MOOCs alone from beginning to

end. They found it worked out well for them.

Interviewee 02: Yeah, um, I, all my MOOCs are run by me solo. I-I don’t have a, um, co-

ins…I mean a co-instructor. Because, I-I tell you the reason why. I think teaching methods

are different. Ah, one, two, ah, the way I come across in front of a camera, very different

from the way somebody else comes across ah, in front of the camera. And three, the one

lesson I have learned through doing a MOOC, is-which is a mistake a lot of MOOC

instructors commit, they bring in too many things into the MOOC. They have um, ah,

PowerPoint presentation, an Excel spreadsheet, animations, interviews. My own

experience has been, and I have done some kind of dip-stick research with some of my

past learners. I think, using too many methods in a MOOC and ah, too many instructors in

a MOOC, ah, tends to dilute the learning experience. Ah, the reason is very simple. Unlike

in the classroom where you’ve got fifty, seventy, a hundred students sitting there, and

there is an instructor, and then there is an interaction at one level. In a MOOC,

interestingly it is a very-very personalized interaction if you know what I mean. It’s, it’s

me on the video, on the screen, and the student watching. Now got to do everything at my

command to make sure that I am able to sustain his interests ah, or her interests during

that period and that the learning is maximized. It’s short bursts but it’s got to be very

focused. And if you have too many distractions the learning quotient, you know, drops

significantly. Ah, and none of my MOOC videos ah, is, the biggest one I’ve done is 11 to

12 minutes. Most of them are between 6 and 10 minutes because that’s the attention span

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so people who learn by watching YouTube videos. Nobody wants to watch a 16-minute

YouTube video. Um, so, a lot has to go into-into in the MOOC design. You know you

take a topic, you know that it can’t be delivered in 8 minutes, so you gotta figure it out

into three or four MOOCs of eight MOOCs each, maintain the continuity. Now, all of this

I find very difficult to do it with co-instructors. So, like an artist at work, I know exactly

what my end product is going to be. And I’d rather play solo.

Interviewee 12: I am it. I am it. I mean we have a center at [institution’s name], we have a

center for instructional technol-, instructional technology, and they worked with me. But

no, I did it on my own without any support.

However, one interviewee collaborated closely with his wife who was also a faculty

member working in the same institution with a background in education. They decided to run the

MOOC together because they saw the maximum efficiency of working exclusively with each

other. They used to work with others such as a graduate student, which turned out to be

dissatisfying outcomes.

Interviewee 06: I put this together with my wife who’s also a faculty member here. Um,

we-we pretty much ran the MOOCs ourselves, we ourselves are on the, on the-on the

discussion boards. Ah, we’re very particular about being involved with the participants,

and we’re very concerned that when people ask questions that the answers are precise.

And as a result, we don’t feel comfortable handing that over to graduate students for

example to do that. You really as the developer have to be involved if you really want to

make this a quality experience for participants. And I think we’re quite unique in that,

there are very few course developers you know that, the typical offering of our course

which you know is a 16-week course, in a typical offering between my wife and I, we will

answer thousands of questions on the discussion forum, which no other instructor that we

know of actually does. So, our dynamics are very different, we don’t have staff because

we don’t want to have staff. We want control, okay? And fortunately, we can manage to

do this.

Lead designer and lecturer.

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Moreover, some interviewees claimed that they had the experience in leading the work of

designing and lecturing MOOCs. In particular, they invited subject matter experts to give

presentations on different topics and to interact with students in their MOOCs. Their comments

were provided below.

Interviewee 01: I was a lead designer of all of them. Um, I enlisted the help of colleagues

at the [institution’s name] and one of the courses, um, I’m also I have an appointment as a

senior fellow at the [Foundation’s name] for the advancement of teaching. So, I work in

collaboration with um, colleagues from the [foundation’s name] on two of the courses.

Um, they were the principal, um, I was the primary designer of both courses, but they did

the presentations for one, and um, they did half of the presen-half of the video

presentation component for the second.

Interviewee 04: At that time, I was it, and I would say that the undergraduates who

worked with me [mm-hmm] so, I mean, in terms of content and organization, recording

the lectures, create, yes, I was the designer. The students were quick critics.

Interviewee 05: So we decided to get um, all the big names on board that we were aware

of in [country’s name] at that time when we planned the project to create a MOOC, and

we have the one pronounced expert in a specific footage of the chapters of the, of the

MOOC. So, it would be fairly fundamental, and each chapter would be something, would

be one chapter on speech, for example, one chapter on [subject’s name] um, and so forth.

So that’s fairly different um, ah, sub-domains. So, we wanted to come, join forces across

[country’s name] and, so that there’s more interaction between university and also that the

entire topic just gains more visibility. We chose people from [country’s name] so that we

can use the um, the course, the MOOC in the curricula at the universities. And, that’s

actually what it was possible.

Interviewee 07: I-I created the project and I brought on board [person’s full name], as well

as [person’s full name], who is my co-teachers, so they teach units as well. And [person’s

first name] also, because she has a doctorate in education as well as in history, she’s got

two doctorates um, I asked her to serve as our primary, um, um, member of the teaching

team to oversee all the assessment activities. So, she was really happily involved from the

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beginning with the assessment activity. So, it’s pretty much a team effort even though I

initiated it and handle most of the oversight.

Interviewee 08: No, no. I don’t have any co-instructors to teach together. There was some

support from, you know, instructional faculty or whatever. So, there’s, um, there was a

promise of help. And so, I got them to build a little you know, a little video for me, but

that was it [mm-hmm]. But like I said, for us, you know, we’re not taking best practices in

MOOCs to the extent that we didn’t change. So, you know the course content, we

basically, I basically formatted it so that I could make it in these little chunks that are

more ah, digestible to the MOOC community.

Interviewee 09: Well first off, I designed it, and I used my class. And so, I brought in

experts on every topic, imaginable. I mean everything I wanted. I had a huge network of

people that in my class I brought in using video just like we’re doing. And so, you see that

I’m more of the emcee, and I take it, take it as they do that, I relate it to the topic, I kind of

keep everything flowing. And so, there are some that I, I did the lecture on. But I also had

people from all over the world who were experts in gamification and different topics that I

thought would be useful for the class. And so, it’s a very, it’s a very diverse group of

people that put it all together. But I was glue and I wrote everything. And so, they’d send

me their PowerPoints and I’d cut it down and adjust it, so it fits into the course. But they

basically said what they wanted to say.

Shared designer and lecturer.

Often hiring MOOC instructors was a pre-determined decision made at the department or

institutional level because of the selected individual’s expertise or research strengths. Thus, this

might require a MOOC instructor to co-design and co-teach a MOOC with another instructor or

a team of lecturers. A case shared by interviewee 10 disclosed that the director of the online

learning unit from a higher education institution she used to work at invited her to co-develop a

MOOC with another content expert.

Interviewee 10: At the end of the second summer, um, I got a phone call from the director

of the online learning um, platform at [institution’s name], at [institution’s name] asking

me if I would be interested in teaching a MOOC um, with another professor who was at

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[institution’s name] um, on the topic of um, how to create an [subject’s name] workplace.

So, we talked it through, and they explained that I would be teaching um, a course that

would be four modules. I would develop all the material and all the content with another

instructor who teaches at [institution’s name].

Lecturer only.

Interviewee 03 was invited to give lectures on a specific topic through a MOOC

developed by her colleagues. This interviewee didn’t engage in any decision-making or

recruiting endeavors. She labeled herself as a pure MOOC lecturer.

Interviewee 03: Okay, um, I want to make clear this is okay. I taught in a MOOC I never

taught a MOOC. So, I was always giving lectures in a MOOC, but I was never the

program director. Um, and so what I have done, I’ve been involved in two MOOCs. In

both of them, I gave lectures.

Experiences higher education faculty encountered in delivering a MOOC.

Overall, interviewees stated that they had a satisfactory experience of teaching MOOCs.

During the conversations, words and phrases such as “positive,” “very rewarding,” “incredibly

pleasant thing,” “I really enjoy doing it,” “I really like it,” “a really good learning experience,”

“it makes me a better teacher,” were cited many times by interviewees when they talked about

their MOOC experiences. For instance, interviewee 02 said, “as a teacher, I find that a very

rewarding experience.” Similarly, interviewee 07 stated her overall impression on MOOC was “I

love it. I really enjoy doing it. Uh, I feel that I would like to see more.” Interviewee 09 expressed

that his participation in MOOCs changed the way he used to teach and interact with students. He

said, “It’s a very different way of teaching, but I really like it. So, you know I found that learning

how to do MOOCs really change the way I taught. And the way that I interacted with students.”

Interviewee 10 made a statement that he thrived from the interactions with students through

MOOCs. He said, “I don’t think I would ever construct my entire teaching career around MOOC.

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Because I really thrive from the interaction I get with my students. And it makes me a better

teacher, and it makes me stay on top of my game and my material.”

The findings reflected from these positive experiences were very close to the results

gathered from the open-ended questions in the survey. Comments from anonymous survey

respondents were provided below.

Anonymous survey respondent: Was a fantastic experience that all instructors should go

through.

Anonymous survey respondent: Working on the MOOC Team was one of the most

exciting learning experiences of my career.

Anonymous survey respondent: Teaching a MOOC has been the most gratifying

experience in higher education of my 26+ year experience in university education!

Anonymous survey respondent: MOOC with Coursera was a rewarding experience.

Preparation for the course took many, many hours! But was ultimately worthwhile.

Interviewees suggested that although they had extensive experiences in delivering

MOOCs, they still had a demand for support. They shared there was a need for specific

competencies to teach MOOCs and stressed the integral role of instructional design support, and

the challenges they faced. These sharing were considered and summarized into four subthemes:

1) more support was needed to do MOOCs; 2) specific competencies were required to do

MOOCs; 3) instructional design was essential to MOOCs; and 4) challenges faced in delivering

MOOCs. Those subthemes and associated categories were further discussed in the following

section.

More support was needed to do MOOCs.

Regardless of how experienced these MOOC instructors claimed for themselves, the need

for support arose as a pivotal one from the conversation flow. The following four categories were

identified and discussed under the sub-theme more support was needed to do MOOCs, coded for

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training and feedback, content support, video production, and assistants such as Teaching

Assistants (TAs), Research Assistants (RAs), and Graduate Assistants (GAs).

Training and feedback. It could be a daunting task for instructors to design and develop an

online course that involved a lot of work that went beyond one’s area of expertise. Interviewees

stated that they used existing faculty support services at their institutions or were offered various

opportunities for professional development to get adequate training for teaching MOOCs.

Interviewee 01: So, the [institution’s name] has an, a central office that is affiliated with

our Provost’s office, called the Office of Academic Innovation. In this-this office,

supports um, online programming across the entire university. It’s a team that includes, I

don’t know the exact numbers maybe 30 people. It includes um, instructional designers,

video, um…Media production and right, it includes people whose job it is to do the-the

course build on edX or Coursera or another platform. Um, it includes people whose job it

is to um, publicize, and promote MOOCs. It, it’s um, it includes people who look for

funding opportunities. So, it’s-it’s a very um, highly developed central function of the

university, and ah we, and with that, none of the individual colleges and schools have their

own capabilities for this. It’s very centralized.

Interviewee 05: We started some, we had, none of the contributors had prior experience

with MOOCs. So, this is why we decided to, to, we met several times with people from

the Online Learning Department at one of the universities. So, people who have seen

MOOCs and how they have created and experienced with that. So that they would give us

advice on how to do it. And we wanted it to be as ah, like self-operational as possible. So,

when ah, we wanted to minimize the interaction and the maintenance, and, and, and

instructor interaction.

Interviewee 02: I got started on this about four years ago. Um, the then head of our

institution, ah, used to teach at the [institution’s name]. Um, so when he came and joined

us, um, he connected with edX because he had been working with them earlier. And he

asked myself and two or three of my colleagues to actually travel to [city’s name] to get

the experience of ah, you know, what, what is MOOCs all about and how is it benefit a

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large community of students. So, we attended the workshop, we interacted with the

faculty at [institution’s name] and [institution’s name].

Interviewee11: So, we, we did go, we flew out to Coursera’s headquarters and they, um,

they trained us for I think three days. Um, through Coursera ah, they were able to help us

out with, even though a lot of their material is online to help you out understand ah, what

you need to put into your courses, we could always go back to our, not Account Manager,

I can’t remember what we call them. But um, we went back to our reps at Coursera and

we could ask them any questions that we-we wanted to. And they were also looking at

does this course meet their expectations as well.

Seeking advice and obtaining input from professionals or learners were considered an

enormous help by MOOC instructors in this study, especially to those who were well-organized

individuals and required strict adherence to deadlines.

Participant 11: Nope, just me. And in fact, we didn’t even have instructional designers to

help us with the first, any of the MOOCs. So, if we had the instructional design, I think we

would have had a lot less headache, um, going back through, and looking at content, and

making sure that um, it’s understood by everybody. Ah, we do have instructional

designers for the university. But they are not focused on MOOC development. I’m in a

unique situation as well. I, I am very, because I run, I tend to believe I-I run a business

inside the university. It’s not just teaching. I’m running massive systems um, for the

university. For IT, I organize things much better than I think some of the faculty do to be

candid about that. Um, and I have deadlines, and I have, I have things that I need to get

done. So, if I’m not constantly setting those deadlines and making sure that my, what I’m

understanding or what I’m putting forward is understood by others, then it’s very difficult.

So, I got mine my two done, ah, before the others finished theirs, [wow] just one. So, um,

because I have deadlines, and because I push it quite a bit. Now that’s not to say, you

know full-time faculty have a huge amount of work anyway, it’s not a, obviously, it’s not

a cushy job to just have a, a faculty position you got to do a lot of work. And so, it’s not,

it’s not that they don’t have a lot of work to do, it’s just that I have a, I have to make sure

that I’m on track with everything that I need to get done.

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Interviewee 04: I was the designer. The students were quick critics. And so, for example,

they said you know because the-the material is complex, and so the slides are dense, and

they said and I-I tried being the talking head and decided I was going to shoot myself and

I wasn’t gonna do that, and so they said okay, you have to make wrappers. And so if you

go in and look at the course, at the, at the beginning and the end of most lectures, there is,

I’m saying something about what’s coming and something in so they so the students who

were watching it saw me [yeah, yeah]. And so the students were wonderful in giving those

kinds of suggestion, and of course, they said you know you need cartoons to go with that,

and you know they had these ideas and somebody knew somebody who could do that and

of course, it never happened and so I ended up during all the cartoons, so yeah. I spent a

lot of time on the course. They were very helpful, and I couldn’t have done it without

them.

Content support. A course with well-developed content not only helped instructors but

also enhanced the learning experience of students. Interviewees stated that they received support

in content development either from professionals at their institutions or from Coursera, which

was the key to a MOOC’s success. Examples of interview comments were given below.

Interviewee 03: And, edX, which is over in the main [institution’s name], which is in

[city’s name], they also have people who know how to do it. So, we had someone come

over and just tell us, you know, you don’t just stand up and give an hour lecture. You take

an hour lecture, you break it down into little chunks, and then you do your chunk and then

you do the last slide saying that in the next chunk we’re gonna do this and then you go

welcome back, um, you know. And so, they told us how to do it, then they looked over

our slides to make sure the chunks were the right way and everything like that. Then they

were there, when we were filming them, and especially at the very beginning, you do it

really badly. So, you know, you do your first chunk and they look at it and they go, mmm-

no. Um, and so you can redo it, you can redo any of the chunks that you want to. So

they’re there with you the whole time and they’re sitting there listening and going, I think

you stumbled over a word or, in this segment, you said this, and in this segment, you’re

saying that, and then you just go in right there and change it. So, um literally, my job is to,

they tell me what to wear, okay don’t wear stripes, don’t wear this color, and so I get

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dressed properly, um, [laugh] I stand there, I look into the monitor um, I give my thing,

and then they take it from there um, and do it.

Interviewee 10: If you go on to the Coursera platform as an instructor, there are some

resources on there about how to develop content and deliver content. Um, the people at

[institution’s name] were very, um I mean they have a whole operation there with a lot of

people who are working with faculty to develop content and to push it out through

Coursera. So, I knew that they would help me, and they told me they would help me. They

told me you know you don’t need to worry about learning how to do this. Video production. Using videos was one of the predominant means of delivering

knowledge in MOOCs. Discussions were held on how to produce videos in the context of

MOOC and what support/training was needed for video production, mainly focusing on how to

make an engaging and high-quality video as well as how to give a lecture in front of a camera.

Comments from the interviewees were provided below.

Interviewee 04: I tried being the talking head and decided I was going to shoot myself and

I wasn’t gonna do that, and so they said okay, you have to make wrappers. And so, if you

go in and look at the course, at the, at the beginning and the end of most lectures, there is,

I’m saying something about what’s coming and something in so they so the students who

were watching it saw me. And so the students were wonderful in giving those kinds of

suggestion, and of course, they said you know you need cartoons to go with that, and you

know they had these ideas and somebody knew somebody who could do that and of

course, it never happened and so I ended up during all the cartoons, so yeah. I spent a lot

of time on the course. They were very helpful, and I couldn’t have done it without them.

Interviewee 05: So, interestingly, um, luckily, and so I recorded the videos while I was

already shortly after I arrived here at [institution’s name], although the university is not

directly involved in the MOOC, and, but it happened such that they also have a contract

with edX. That’s just like a, like a curiosity on the side, but they have, so they have an

online learning department, and they have a small video studio, and they were surprised to

record the videos with me free of charge. So that the videos are very good quality, and

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therefore camera and lighting and stuff. So, yes, they, I was able to do the videos with

them.

Interviewee 08: So, we have, we actually have a, you know, a complete video production

enterprise at [institution’s name]. We do have um, ah, different programs that are based on

kind of a teleconference format. And we also have many other MOOCs, so this was not

the first MOOC that was being produced. There was the whole machinery to support my

work.

Interviewee 09: Well first off, you have to understand I’m in a journalism school. So, what

happened was the ah, one of the top people in the IT department, they had a team of

production people and, and a director. And so, they brought in a team of five and Coursera

gave us X amount of dollars which the university was just gonna, thought we’d just spend.

And I went in and tripled the amount of money. I said you got a kick in this you know

double the amount. And we put it together. So, we hired a very professional team, we had

our own music brought in, we ah, we shot, we had a makeup person, we had several that

we’re doing scripting, as well as, ah, director and a producer. We had professional

lighting, I mean, it was done on a professional set. And we had the, you know, I had the

script you know that I could read as it was going. And so, we would do a lot of shooting

the ins and outs as well as you know recording the, the speakers. But then we would edit it

all down and really get to the really good stuff.

Interviewee 11: So, we have an on-campus TV studio, um, which is, believe it or not, the

best, the best TV studio in the city we have. Um, so we did it here video, the students

filmed it. They’re part of the um, they’re part of the film classes that we have here. Ah,

and then the second one, I just couldn’t, I need to speed up the production. So um, we

went with an outside company to do that. The university paid for it, and, um, yeah and

then the university was repaid from, ah, the monetary whatever they got from Coursera.

Interviewee 12: They, well they used my video, yes. And then they helped to refine it, cut

it down, put it together. Likewise, they taught me how to use the equipment for recording

the MOOCs, set it up in my office, and I recorded on my own. But they would then take

the video, edit it, cut it down, and make it look ah, make it look good.

Assistants. Keeping students engaged with the instructor, the content, and one another

promoted student success in an online learning environment. MOOCs recruited research

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assistants (RAs), teaching assistants (TAs), graduate assistants (GAs), or student workers to

enhance student engagement and the instructor’s presence, provide prompt feedback, answer

common questions, post replies, moderate online discussions, and unleash gradebook.

Interviewee 01: Well, we raised some money, I mean, I had to get a grant to get the

graduate student support that I needed. I got a lot of voluntary support from other graduate

students.

Interviewee 02: Yeah, I have a filtering mechanism. Um, my research assistants both of

whom have very high domain knowledge, and who have now also switched on to, ah you

know, the HTML coding and everything that goes with turning a raw video into an edited

finished product. So, they are an integral part of it. Um, I ask them to go through the

discussion board. Ah, so whenever the discussions appear on the discussion boards, one of

my research assistants who’s helping me with the course, if it’s an easy question, it’s just

one clarification, etc., she responds to it herself. Ah, if it’s a tough one, it could be a little

controversial or difficult to argue, those get passed up to me. They just send me the-the

hyperlink, ah, so in my free time, I just go into it, look at the question, give a response,

and be done with it. So, I’d say about 70% of the ah, questions they get posted on the

discussion board are handled by my very capable research assistants. Ah, maybe 30 %

comes up to me and that takes a lot of effort to respond. Ah, That’s-that’s the way it goes.

Interviewee 03: So, we had teaching assistants who did all that, so the teaching assistants

would run seminars um, on a regular basis, they would do office hours, and then there

were homework assignments that they needed to, um, they needed to do and then would

send back.

Interviewee 04: But we had, that was another thing that I used ah, students that had taken

the class, so they knew the material to monitor the discussion session.

Interviewee 09: The way Cours-, I don’t. The way Coursera works though is they pick

some of the better graduates, and they become mentors. We generally have two to three

mentors in the course at any given time across all of the different MOOCs.

Interviewee 11: So, Coursera actually offers Tas. I have rarely stepped into the discussion

forums. Coursera offers instructors, um yes, people to help out with the course. But they

have taken the course before. They’re not in Coursera employees, as far as I know.

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Nonetheless, unlike most of interviewees who embraced support enthusiastically in

developing and delivering MOOCs, two interviewees explicitly stated that they preferred to do

some MOOC work independently because they felt that getting someone to assist was not as

effective as other interviewees experienced.

Interviewee 05: Ahem, when the MOOC I do it myself since um, the MOOC contains a lot

of different topics, um, usually the teaching assistants they’re not, they’re not experts

enough in everything, may or maybe not in the topics also. So that it, it seems easier for

me to just do it myself rather than have somebody always have to ask me. Um, yeah, so

many I-I-I many times if it’s, if it’s, if it’s a significant effort to delegate something I

rather do it myself because um, it’s, that’s more, more efficient and more rewarding than

just tell somebody and then this person might not be able to perform the task.

Interviewee 06: The fact that the first time we did have such help, and it was a disaster

only convinced us that we don’t want it.

Specific competencies were required to do MOOCs.

Teaching a MOOC was considerably different from teaching a face-to-face class. MOOC

instructors were expected to have some core competencies and skills to facilitate student

learning. Therefore, interviewees suggested several competencies needed by MOOC instructors

in the following five categories: 1) commitment (time and effort); 2) content expertise; 3)

understanding of online teaching context; 4) camera presence; and 5) language accessibility.

Commitment (time and effort). Teaching online required a significant amount of time,

effort, and preparation, especially in MOOCs characterized with a massive number of

enrollments. To architect a good learning experience for students, MOOC instructors needed to

integrate instructionally sound learning theories and frameworks, project planning, content

expertise, communication, writing, and various technologies. One of the interviewees shared his

insights on what qualities a MOOC instructor needed to have.

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Interviewee 06: So, I think you have to have a willingness to really think deeply about

how to scaffold the material so that learners can learn independently, and so that they sort

of gain the insights through experience as opposed to through um you know, conventional

means. Um, so it takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of thought, and it takes a lot of desire to

really, you know have the student discover the material and the on the, gain the

understanding independently as opposed to using the model of you know, God passes

knowledge to the instructor and the instructor passes it to the student which is the

traditional way of doing it.

Content expertise. Interviewees stated that MOOC instructors should be capable of

demonstrating an in-depth knowledge of the subject that helped students achieve their learning

goals.

Interviewee 07: You need to know your discipline. You need to have a course that you

feel is your best course in terms of communicating to students. I would argue that unless

you’re at a place that’s really dedicated to doing a lot of MOOCs, that it should be

specialized in some way reflecting a research interest or something that your institution’s

known for.

Interviewee 08: As a MOOC instructor you have to know what level you’re hoping to, ah,

what level of knowledge you want to convey. And so, I think that the most important

thing is that the instructor is clear on what the goal is of the class. But I think that’s the

same thing ah, for teaching, ah, you know students.

Interviewee 10: I think um, I think a really strong command of your subject I think, is

important.

Understanding of online teaching context. Being a MOOC instructor, knowing the

pedagogy of online teaching, such as how to teach online, both synchronously and

asynchronously, would help deliver a successful MOOC. Three interviewees shared their

opinions in this regard such as how to respond to learners, how to meet the needs of international

learners, and how to engage students.

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Interviewee 08: So, I think that um, if I think about the competencies, I think that you

have to be, um, you have to be responsive to the medium. And by that, I mean that,

understanding that this is asynchronous. It’s really important because that means that you

have to be very direct and explicit about what the goals are for your class. Because you

know that people can’t ask you questions in a sense. If you’re in class, you can imagine

that you can have goals for the class. But if these goals are not being met, that you’ll have

feedback, either quizzes or you know a student is looking confused or whatever. But that’s

not the case with, you know, with a completely asynchronous you know, or more than

asynchronous with um, this, this kind of a platform. So that means that ah, I have to be

very deliberate about what my goals are, and how each lesson is meeting that goal [right].

Yeah. Beyond that, I mean it’s the same, I don’t think there’s anything different to tell you

the truth.

Interviewee 10: One is a strong sense of how to structure, organize and talk about a topic

for an international audience who will have a great variety of educational, um, educational

levels and linguistic skills. So, in other words, how to, how to meet as many of those

needs from a heterogeneous audience as possible.

Interviewee 11: They should understand how students learn online. And I think that, and

one of the things that I’ve told my leadership, um, if we’re gonna keep on doing more of

these, is that everybody needs to either have an instructional designer helping them, or at

least they need to go through a ‘Quality Matters’ preparation course like I did to

understand what it really takes um, and to show that these things are trying to be helpful

for students because we don’t see the objectives in um, what are you supposed to learn

this week? What are you supposed to be learning over the course of the entire um, class

period, or the entire semester? Um, we don’t do that enough. Um, so I think that

instructors really need to understand how their students learn. And understand that it is a

lot of work to try to understand the breadth of instruction that you are gonna have to do to

make sure that it’s understood by everyone, not just the students who are your target

students.

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Three interviewees discussed actionable strategies to meet the needs of learners and to

build connections with them. Specific approaches for engaging students were discussed as

follows.

Interviewee 02: Students are an abstraction in the MOOCs to me, and your ability to make

connections in that abstraction ah, makes a huge difference. Um, the ability to connect the

students who you don’t even see. They should be, feel very personalized, you know. So,

the question in the discussion board, the way you respond, always [voice cut out] their

name, make it a very personal communication.

Interviewee 09: You know what it makes you human, and it makes it a very humanistic

learning experience. And so, students are just amazed that they can go out on Twitter and

ask me a question and I’ll answer it the same day. But I do, I work on it every morning,

afternoon and evening just for a few minutes. But I’ll answer every one of their

comments, and I give them advice as to how to get, you know, they say “but I can’t get

anybody to do my peer things.” It’s like here are the resources you go to. And if those

resources don’t work, then I’ll get involved and take care of it. Because I want to have

them satisfied.

Interviewee 10: Um, the only other thing I would say is, if you have the ability to stay

engaged with the MOOC, in other words, if it’s a part of your job and not something

you’re doing as a side gig like I did, I think it would be important to spend more time

going on the site, be part of a discussion board, um, engaging with learners. Because, we

know for a fact that online learning is really only engaging when, when faculty stay

involved with it.

Camera presence. Interviewees revealed that presenting in front of people as opposed to a

camera were two completely different things. When asked to speak in front of a camera, MOOC

instructors usually didn’t know how to behave accordingly or transfer their public speaking skills

to talking to a monitor. Mostly when the recording was on, they got trapped because the face

froze, words stumbled, and the brain blocked, although most of them were seasoned presenters

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with rich experience in giving lectures. Interviewees shared their funny stories of recording

MOOCs and made recommendations below.

Interviewee 02: The challenge is, ah, the ability to stand in front of a camera and deliver a

course and turn it into an engaging MOOC. Ah, being able to handle the camera is only

one part of it. Turning into an engaging MOOC requires a group of people who you work

with very closely to deliver. For the first few videos that I produced, I was still on the

learning curve. [Ahh] But, as I went along, it-it got better. And by the time I thought I am

doing a reasonably good job, most of my videos had already been produced and [voice

lost]. That-that’s the way it is. Um, so that’s the challenge actually. A lot of instructors

who have been teaching in the classroom for very long. This is a barrier. My, a lot of my

colleagues refused to get into doing the MOOCs for exactly the same reason.

Interviewee 03: It’s very disconcerting to teach to a monitor. You know to (unintelligible)

– you know, that is the most occult thing about doing it, it is realizing it doesn’t matter for

you if it’s online, if it’s online filming as opposed to online where you actually WebEx,

give a teaching. Um, for me, the hardest thing was not having eye contact with the

student, no, no way to, no way to understand to know if they understood it or not, if they

didn’t should I be giving another example, can I stop giving examples, and that you have

to look at a light on a monitor, and communicate with it. And ah, that takes a little getting

used to basically.

Interviewee 12: The second one I think, is the ability to, is the ability to give a lecture to a

screen while being able to pretend that you have students on the other end watching you.

Because it’s, it’s very lonely and miserable and strange work otherwise you know. Language accessibility. In addition to English, a considerable number of MOOCs had

been distributed in multiple languages. Interviewee 10 claimed that accessibility of languages

deserved particular attention when involving international enrollees in MOOCs.

Interviewee 10: Now that I know how many people read or watch MOOC are rational

learners, I think it would be really important to think about language accessibility. Um, I

didn’t think about that because I, it didn’t occur to me, and the people at [institution’s

name] didn’t say oh by the way most of the people will be from other countries. Ah, but

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now that I know what I know, I think if I were going to give someone advice, and they

were doing the same thing I did like using a platform that goes out, gets pushed out

through a big international research university, I would recommend that they really think

hard about you know making the language maybe 10th-grade level. Because at the end of

the day, it was an undergraduate-level course, but it was primarily international learners.

So, I do think that you have to take that into account.

Another interviewee, however, used Google Translate successfully, interacting with

students who spoke a different language other than English in his MOOC.

Interviewee 02: I tried something ah, really interesting. I have a bunch of Portuguese and

Spanish students signed on to my course. Ah, they posted their questions in Portuguese,

and somebody else did it in Spanish. So, I didn’t know what it was. I couldn’t understand

their languages. So, I copied and pasted that into Google, I prepared my response,

translated it into Portuguese, and I posted it on the discussion board.

[unintelligible]…non-Portuguese I said this question is in Portuguese, and here is the

English language equivalent, and then here is the answer. And to the Portuguese student I

told him in Portuguese, thanks to google translator, this is my answer, forgive me if the

Portuguese is, is not grammatically correct. Yeah, that guy sent me a response with you

know smiles and so on and so forth. Ah, in Portuguese, it said fantastic professor, you

know.

Instructional Design was essential to MOOCs.

Online education could be beneficial and rewarding if suitable methods of instructional

design were used to engage students. Interviewees elaborated on why instructional design was

essential from three perspectives of MOOCs: attention span, supplemental materials, and

engagement and interaction.

Attention span. Videos were commonly used to engage students and effectively improve

their learning in the online environment. In general, the optimal length of an instructional video

was approximately 6 or 7 minutes. The interest of a viewer dropped rapidly after 7 minutes. This

was noted by four interviewees.

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Interviewee 05: Um, longest one would be somewhere I think on nine and a half minutes,

the shortest would be more like two minutes, so kind of five-ish six minutes is kind of the

mean or median or something. But sometimes it’s short, sometimes it’s a little longer.

Interviewee 08: I think that basically for every, I think for every lesson right, where a

lesson might be I forget like seven minutes right, yeah or even shorter because that’s the

attention span, right, you should be able to ride out, you know a trolley from one course to

the other and finish a lesson.

Interviewee 09: We broke everything into seven-minute videos. So, most of mine are in

the four to five-minute range. But I agree if you go over seven you know. It’s just like I, I

had a company that they sent me their videos and they were half-hour videos. And I said

nobody’s gonna watch a half-hour.

Interviewee 12: Um, it could be anywhere from 5 minutes to 20 minutes. For the most

part, we had hoped to keep them between 8 and 10 minutes, because that seems to be how

people function the best.

On the contrary, one interviewee stated that she did not like to limit the content to 20

minutes or less because it was challenging for her to compress meaningful and necessary content

in a short video. She commented,

Interviewee 10: And I think that the goal of the people at [institution’s name] was that the

recorded time would be under 20 minutes. And then we had like supplemental readings

and other materials that we used also that were, um, you know, that were used to enhance

the students’ learning. Um, you know it-it was a little funky because I’ve never taught a

class before that only lasted 20 minutes. Um, and I didn’t, you know, I didn’t exactly love,

hold on, I’m just plugging back in here. I didn’t exactly love that because you know, it’s

really hard um, to cover a lot of meaningful content in 20 minutes. And we had and, that

was kind of all we could do.

Supplemental materials. MOOC instructors invested in a plethora of thoughts, time, and

effort, as well as incorporated high-quality learning resources while creating a MOOC. Without

question, they would recycle some of the well-crafted MOOC content to promote student

learning in their face-to-face courses as needed. Below were examples of their remarks.

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Interviewee 04: Well, if you, if you couple it with, with your classroom teaching, I think it

adds benefits to the classroom. You can, you can put the lecture, you know you can put

the material that you want them to have, available and be able to talk about, you can put

that out in the video. Then you can spend class time, and you can do other things online,

but you can spend class time on taking that material and putting it in a different context

and think about the material itself.

Interviewee 05: But they, but I sometimes, I some of the video since, since the topics of

the MOOC are fairly fundamental, and um, I can make use of, the, especially the video of

it in my regular teaching, so that, that’s kind of a like a secondary, second-life use of the

materials.

Interviewee 07: What happened was is that after I did the MOOC, I began to incorporate

more flipped learning into my classes. So now we do flip learning and we do more hybrid

materials in that Common Core class I mentioned. So, the students will interact with

learners from the MOOC, and I get to know these international, kind of, fellow learners,

and then they’ll work together with that in that kind of time.

Interviewee 08: So now I basically tell people if you wanted to get, you know basically a

sense of what’s gonna be going on in class, or if you missed something in class, you can

always go to the Coursera material [mm-hm]. So, I give them the option to um, you know

ah, to use a material to supplement their in-class time.

Interviewee 09: Not only do I use it, and I still have some that I kept because certain

foundational things don’t change, um, I other, other professors in the ah, in the schools

have used them as well. And so, we made them available to any, to anybody. And, uh,

yeah. And so, a lot of the, lot of the other professors liked it because I had modules on

data governance and data security and if it was appropriate, they could use that in their

classes.

Engagement and interaction. MOOC learners had varied preferences for the interactions

of learner-content, learner-instructor, and learner-learner. They might select one type over the

other for varying reasons. Interviewees found engaging with learners in MOOCs challenging and

time-consuming, especially in those MOOCs with a massive number of enrollees. One

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interviewee stated that he attempted to run a “self-operational” model in his MOOC to minimize

the interaction. Interviewee 05 stated,

And we wanted it to be as ah, like self-operational as possible. So, when ah, we wanted to

minimize the interaction and the maintenance, and, and, and instructor interaction.

MOOC communication was concerned. Interviewees’ responses differ from each other.

Interviewee 10, for instance, said,

I think it would be important to spend more time going on the site, be part of a discussion

board, um, engaging with learners. Because, we know for a fact that online learning is

really only engaging when, when faculty stay involved with it. And had [institution’s

name] paid me more, then basically a small fee to develop the content, I probably would

have done that, and I think, look, I would have had a more engaging experience, but more

importantly, my students would have. Um, and you know I talked to Julie I don’t know

maybe six months after the MOOC launched and I said, hey have you ever gotten the

discussion board and she said, oh you know I just hadn’t even thought about it. I’m so

busy with my own teaching. And, we’re gonna only give most of our attention to the, the

students who are right in front of us. So, if people who teach MOOCs were compensated

enough, and we’re committed enough, I think it could be a much better experience.

Interviewee 11: But I’m not, I’m not in the discussion forums all the time at all.

Interviewee 12: I have a TA from Coursera and if questions come up and he can’t answer

them, he notifies me, and I will go on once in a while and answer a question that he can’t.

But for the most part, it runs on its own. So, I am not, it is not a MOOC in which I’m

actively involved.

In comparison, three interviewees stated that they were very interested in engaging

learners through virtual office hours, discussion boards, or additional communicative tools

regardless of a massive number of learners. They were enthusiastic about the experience of

communicating with MOOC learners. Their comments were provided below.

Interviewee 01: The first time I did morning office hours, a woman who was from Paris,

who was actually in Quebec who was working as a school leader in Quebec, you know

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she was the only one who checked in so we had coffee together and, and had a wonderful

morning. And she went her way, and I, I had mine. And it was a pretty incredible way to

spend a morning, mmm, from here and my humble little [city’s name] bedroom office. So,

anyway, [I like your office] I put EEOC’s on it. Oh, thank you. I mean, I, I do find it

really exciting though I mean it’s, um, you just realized that there really is a lot of

potential in all of us.

Interviewee 02: Um, I-I will always be very active in my discussions. The-the, ah, my

research assistants are told every question you must give a response ASAP. And whatever

is not done, send them up to me if you find that question difficult or tricking. I’ll handle it

and I’ll make sure I get back in 48 hours. I, I learned this ah, from ah, Allen Agrawal

who’s actually the person behind the edX initiative at MIT. I mean he’s the one who

started all this off. Ah, so when I met Allen, ah, one of the things he told me was, he said

PC when you’re doing a MOOC, make sure you as the course instructor is active on the

discussion board. Ah, that’s the way you connect with your students/learners. And the

webinar, you know the reason why I thought of the webinar was it’s, a -it’s a way for

them to ah, see me in a different mode. So, I’m in a t-shirt from the webinar you know I

don’t wear a suit and a jacket and a tie. Very informal and it helps. So those are, if I look

back, those are the two or three things that appear as a challenge, but we cracked it and it

worked. And it worked very well.

Interviewee 09: I have a team of people who are always engaged with the discussion

boards as well as with the s, with the students or the participants, to make sure things are

going well for them and answer any questions they have. Um, I do a lot of engagement

with the students that are ah-um, through the forums, and they helped me to understand

that where I’m efficient, where I’m not. And so, it’s a- it’s a very different way of

teaching, but I really like it. Um, this even the students in my courses now say these

videos are great you know, much better than wa-, than reading. And I think that that’s

probably true.

One interviewee suggested that learners in a MOOC should be given clear communication

explaining how quickly the instructor would respond. Because a successful learning experience

was heavily dependent on effective communication between students and the instructor.

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Interviewee 03: If there’s going to be um, communication, between them and you, like-

like the Tas except even for them but for me to you-you have to put limits on when they

can contact you, or more importantly how soon you’re going to get back to them because,

with 5,000 people, you simply cannot be at their beck and call every time when they want

to write you. So upfront, you have to say I’ll get back to you within 24 hours or something

on that or you have to put limits. I mean, you almost have to put limits when you’re

teaching a course in person but you really have to put some sort of expectations in place

when you’re doing something where there are time zones all over the world and we got

5,000 people who are actively doing something. I-I think you can’t answer the questions

all the time. We did in one of them put in a discussion board, and it turned out that it was

very useful because with 5,000 people if someone puts up a question someone else from

the class will answer it.

Challenges faced in delivering MOOCs.

Some major issues, such as feeling overwhelmed, one-size does not fit all, copyright and

fair use, assessment, high enrollment and low completion rates presented obstacles for MOOC

instructors.

Feeling overwhelmed. Several interviewees and survey respondents claimed that

developing and participating in a MOOC made they feel overwhelmed due to a shortage of time,

immense workload, the difficulty to get MOOC work recognized and justifying the expense.

Their statements were given below.

Anonymous survey respondent: Weekly preparation time was after the MOOC was

designed and completed. Creating the MOOC in the first place was VERY time

consuming - I spent most of the summer and a semester constructing the MOOC.

Anonymous survey respondent: I would like to take a more active role in my MOOC

someday, but right now I just don’t have the time because of all the teaching and research

responsibilities I have for my job.

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Anonymous survey respondent: Developing MOOC material is more time-intensive than

for traditional teaching, especially professional-grade multimedia. The return on

investment is marginal at best from a financial perspective.

Interviewee 02: In fact, now I keep getting query saying prof, can you do one more

MOOC course on this topic. You know, ah, some of the emerging subjects. Um, so I said

yeah. I mean it challenges me to do it and, very time-consuming the first time around, you

know. To put together a good MOOC, it takes about six hours, six months. To

conceptualize it, to turn it into sessions, videos in each session, the comprehensiveness of

each video, the quizzes, work on the summary of each week, the quiz, ah, you know it’s-

it’s hugely time-consuming.

Interviewee 04: I spent a lot of time on the course. I mean it was overwhelmingly

consuming in terms of time. It, at-at least what I did and how I did it. There may be other

ways to do it, but I watched other people around me do it, and everyone says it’s very

time-consuming.

Interviewee 06: So, creating the course, took, 12 months of working 12 hours a day, seven

days a week. We worked on Christmas, we worked on Easter, we worked when we were

running a 103-degree fever, ah, this was a continuous one year of both of us working on

this essentially continuously. Once the course sort of stabilized, I would say that now we

probably spent still between 20 and 30 minutes a day just answering questions on the

discussion board, but it’s much more manageable now obviously.

Interviewee 07: So, it’s quite you know, it’s labor-intensive to keep ah, the MOOC afresh

and to respond to what’s going on on the MOOC.

Interviewee 10: I’m gonna estimate that I put about 20 to 30 hours of work into writing the

script, and so going over them with Julie, before, before I flew to Pittsburgh to record

them. And that was, that was a full day. So, the full day of the time the studio, um, plus

maybe 30 hours of work, um, to write the scripts, to edit them, to add graphics, to put you

know the charts and the, all the pictures in. Um, so maybe yeah, a total of 40 hours. Um,

and then as I said, I wasn’t asked or expected to go into the discussion board, I did it a

couple of times because I was curious. But I didn’t spend very much time in the

discussion board. So, I did, I did what I would call a respectable job, but I didn’t, it wasn’t

a huge output of labor.

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Interviewee 11: I don’t have the time to grade everything um, on Coursera.

Interviewee 12: Um, if I had known how much work it was going to be when I agreed to

do it, I probably wouldn’t have done it. And in fact, the only way, the only way the reason

that I am revising it right now, is that my University gave me next semester off. So, they

gave, they gave me, yea, they gave me time off. I did not have time off when I did it. I did

it on the side. But I frankly refused. I was simply, I told them either I’m gonna take it

down, or I’m gonna need, you know credit, for revising it. And they and they gave me

credit because it’s brought so many graduate students to, to our program.

The workload of a MOOC instructor was huge during the course development and

instruction cycle, such as scaffolding the course structure, writing the learning outcomes,

drafting weekly lesson plans, designing activities and assessments, crafting lectures and

recording them. Statements from survey respondents and interviewees were given below.

Anonymous survey respondent: Developing a MOOC is very labor-intensive, and even

with a great team of undergraduates, it was an exhausting enterprise.

Anonymous survey respondent: Developing a MOOC was MUCH more work than I ever

imagined!

Anonymous survey respondent: I cannot say the number taking the MOOC hence why I

put in 0000 to this question. I know it is over 1,000.

Anonymous survey respondent: It took 15 months of hard work to develop our MOOC.

Anonymous survey respondent: When I said “0” for hours preparing, that’s now that my

course is live. Of course, there were many, many hours required to produce the course.

Interviewee 11: Challenges, it’s a lot of upfront work, it is a lot of work to anticipate.

According to survey respondents and interviewees, making MOOC work acknowledged

by their institutions seemed to be laborious. They suggested that junior faculty could initiate a

conversation with administration or university to share this concern prior to start the MOOC

development work. Comments from the survey respondents and interviewees were as follows.

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Anonymous survey respondent: I only wish my university would consider this part of my

regular teaching load (the university considers it a “spare-time” project). I wonder how

many MOOC instructors are in a similar circumstance with their university.

Anonymous survey respondent: Sadly, my university has stepped back from MOOC

development, and there was no monetary or other recognition from my department or the

university for the work we did. I am glad I did it, and I would like to do more. But the

incentive structure does not exist.

Interviewee 03: If they’re a junior person, I would want to make sure that their university

valued teaching in a MOOC because teaching is required for all of us. But if the university

doesn’t think that MOOCs are as valuable as teaching a class in person, I don’t want them

putting all that time in to find out that when it came they came up for promotion they just

said that was just a MOOC, you know you didn’t interact with students or something on

that order. So, I think it’s very important to understand how the teaching in a MOOC will

be, um, interpreted by the promotion’s committee where they are.

Interviewee 04: Well. I-I’d tell junior faculty do not do it, [laugh, okay] unless you’re

planning to put your course as a flipped course, and you start from scratch and think about

the MOOC and the course at the same time. Understand what the MOOC requires and

understand what the course requires and see where those interfaces. [mm-hmm] Um,

because it is, I mean it was overwhelmingly consuming in terms of time. It, at-at least

what I did and how I did it. There may be other ways to do it, but I watched other people

around me do it, and everyone says it’s very time-consuming. So, an assistant professor

cannot afford the time unless they’re going to be judged on their teaching unless they’re

encouraged and will be rewarded by their department for doing it.

Interviewee 12: Well, my main, my main suggestion is not to, to faculty members but to

administrators, and that is to recognize that this is very different and that it is important to

incentivize, recognize, and reward faculty for doing what I think is a public service. Um,

and for faculty members, I would say that they need to negotiate that with the

administrators, and in particular make the case that this is not, I’d only help you know

disseminate knowledge about a particular topic, but it’s actually an excellent branding

opportunity for any university.

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One interviewee said she had a tough time to justify her MOOC work to her institution,

especially the MOOC expenses. A similar comment was made by an anonymous survey

respondent. Their claims were laid out below.

Interviewee 07: Um, I think that the expenses involved, I think, ah, are oftentimes hard to

justify for my own institution. So, I’ve always constantly tried to justify what I’m doing.

Anonymous survey respondent: In engineering and technical fields, producing a good

quality MOOC takes an enormous amount of time and effort. It is worthwhile for the

impact it has, but without the possibility of royalty payments very few would undertake

such a large task. There isn’t a way to justify the time otherwise unless time off is given

for development.

One size does not fit all. Interviewees indicated that MOOCs were not one-size-fits-all

models in all subject areas and levels of academic degrees. This might be considered by

educators who are interested in making a MOOC. Comments from the survey and interviews

were provided below.

Anonymous survey respondent: A MOOC is a great way to teach the theoretical

component of a professional course that also has a practical workplace component.

Anonymous survey respondent: I think that it is good that MOOC exists, but I see them as

a complement to traditional courses, not as a replacement.

Anonymous survey respondent: I think MOOC’s fill a very nice gap. People can learn new

things and then decide if this might be a course they could take on a more formal basis. I

do not think it will replace traditional classes. However, it could serve to augment them in

many significant ways.

Interviewee 02: There are courses I agree which are highly intellectual in their orientation

like a high-end research ah-ahem course, I wouldn’t do that using a MOOC, because it

calls for a lot of interaction in the class. But something like Econometrics research

methodology, marketing research techniques, you can easily deliver that through a

MOOC.

Interviewee 03: To be honest, I don’t think much with a MOOC, um, you know there

might be better MOOCs than ours. Ours were really to introduce people to the field and

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give them an opportunity to get some basic understanding and then maybe they could go

back to an online degree program or something on that order. Um, I don’t know, I’m not

as knowledgeable as you are about what-what is the distribution of MOOCs, you know,

how, can you, can you get a degree with a MOOC, or is there a deeper MOOC you know

where you really go into a testing center and you really do it much more rigorously. But

for what I know the MOOCs that we’ve got to do no more than this, I, I don’t think they

would fulfill degree program requirements.

Understanding copyright and fair use. MOOC instructors were plagued by fear and

uncertainty about copyright law in MOOCs compared to face-to-face or online classes. Some

universities provided MOOC copyright guidelines for instructors to follow, some were not clear

on this. Several institutions told their MOOC instructors that the intellectual property of MOOC

content belonged to the employer (i.e., the school/college/university). For example, interviewee

03 said,

The videos are the schools. I mean, I can’t take the video anywhere. There’s no way to

take a video anywhere. So, the question is though, when you’re doing a flipped course,

where you want them to watch videos and come to class, can you have them watching

these videos? Is that, is the MOOC course gonna stay open forever so that the student can

go in and watch something, and then you can use it and it’s only very, I’d say within the

last few months that the word has come down, that the videos can be put into a library,

and the students, any student would have access to it. It means we can use them now for

the other courses. So, if I were talking to anybody who is gonna do a MOOC course or an

online course, it doesn’t really matter, I would tell them to ask the first question is, what

are your rights in terms of the material? Will you be able to use the material again? And I

understand why they wouldn’t want us to have the videos because once they go to all this

trouble, and it costs money to do this, you have to have a studio, you have to have people

doing it. Let’s say I get hit by a bus or let us say I decided to go elsewhere, they want to

still give the course. So, they have to own the copyright to the videos so that they can

continue to give the course even if I’m not part of the institution. I understand it very-very

clearly. But on the other hand, I need that material to go ahead, yeah, but I did it, but I did

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it with their equipment. So, it’s just a little bit different than teaching in a class because

again written material, exercises and all that no one would disagree that material is

intellectual yours. But the videos, it’s hard to know who the videos are, so it’s just worth

always somebody checking before they do it.

Interviewee 04: You know I had sort of the basic course, but we had to put it online which

turns out if your slides, which I already had if you use fair use in education, you don’t

need permission. If you put it on a MOOC, you need permission. So, every image in my

slides we had to get permission or pay for it, copyright, right. So that had to be done.

Well, one thing is that I had to renew a, um, a resource, um, an image attribution, and I

have to change the attribution because one company obtained the other company and now,

they wanted in their name.

Assessment. Personalized feedback from an instructor benefited students in various ways.

However, this presented a challenge for MOOC instructors to grade and provide in-depth

feedback in a short amount of time to hundreds or thousands of submissions. MOOCs offered

automatic input in the form of online quizzes. One interviewee used to grade assessments herself.

When she first launched a MOOC, she felt awkward at automatic grading. She (interviewee 10)

said,

Um, we didn’t, the part that I thought was really strange, and I still don’t feel great about

is, I didn’t, I didn’t grade any of the assessments. You know they were set up in such a

way as to be able to kind of be automatically graded I guess, or evaluated, um, by the

technology that Coursera has. And, I still feel kind of funny about that. Like I don’t, I’ve

never had the experience before of kind of turning over that part of teaching to a machine,

right? But I, but I also knew, I mean, the other day I got an update from Coursera, they

send you periodically a list of how many people have taken your course and it’s in there

like 5,000 now. So, there’s no way I could have ever graded all of them.

Little evidence tells us if the peer-review technique was appropriate as a form of

assessment and how efficient it was in MOOCs. One interviewee stated that he noticed a sharp

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drop-off in student enrollment when he announced a peer-reviewed assignment in his MOOC.

He (interviewee 11) stated,

I see a very interesting trend in my own classes where I have peer-reviewed assignments. I

see a very sharp drop off whenever there’s a peer-reviewed assignment because I think

there’s a big problem with the language barrier and fear of not being able to pass the

course because their English, since that’s the language everybody’s submitting their

homework in, um, it is not the same as um, how they’re actually reading it, how they’re

listening to it, and they may not be able to articulate the content well enough for their

peers. Ah, so I do see a massive drop-off for when I have peer-reviewed assignments

which is lucky, and I’m going to be changing some of those here shortly um, to make sure

that it’s not peer-reviewed and it has a, even though that. I think the peer-reviewed

assignments, you can get away with a lot of, do a lot of work, and it’s very hard in

computer science I think to do the, I don’t have the time to grade everything um, on

Coursera. So how do I build that into my courses um, where it’s not peer-reviewed and

it’s, and it’s not um, oh what I am trying to say? It’s not a set answer, it’s not just one

answer, it’s interpreted very differently from student to student.

High enrollment and low completion rates. With a few mouse clicks, learners could sign

up for any MOOC at no cost and gained immediate access to course materials. High enrollment

numbers for courses did not make MOOC instructors feel excited as much as when they saw the

massive figure of enrollees for their first MOOC. Interviewees commented,

Interviewee 01: Um, it’s like any MOOC course, you know, the-the number of enrollees is

very high, the number of completers is, is low, the amount of discussion board and team

participation is generally low.

Interviewee 02: Um, the one thing I found is, well, you may have, and I’m sure this is the,

this is the experience of MOOC instructors worldwide. I’m never excited by the number

of people who registered for my course, frankly, whether it’s 5,000 or 100,000. It doesn’t

matter. Because in the end, there will be only a couple of hundred serious learners who

take it all the way through, and they complete the exam.

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Research Question 3

What lessons have higher education faculty learned through the experience of teaching a

MOOC?

Findings concerning what lessons interviewees learned through the experience of teaching

a MOOC were derived from interview results, and were coded for five topics: Teaching a

MOOC improved my academic reputation (theme 1), MOOCs served opportunities for learning

(theme 2), it was a challenge to get MOOC participants to engage (theme 3), preparing to teach a

MOOC was time consuming (theme 4), and working with others in MOOCs helped (theme 5).

Subthemes and categories were presented in the following paragraphs.

Teaching a MOOC improved my academic reputation.

Little research focused on addressing MOOC benefits from a MOOC maker’s perspective.

Interviewees in this study stated that their academic reputation was strengthened through

teaching a MOOC in two ways: 1) they became more academically visible, and 2) they were a

better instructor.

I became more academically visible (research, publications, expanded network).

Several interviewees reported that the MOOC teaching experience made them more

academically visible in research and publications as well as helped them expand professional

networks.

Interviewee 02: Um, at a very personal level, um, I think I am a lot more, can I use the

word, ah, visible and known? Across several geographies, not just the countries that I

worked, everywhere. And um, you know not just students, ah bankers, risk managers, um,

heads of ahem, learning and development organizations in populations. It’s amazing. And

I getting, as a result of this, I get invitations to come and talk in-in conferences, in forums,

not just on technology in education, but on my course subject of banking, finance, and risk

management. Ah, and I’m going to be reaching out to an audience I would never have met

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otherwise. So yeah, in some sense, actual visibility goes up, ah, significantly. But these

are, you know when I started out on MOOCs, I didn’t have all this in mind. These are all

outcomes.

Interviewee 05: Um, visibility, I think, is, is one benefit. And I, I think the, or the initially

expected benefit to reach out people who are less privileged somewhere in the world um,

that expectation was not really fulfilled, because if you look at who participates in our

MOOC with people from wealthy regions in the world ahem, because presumably people

from less privileged ah part of the world they have other things to worry about then the

contents of our MOOC. So, um, for me it’s mostly visibility it doesn’t really, it doesn’t

really save much teaching time, much face-to-face time for me, um, oh yeah, that’s kind

of it.

Interviewee 07: I also feel that we’re very strong in terms of globalization and global

cultures. And I feel that in order to get our research strengths out there to people, that one

of the best ways to do it is MOOC, because a MOOC has global reach. And I wanted

people all over the world to know, get to know Hong Kong U is a research hub in this

area.

Teaching a MOOC sparked great ideas and aroused interest in publishing research papers

or writing book chapters. For example, interviewee 02 stated,

In fact, that discussion resulted in me actually ah, doing a research paper on the back of

ah, you know, some of the learnings that I got from the learners in that... And, so yeah, I

mean it’s-it’s, it’s been a very positive experience as far as I’m concerned.

Notably, teaching a MOOC expanded the academic network for MOOC instructors. One

of the interviewees was invited to give speeches at other universities because the inviter used to

take his MOOC. He (interviewee 02) said,

Some of such teachers have actually written to me and said can you come and interact

with our students. In fact, mid of October, I’m going to one of the other universities ah,

because one of the ladies who did my MOOCs, ah, and she was here. There are people

who write to say I’m coming to Bangalore, I’d like to meet you because they’ve used my

videos or they’ve ah, participated in one of my MOOCs. And, and, that the ability to

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network and connect professionally for a very positive cause ah, I don’t think I’ve

achieved but for getting into this MOOCs space.

I became a better instructor (explore strategies, more efficient, reconceptualize

curriculum).

A good teacher always seeks to expand the boundaries of his/her knowledge in order to

promote student success. According to interviewees, teaching a MOOC opened the window for

him/her to receive feedback from global learners, explored new teaching strategies, became an

efficient educator, reconceptualized curriculum, and increased the level of education in a

particular discipline. Interviewees stated that student feedback helped them understand the

learning experience of students and improve their teaching.

Interviewee 06: Another thing that’s very pleasant is that you end up interacting with very

different kinds of people. The two people who over the years have been the most involved

in the class, in all of our classes and have given us the most feedback, were all, were both

senior lawyers. One is the Deputy District Attorney of California, and another one is a

corporate lawyer in New York State. And these people meticulously went through the

material, gave us details feedback in a very gentle way on how to improve things. And

you really get to know these people, and these people are looking forward to the next

MOOC we do because they want to be involved again. And you know it’s, it’s, it’s really

pleasant interacting with people that way. People who really care, and people who don’t

want to be paid for it, they just want to contribute back in their own way.

Interviewee 09: I think. I think that it, I mean it really changed my professionalism in the

way I teach. Um, I also get feedback from people all over the world. And a lot of times

when I travel, I’ll say hey I’m going to this hotel, come by and let’s talk and it always be

20 to 50 people there, who will just want to talk. And so, um, I think it’s, it’s really an

interesting and very fascinating media form, and it really does work. I mean, the students

are really engaged, they learn a lot. And for a lot of them, it’s a career change for them.

And so, I, that’s, I think that’s one of the great benefits of it.

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Over the past decade, technology had changed exponentially. Improvements in teaching

strategies to accommodate the increasing demands of various learners were pressing.

Interviewees found that MOOC teaching experience reshaped the way they learned and inspired

them to explore new approaches to teaching. They said,

Interviewee 03: So, it wasn’t that I sought out doing it, but it was necessary for somebody

to do it and it gave me an opportunity to explore a new way of teaching that I didn’t know

anything about.

Interviewee 06: And that’s, that’s you know one thing that you learned is that it changes

how you teach yourself in the classroom.

Interviewee 09: And as I got into it, I began to learn the power of doing you know

effective videos, and how to integrate different media into the program, which then

allowed me to you know not only did I do the MOOCs but as we’ll talk about here in a bit,

I used a lot of the technologies in my on-ground classes as well. And so, you know I

found that learning how to do MOOCs really change the way I taught. And the way that I

interacted with students.

Several interviewees shared, based on the experience of teaching a MOOC, that they

worked more efficiently as they had to keep the content concise and to the point in their lectures.

Their statements were given below.

Interviewee 06: So, I-I think the benefit to the university is that it changed how I teach

myself. I-I’d like to think I’m a more effective teacher now.

Interviewee 09: Um, what I found to be either the real takeaway, was that learning how to

do a MOOC forced me as an educator to cut things to the essence, and be extremely

efficient with what I was, what I teach. In other words, I used to teach, you know, I do a

half-hour or an hour and just kind of drone on. Um, but MOOCs taught me that you had to

break things down into seven-minute intervals. And so, what it did was we took extremely

complex topics and we broke them into little nuggets of information that let people do it.

Interviewee 10: So, at the end of the day, I, um, I feel sort of, um, I feel like it’s a better

way for students to have opportunities to revisit material repeatedly um, and it’s efficient

for me. And, I don’t have, I don’t have a bunch of people sitting there, in there, in my

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classroom with their iPhone up recording me. Right? And so, so if-if what I care about is

making sure that students learn concepts and can apply them, and if I understand that I do,

then that means often revisiting them repeatedly. That to me is the benefit of-of offering

MOOCs, have a learning strategy. Um, ah, students can revisit material multiple times,

they can review, and it can refresh. Um, it’s just not something you can do in a live

classroom. Right? From a learner’s perspective, I think it’s efficient, it’s easy, they can do

it from their home in their you know, their pajamas or whatever. Um, they don’t have to

travel to a campus, they don’t have to park, they don’t have to get childcare. Um, I mean

it’s a very democratic way of delivering course content.

Interviewees indicated that teaching a MOOC enabled them to acquire new knowledge

and beef up their out-of-the-box thinking skills, which turned into the driving force for them to

reconceptualize the course.

Interviewee 08: Um, well I think one of the, one of the biggest benefits for me is that it

really, in teaching these tiny little modules, I really had to reconceptualize all of these

other things about my course [mm-hmm]. So, and, and actually one of the nice things was

that in teaching this course, I basically learned some things that I hadn’t. You know after

having teaching this course you know seven years or whatever, right, I’ve been teaching

this course a long time, it’s one of my, the courses I teach once a year, and yet, you know

I think that maybe it’s in preparing this in a different way I had to really think differently

about the material [mm-hmm]. Right? So, I think that was one of the best parts.

Interviewee 10: So, um, I would say that you know the opportunities to really think hard

about um, crystallizing content into a manageable set of concepts and delivering it in a, in

a way that students can go back and watch it again and again and again. I mean, in life in

my view, that’s the thing that makes MOOCs kind of most um, actually useful in higher

ed.

Moreover, one interviewee pointed out that teaching a MOOC allowed him to share his

knowledge and expertise in a specific subject area that may increase the overall educational level

of the discipline. Interviewee 12 shared,

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Well, I think the greater, the greatest benefit is something that I said earlier, and that really

is, is, is sharing and increasing the general level of education about a topic that you care

about.

MOOCs served opportunities for learning.

MOOCs were seen as a good learning opportunity with great potential because MOOCs

served the needs of various learners, such as adult learners, full-time professionals as well as

underrepresented individuals.

MOOCs served adult learners and professional needs.

MOOCs gave an instructor a chance to serve adult learners by fostering a learning

community. Adult learners were connected with other professionals who shared similar learning

goals and pursued professional growth through a robust learning community. As interviewee 01

stated,

And what we said was, what I said was, no, what we need to think this is an opportunity to

create a community of people, who want to do a certain type of work and who, who begin

to do that work. And what we’re trying to do is create a community. And so, when I think

about, what my role, my role, part of my role was to sort of create the space in which this

community needs. That’s our course.

Interviewees asserted that MOOCs bridged education for national and global learners by

engaging in discussion, reflection, and collaborative teamwork. Their statements were given as

follows.

Interviewee 01: And so, ah, October of last year when the first course was up and running

when we got an email from the US Embassy in the Philippines, and, they had 800 Filipino

teachers who wanted to complete the first course together. And they had some U.S.

teachers on the ground who would, who would help them, and, could I help them launch

this and sort of provide the kind of motivation and inspiration to work together to do this

really hard work together? And, and, and they took 800 people teachers from all over the

Philippines, um, that were organized into little teams um, through the course. But they

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didn’t get through it because the content is that exciting, they got through it because it was

a social experience for them. And, and so that’s, that’s a very, I mean, so I just, I mean

when I think about my role, it’s sort of like, the social constitution by creating the space.

And yeah, yeah, right. So, so that’s how we, that’s how I think about it.

Interviewee 03: Yeah-yeah, and I actually thought from a social justice perspective it’s

wonderful. I mean, it really means that people who do not have access to schools or

money to go to a school or time to go to a school can access a course and get information

that they wouldn’t otherwise be able to get. And from that standpoint, it’s phenomenal.

There’s no question about it.

Interviewee 09: One of the stories that blew me away because we asked students to give

stories you know about what they thought of the class. They, we had two nuns who lived in

Afghanistan, and they would take a portable computer, and they would drive nearly an hour

to get to where they could get online. They would download the videos cuz you could

download, you can do that through Coursera. They downloaded the videos for the week,

drove an hour back, and this is in a war-torn country. They would then work through during

the week and watch the videos on their little portable computer. Erase them after they did

the assignments, and then drive an hour to go, you know an hour and a half to go back and

do it again. And they did that for months. And it was like that is just amazing, you know

that people would go to that length to get the education that we offer online. But you know,

they would never get it unless there were MOOCs around. And so, I think that, I always

keep that in mind is that, there are some people out there that are killing themselves to get

to the education that we’re putting out there. And so, it just amazes me you know, that they

have that much drive to do it.

Interviewee 11: Um, the reason I like them is because they provide opportunities that you

don’t normally get everywhere. You can learn from a variety of instructors, a lot of

different universities, a lot of backgrounds, a lot of them are either focused on theory or

they’re focused practically. Um, and it’s different than the college experience that you

would get learning on your own and being able to self-pace.

MOOCs extended learning opportunities for those less well served.

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MOOC providers worked with universities to expand their global reach. Interviewees

reached out to a diverse global audience, particularly for those who were less privileged. Their

opinions were provided below.

Interviewee 02: And, and, just to put it in perspective, I mean the number of students from

countries like Angola, Zambia, I would never have been able to reach them but for this

platform, you know. I would not even able to reach out to so many universities and

teachers and so many universities without this. So, I’m looking at a much ah, broader

perspective and in the process, I dare say that my brand as a teacher is also enhanced.

Interviewee 10: I knew it would be, um, a way to reach a lot more people.

Interviewee 11: I really think it’s being able to teach those that don’t have the resources

where they’re at. So that’s, that’s where I, that’s where I see it. I don’t care if, I mean the

University, I’m sure, cares of people pay for it. But if you’re helping just one person better

themselves, then you’ve done a, than you’ve done an okay job. So that’s, that’s the main

benefit I see.

Nonetheless, two interviewees revealed that the expectation of reaching out to less-

privileged learners was not fully fulfilled in their MOOCs.

Interviewee 05: I think the, or the initially expected benefit to reach out people who are

less privileged somewhere in the world um, that expectation was not really fulfilled,

because if you look at who participates in our MOOC with people from wealthy regions in

the world ahem, because presumably people from less privileged ah part of the world they

have other things to worry about then the contents of our MOOC.

Interviewee 06: And the other thing is when we started all of this, we really wanted to

reach people who did not have access to quality education and give them that opportunity.

And it’s very clear that’s almost exclusively people who use MOOCs to further their

education or people who already are very capable of independent learning for whom this

is simply yet another way in which they can learn independently. So, I don’t think we

have broadened the audience for education. I-I and, it is third case that platforms like edX

and Coursera are so focused on their own survival, and coming up with the model by

which they can raise enough money, that’s actually reaching that really important

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demographic that, that we really, we got involved with MOOCs for. When we found out,

you know, I think more than two-thirds of the people who take her course already have a

bachelor’s degree. These are lifelong learners; these are not the people who need us.

Every once in a while, you end up with a really bright middle school student or high

school students who you really then help along and that’s, that is one of the groups that we

really always were after. But invariably, these are high school students who already had a

lot of support from home to learn and therefore this is just another way for them to get

ahead. And that’s really frustrating that you, you’re not reaching the person from a poor

village in Africa and giving them the opportunity. It’s, it’s, it’s just not there. And it was

to us frustrating enough that after the first time that we offered the MOOC, we almost

decided not to even bother anymore because we really were disappointed with that

particular aspect of the whole thing. And we’re still very, very disappointed with that.

That’s the frustration.

It was a challenge to get MOOC participants to engage.

Interviewees reported that getting MOOC participants engaged was challenging. This

problem was addressed from two aspects: 1) there was less opportunity for active participation

and student feedback; 2) language barriers and gender issues might inhibit participation.

There was less opportunity for active participation and student feedback.

Although MOOC educators were connected with heterogeneous groups of learners

through a MOOC, interviewees recited that they had difficulty getting individuals engaged.

Some learners actively participated in a MOOC, such as asking questions, volunteering answers,

or contributing to discussions, whereas others did not. Getting all learners to engage and talk was

not easy in a MOOC. For instance, interviewee 01 stated,

One challenge is getting everybody to talk I mean getting people engaged you know, our,

the-the type of assessment that we liked most do is to, is to talk to people about what’s on

their minds and the rate can help, [to share ideas] yeah, right. So, but, and then like you

know really making a hard call or a tough assessment on who learned what.

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The most explicit approach to help an instructor check student understanding, clarify

questions and address issues seemed to be receiving an immediate response from them.

However, interviewees claimed that they could not get sufficient feedback from students in

MOOCs to assess learning outcomes. Their comments were provided below.

Interviewee 11: Um, I think as you’re developing the MOOC, it’s, it’s hard to understand

if students like the course or not, and I don’t have that many reviews. I know that other

MOOCs have way more reviews, but I only have several, several hundred out of all of

them. Ahhh, let’s see if I go to, where’s my most popular one here… yeah, I only have a

hundred and nine on my most popular one, reviews. And it’s hard to, hard to understand if

over two thousand, five thousand people have taken these courses, what does this actually

look like? Um, are they benefiting from it? So, it’s hard to anticipate. I know what they’re

gonna say on campus, I don’t know what they’re necessarily gonna say off-campus.

Interviewee 12: The challenge is that, the challenge is that you don’t have the immediacy

of exchange and response. And you can’t take students in an individual way um, through a

learning experience. And for someone like me, um, I love being in the classroom. I like

being in front of people. So, the MOOC became ch-, is challenging because I don’t, as I

said, get the kind of immediate gratification and feedback that I like so much.

Language barriers and gender issues might inhibit participation.

Interviewees were concerned about learners who were from non-native English-speaking

countries because English was the primary language for over 80% of the courses offered by

Coursera or edX. Comments by these interviewees were provided below.

Interviewee 10: And what I realized was a lot of the people watching the course, taking

the course were not native English speakers [mm-hmm]. And I think we’re having a little

bit of difficulty um, you know, understanding some of the concepts. And it was a kind of

complex language. So, if he weren’t a native English speaker, I think it would have been a

little hard to wrap your head around. Um, even though we tried very hard to make sure

that we, uh, that wasn’t just U.S.-based contexts. So, we were very conscious to add in

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international references [um-hmm]. Um, but you know there’s only so much we can do to

make, to make the language more accessible, I guess.

Interviewee 11: I see a very sharp drop off whenever there’s a peer-reviewed assignment

because I think there’s a big problem with the language barrier and fear of not being able

to pass the course because their English, since that’s the language everybody’s submitting

their homework in, um, it is not the same as um, how they’re actually reading it, how

they’re listening to it, and they may not be able to articulate the content well enough for

their peers.

The male-female student ratio varied from subject to subject in MOOCs. Women

outnumbered men in certain disciplines. One interviewee pointed out that his MOOC had a

relatively low number of female students, which could inhibit their participation. He hoped that

his course would have more females.

Interviewee 06: The biggest challenge that we have had is getting participation from

female students. It is, I don’t know if you’ve seen statistics on this, but the, the number of

female participants in a course fluctuates between 15% and 18%, one five, one eight. Just

tiny and apparently this is um, par for the course when it comes to online education. And

we’ve actually, Maggie once, you know for one semester she went really out of her way

trying to attract more female students into the course, and we ended up with the fewest we

ever did, percentage wise. So, there’s something about… Now obviously how many

people register is very different from the number of people who actually complete. We

believe that the number of female students who complete is actually quite a bit higher,

maybe one-third. But still, it is um, unfortunate that we, that there are, whole um,

demographics that we just aren’t reaching.

Preparing to teach a MOOC was time-consuming.

A tremendous amount of effort and preparation was required in teaching a MOOC,

particularly time investment. Therefore, interviewees summarized three things that MOOC

instructors needed to be aware of. First, starting early and noticing the learning curve was

important. Second, figuring out how to break up the content and keep it current was helpful.

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Last, thinking about timing, comprehensiveness, and assessment was critical to the development

of a MOOC.

Start early and beware of the learning curve.

Interviewees stated that starting MOOC preparation early provided them sufficient time to

plan, explore options, tinker with changes, research fresh ideas, and pilot everything in order to

ensure they were prepared adequately. Their comments were as follows.

Interviewee 03: Um, you have to make sure that you set these courses up enough in

advance. So, you cannot start a MOOC course in June and need it in July, it-it takes too

long to do this. So, you have to, if-if somebody we’re going to say I’m gonna do a MOOC

course, I would tell them that if you’re gonna give it in the, even if you’re gonna give it in

the fall you should be taping in the spring.

Interviewee 05: Probably one, it was at least one year before that so, is when we started

ah-ah, developing the idea, and contacting people. So probably it was one year before the

course was supposed to start that we had the team complete with everybody committing to

the project.

You must figure out how to break up the content and keep it current.

Interviewees said they faced challenges in dividing content into small portions to keep the

recorded lectures succinct and to the point. Examples of interviewee comments were provided

below.

Interviewee 08: The fact that now you have to understand you know when do I break up

this, how do I take this lesson and break it up into three to seven-minute chunks that are

useful and usable? [mm-hm] I think that’s really the greatest challenge.

Interviewee 10: Well, one thing I learned is, because you only have that 20 minutes you

know, four or five pages of text, and to, to actually deliver content, and you have to be

really choosy about what you include. Keeping MOOC content updated all the time has

been identified by interviewees as another problem because the landscape changes rapidly

and frequently in some particular fields. Comments by these interviewees are provided

below.

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Interviewee 07: And then, the follow up has been challenging, keeping it fresh, keeping it,

ah, trying to get new learners interested in it, kind of keeping the numbers up, keeping,

keeping up with all that.

Interviewee 09: My biggest challenge is, is keeping it current. You know, I mean, things

that we, we planned on went away. And so, well, you know, I see a number of these

MOOCs that are really dated and they’re still around. And they haven’t been changed, and

I just think that that’s dangerous. I mean, you’re, you are acting as though this, you know

what you recorded in 2012 is still the rule in, you know 2018. And I think that’s a huge

challenge, you know I think that I don’t want to be associated with it.

You had to really think about timing, comprehensiveness, and assessment.

The development of a MOOC took a lot of time away from the instructor. Therefore,

interviewees asserted that it was essential to develop a reasonable and manageable timeline in

advance for getting all course prep work completed on time. Interviewees shared their experience

in this regard as follows.

Interviewee 02: In fact, now I keep getting query saying prof, can you do one more

MOOC course on this topic. You know, ah, some of the emerging subjects. Um, so I said

yeah. I mean it challenges me to do it and, very time-consuming the first time around, you

know. To put together a good MOOC, it takes about six hours, six months. To

conceptualize it, to turn it into sessions, videos in each session, the comprehensiveness of

each video, the quizzes, work on the summary of each week, the quiz, ah, you know it’s-

it’s hugely time-consuming.

Interviewee 04: I spent a lot of time on the course. I mean it was overwhelmingly

consuming in terms of time. It, at-at least what I did and how I did it. There may be other

ways to do it, but I watched other people around me do it, and everyone says it’s very

time-consuming.

Interviewee 07: So, it’s quite you know, it’s labor-intensive to keep ah, the MOOC afresh

and to respond to what’s going on, on, the MOOC.

Interviewee 10: I’m gonna estimate that I put about 20 to 30 hours of work into writing the

script, and so going over them with Julie, before, before I flew to Pittsburgh to record

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them. And that was, that was a full day. So, the full day of the time the studio, um, plus

maybe 30 hours of work, um, to write the scripts, to edit them, to add graphics, to put you

know the charts and the, all the pictures in. Um, so maybe yeah, a total of 40 hours. Um,

and then as I said, I wasn’t asked or expected to go into the discussion board, I did it a

couple of times because I was curious. But I didn’t spend very much time in the

discussion board. So, I did, I did what I would call a respectable job, but I didn’t, it wasn’t

a huge output of labor.

Most MOOCs were created to introduce fundamental concepts and skills. Thus, one

interviewee contended that making the content thorough was necessary for a MOOC. An

anonymous survey participant also commented that MOOC was great for theoretical knowledge.

Their comments were provided below.

Interviewee 05: I think the risk is always that you’re not thorough enough um, or not

comprehensive enough. Ah, that applies, also I mean, for example, if you, if I advise, see

presentations by researchers at a conference, some, sometimes people expect too much

prior knowledge or it’s too or they expect the prior knowledge to be available like, like

really, on the spot. Um, I think it’s worth um, even if you’re expecting if you clearly state

people if you want to do my course you have to know this. It’s still worth quickly

summarizing or referring to something so that people get to, get into the mindset that they

need. So, I think good advice is to be more comprehensive than you think is necessary,

and more self-contained than you think it’s necessary. I think that makes it easier for

learners to consume the content.

Anonymous survey participant: A MOOC is a great way to teach the theoretical

component of a professional course that also has a practical workplace component.

Assessments might vary from course to course in the context of MOOC. In developing

formative and summative assessments, MOOC instructors put in a plethora of thoughts that

could take a lot of time. It was suggested to start working on the development of assessments as

early as possible. Examples of interview comments were given below.

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Interviewee 02: Um, assessment, at the end of every video that they see, ah, we have a set

of ah, multiple-choice questions or ‘True or False’, and we give them two chances, ah, if

they don’t get it right then we gently not nudge them to say you know to go back and look

at this video and come back. Ah, at the end of every week, we have a graded quiz, the-the

quizzes that they do at the end of every video is ungraded. I mean it does not include if

any credit. It’s just to, for the guy to test himself that he has understood the contents in

that video. Um, at the end of the week, remember MOOC has five, four, five, or six

weeks. At the end of every week, we give them um, a weekly graded quiz, a weekly

graded quiz. At the end of the course which is at the end of week 4 or week 5, in fact, one

of the MOOCs, the end of course quizzes in progress right now, they’re doing it. They do

it whenever they want. Um, in some cases we do this a proctored exam, in some other

cases, we let them go back and look at the contents if they have to. Because the whole

idea is not to be very punitive but to make sure the learning is reinforced.

Interviewee 04: We had videos, each video, in each lecture or each week has either four or

five videos [okay] and after each of those videos, there are two to four questions that-that

ask about material that was, that was in the video [mm-hmm]. So, as they’re going along,

we’re asking them to give us something back. At the end of each video, there are

reflection questions. So, you know, what do you think about or how does this fit with, um,

that sort of thing. So, we have reflection questions and then content questions. Um, in

addition to those, there are, with-with each of these there is either, um, there-there’s

something that is-is that on which we can test them, [mm-hmm] that is we can test their

knowledge by asking questions [assessment], assessment, right. And so, we give them a

case.

Interviewee 09: So, one of the things that I would give you as a tip, we created our own

Twitter page, our own LinkedIn page, our own Instagram, and we have the students go out

and they comment on things that are in the class of what they’re told to. So, I say watch

this video and pick the most important trend, and tweet that out. Then I retweet them, and

they suddenly begin to see they can pick up followers just by doing those sorts of actions,

and we do that every class. Then the ah, each MOOC which [voice lost] I have five

MOOCs and then a specialization, the capstone, the five MOOCs are divided into four

sections, each section has an assignment and a quiz. They have to go through, go through

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the quiz. And so, and then so they basically do a tweet, they go through and do an

assignment, and then they go through and do the quiz. The specialization, they actually

build a complete marketing plan for any business they want anywhere in the world. And

all of the different assignments we put together, ah they, teams of peers who grade it, and

then we have, I have a team of people who are always engaged with the discussion boards

as well as with the s, with the students or the participants, to make sure things are going

well for them and answer any questions they have.

Interviewee 11: Oh, I can make more, I can make more ah, [quizzes] yeah, more quizzes,

more formative, and more summative assessments. Um, could do a better job of getting

into discussion questions. But then that’s again, that’s a lot of work. Um, and students are

learning now, so I don’t know how much I want to change it. I may do my next course

completely different because that’s um, something new.

Furthermore, one interviewee recommended prospective MOOC instructors taking a

MOOC before teaching one, which might help gain some learning experience.

Interviewee 07: And I think that it (the experience of completing a MOOC) gave me really

a lot of insight into ah, what’s acceptable in terms of designing the MOOC and the range

of approaches that people take to it. And then also some of the difficulties the learners

encounter and actually doing the assessments. When I designed the assessment, I was very

cognizant of that.

Working with others helped.

Interviewees reported that working with other experts such as inviting guest speakers and

collaborating with co-instructors led to the success of their MOOCs.

Team approaches to developing a MOOC helped.

Under certain MOOC circumstances, interviewees found out that having a team to support

them was crucial to the success of MOOCs. They commented,

Interviewee 02: Ahem, the team is key. I mean I keep saying that. Ahem, most MOOC

instructors did exactly the opposite. They have multiple instructors but a very lean team.

Interviewee 04: Try to have a team that can give you advice and information and input.

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Interviewee 07: Because even though there are many people who kind of believe MOOCs,

there’s a lot of group efforts, like making a film, you need to have a crew, you need to

have a lot of people involved. So that’s what I would say.

It was good to incorporate guests and co-instructors.

It was common to see that a MOOC had multiple lecturers when you searched for courses

via Coursera or edX. MOOC instructors tended to collaborate with other subject matter experts

for crafting presentations, recording lectures, sharing research findings, and interacting with

learners in order to enrich their learning experience. Interviewees suggested this kind of

partnership helped. Several examples of interview comments were given below.

Interviewee 07: So, anyone who wants to do a MOOC, it can’t be a, an individual

decision, it has to be an institutional will, it has to be a group decision. Because even

though there are many people who kind of believe MOOCs, there’s a lot of group efforts,

like making a film, you need to have a crew, you need to have a lot of people involved. So

that’s what I would say. Now for people who are not in institutions like this, there is still

hope. What I would recommend is a partner with someone, add an institution that’s

already doing MOOCs, a colleague and then they have that colleague float the idea, and

then do something where they’re part of a team doing a MOOC elsewhere.

Interviewee 09: Yeah, but part of the things though that I found really useful was to bring

in guests, and you see I have a lot of guests in mine. Um, simply because that made me

become the student, and my thing was just ask the questions do they… So, I started with

me looking directly into the camera and I got the, do the introduction. Then I swing

around and sitting next to me would be the guest. Then I could just lay back and ask the

questions that I know the students would want to ask, which kind of changed the role. So,

it was kind of fun to do it that way as well. I think a lot of times, we as, as professors think

we’ve got it, we’ve got all the answers. But I think bringing in some people gives you

credibility.

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Summary

This convergent parallel mixed methods study aimed to explore the higher education

faculty members’ teaching experiences in MOOCs. Qualitative findings from each research

question were outlined in this chapter. Themes included:

RQ 1. How do higher education faculty describe their decision-making process in terms of


Theme 1: Intrinsic Factors

Theme 2: Extrinsic Factors

RQ 2. What are roles and experiences higher education faculty encounter in delivering a

MOOC?

Theme 1: Roles higher education faculty performed in teaching a MOOC

Theme 2: Experience higher education faculty encounter in delivering a MOOC

RQ 3. What lessons have higher education faculty learned through the experience of

teaching a MOOC?

Theme 1: Teaching a MOOC improved my academic reputation

Theme 2: MOOC served opportunities for learning

Theme 3: It was a challenge to get MOOC participants to engage

Theme 4: Preparing to teach a MOOC was time-consuming

Theme 5: Working with others helped

Interviewees’ shared experiences were coded and categorized into themes in order to

address the three research questions for the qualitative strand. Each theme was analyzed in detail

with thick descriptions that used fragments of the conversation from the interviews and survey

answers. In Chapter Six, the results of the study with associated findings were discussed.

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CHAPTER 6. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

The purpose of this convergent parallel mixed methods study was to explore the

experience of higher education faculty members who had taught a MOOC or were currently

teaching a MOOC via edX or Coursera. This chapter included a discussion of major findings as

related to the literature, followed by implications for practice and a discussion of the limitations

of the study. It concluded with recommendations for future research and a summary.

Discussion of Findings

Quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed simultaneously and

independently as the convergent parallel design was executed in this study. The researcher gave

equal weight to quantitative and qualitative data and looked for pattens and contradictions by

comparing and contrasting the results received from both strands. The final interpretation was

made based on the merged results through a matrix including quantitative variables and

qualitative themes. The researcher used the matrix to outline all quantitative variables and all

qualitative themes and subthemes to determine to what extent and in what ways both sets of data

converged, diverged, or related to each other. Convergent data were highlighted in a same color

and synthesized, whereas divergent data was identified and differentiated with special symbols

and numbers. Data related to each other was grouped together for final interpretation. The table

below provided the detailed steps and the products generated at each step throughout the research

process.

Table 19. Sub-steps and Products for Each Step

Convergent Parallel Mixed Methods Design

Quantitative Qualitative

Step 1: Data Collection

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Sub-steps Surveys (89 responses) Interviews (12 interviewees)

Products Numerical scores Transcripts

Step 2: Data Analysis

Sub-steps Descriptive statistics Coding & thematic analysis

Products Means, frequencies, percentages, SD Quotes, pattens, categories, themes

Step 3: Results Compare/Relate

Sub-steps Cross-tabulation of derived qualitative themes with quantitative variables

Products A matrix of quantitative variables and qualitative themes

Step 4: Interpretation

Sub-steps Use merged results to produce a comprehensive understanding

Products Findings & Discussion

The following six research questions guided this study. The discussion of findings of this

study were presented in the sequence of the research questions as follows.

(RQ1): What intrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

(RQ2): What extrinsic factors motivate higher education faculty to teach a MOOC?

(RQ3): What are faculty experiences teaching a MOOC?

(RQ4): How do higher education faculty members describe their decision-making process in

terms of participating in MOOCs?

(RQ5): What are the roles and experiences higher education faculty encounter in delivering a

MOOC?

(RQ6): What lessons have higher education faculty learned through the experience of teaching a

MOOC?

Finding 1: MOOC Instructors, Who Are They?

Previous studies revealed that most MOOC instructors were tenured faculty with over ten

years of experience of teaching at the college level (Kolowich, 2013) and the majority were

white males in their 40s to 60s (Doo, Tang, Bonk, & Zhu, 2020). Only a small percentage of

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MOOC instructors had experience in designing fully online/hybrid courses before designing a

MOOC (Zhu & Bonk, 2018). Survey findings from this study were similar to previous research.

There were more male MOOC instructors than female, and most of them were Caucasian. Their

ages ranged from 30 years old to 80, generally fell between 30 years old to 69. Over 75% of

MOOC instructors held a terminal degree (i.e., doctorate) and more than two-thirds (67.4%)

were ranked as associate professors or above. Teaching an online/hybrid course was new to

about half of respondents, although over 90% indicated they had 1-5 years of experience in

teaching a MOOC via edX or Coursera with courses generally enrolling a range of 1,001 to

10,000 students. The eight-nine survey respondents in this study were representative because

they matched demographically the previous findings about MOOC instructors in other studies.

The twelve interviewees might not be representative because demographic data such as age and

ethnicity were unknown.

Finding 2: Intrinsic Motivators and Extrinsic Motivators

Empirical research had been done to identify intrinsic and extrinsic factors that affected

faculty members’ participation in online education. Green et al. (2009) stated that an opportunity

to share knowledge with others was a pivotal intrinsic motivator for faculty to teach online

courses. Faculty members were highly motivated to participate in online education to develop

new ideas about teaching and learning (Cook et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schopieray, 2006).

Having the personal motivation to learn and use technology was cited as a highly motivating

factor for faculty to teach online (Chapman, 2011; Green et al., 2009; Schroeder, 2008).

Schopieray (2006) reported that the intellectual challenge of learning to teach in new ways was

one of the top four intrinsic motivators for instructors to teach online. Faculty perceived the

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intellectual challenge as a motivating factor when considering online instructions (Cook et al.,

2009; Green et al., 2009; Pinkerton, 2008; Schroeder, 2008).

The results of this study corroborated these earlier findings, although MOOC differed

from a regular online class due to its openness, massiveness, and other noteworthy

characteristics. Results revealed that the majority of higher education faculty members were

more intrinsically motivated rather than extrinsically motivated to teach a MOOC. This was

consistent with studies that had shown that intrinsic motivators had a greater impact on

instructors’ decision making to teach MOOCs (Doo et al., 2020; Lowenthal et al., 2018; Najafi et

al., 2015). This finding resonated with the Self-Determination Theory that suggested humans

were intrinsically motivated to take part in activities that fulfilled their innate psychological

needs.

The survey results indicated that more than 80% of respondents were motivated by

intrinsic factors in the decision of teaching a MOOC. The importance of intrinsic factors was

borne out in the twelve interviews. The intrinsic factors most mentioned during the interviews

included a desire to reach a wider audience, a desire to showcase or share expertise, and a

passion for teaching with technology. Interviewees (and survey respondents) did bring up some

extrinsic motivators, such as institutional decisions and institutional MOOC partnerships,

encouragement by others and external rewards. However, it appeared that the extrinsic factors

came into play or were taken into consideration after they were triggered by an intrinsic interest

in teaching a MOOC.

Finding 3: Satisfactory Experience in Teaching a MOOC

The vast majority of higher education faculty members in this study claimed the MOOC

teaching experience was personally rewarding and professionally beneficial. This finding was

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consistent with that of Belanger and Thornton (2013) and Khalil and Ebner (2013) who stated

that most of the MOOC instructors’ teaching experience was satisfying.

Nearly 90% of participants in this study reported that they were satisfied with their first

MOOC and over 75% said that they would consider teaching a MOOC again. More than half of

the participants shared that the MOOC teaching experience greatly inspired them to change the

approaches they used to teach. Participants’ beliefs about fully online courses were assessed

before and after they had taught a MOOC. The results showed that participants’ enthusiasm level

for fully online courses increased after they taught a MOOC. The results obtained from

interviewees regarding MOOC teaching experience were very close to the survey results.

Overall, interviewees stated that they had a pleasant and rewarding experience teaching MOOCs

and learned valuable lessons throughout their MOOC teaching adventures.

Finding 4: Intention of Participating in a MOOC

Previous literature showed that the primary intention of MOOC instructors to teach a

MOOC was threefold: connecting to a larger number of diverse participants (Agarwal, 2012;

Mackness et al., 2010; Roth, 2012), egoism (Hew & Cheung, 2014), and increasing student

access to higher education resources globally (Belanger & Thoronton, 2013; Lowenthal et al.,

2018; Sari et al., 2019; Watson et al., 2016). Consistent with previous work, this study found that

higher education faculty members chose to teach MOOCs for similar reasons. For example,

survey participants and interviewees in this study noted that MOOC was an effective medium to

build connections with a wide range of global learners beyond the geographical limitation. They

sharpened skills and expanded knowledge about how to teach a MOOC, which inspired them to

make improvements in traditional teaching practices. Additionally, they received national and

global attention from others in the academic field. They were granted opportunities to establish

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their brands, advertise their academic programs, and promote the reputations of the institutions

where they worked.

Finding 5: MOOC Instructor’s Roles

Online faculty roles had been examined and documented in a variety of studies. Specific

taxonomies and models were developed to describe roles faculty needed to perform while

teaching online, such as administrator (Bawane & Spector, 2009), coach (Zhu, Valcke, &

Schellens, 2010), facilitator (Johnson, 2013), and content expert (Change et al., 2014. One of the

early models concerned with the instructor’s roles in online education was the Instructor’s Roles

Model, put forth by Berge (1995). Initially, this model was created to define the roles and

functions of online instructors. Later, this model was widely adopted and applied to a myriad of

empirical studies to identify student and/or faculty perceptions, experiences, and competencies in

terms of the roles in the development of online instruction (Ching, Hsu, & Baldwin, 2018;

Dehghani, Sheikhi Fini, Zeinalipour, & Rezaei, 2020; Gómez-Rey, Barbera, & Fernández-

Navarro, 2017; Gómez-Rey, Barbera, & Fernández-Navarro, 2018) and provide guidance in

practices on facilitating skills for online courses (Adebisi & Oyeleke, 2018; Blanchette, 2016;

Farmer & Ramsdale, 2016). For example, Gómez-Rey et al. (2018) used a bottom-up approach

to examine the roles of online instructors from a student perspective. Respondents were asked to

score on six roles (pedagogical, managerial, social, technical, course designer, life skills

promoter) in a questionnaire. The results suggested that the managerial role received the highest

average score, followed by technical role, pedagogical role, course designer, social role, and life

skills promotor which presented itself as a new role. Dehghani et al. (2020) used Berge’s model

to identify expected competencies in MOOC context and found that MOOC instructors needed to

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be prepared in four dimensions (i.e., knowledge, professional skills, professional attitude, and

personality).

This study revealed that the four roles (pedagogical, managerial, social, and technical)

were deconstructed in the delivery of MOOCs compared to what Berge presented in his model.

These four roles were carried out by different individuals or groups in each stage of running a

MOOC but still functioning in the same way as they were in a regular online course regardless of

the massive number of learners and other key characteristics that differentiated MOOCs from

traditional online courses. The role of a MOOC instructor was largely pedagogical-oriented,

especially at the planning, designing, and delivering stages through scaffolding the course

structure, developing recorded lectures, curating learning resources, designing formative and

summative assessments, facilitating learning by keeping the discussion on track or contributing

insights. Once the MOOC was up and running in a self-paced mode (a predominant course

delivery format for edX and Coursera), most MOOC instructors’ engagement dropped

dramatically. According to Berge’s descriptions of each role, the social role was identified only

within far fewer MOOCs in this study. The results showed a trend that over a half of MOOC

instructors spent no or little time fostering a welcoming, engaging, and supportive social

environment for learners to develop individual connections or group cohesiveness. Reasons for

not doing that included a shortage of time, heavy workload, other competing priorities, no

compensation for the time spent on engaging with students, language barriers, time difference,

and insufficient student feedback. In addition, the majority of MOOCs reviewed in this study

were self-paced xMOOCs with predominantly automated grading or peer-reviewed assignments.

Given this prescribed design, MOOC instructors were not inclined to promote human

relationships and develop group cohesiveness in a xMOOC environment. The managerial role

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was mostly taken over by assistants employed with the MOOC platform or the student

workers/graduate assistants assigned by the MOOC instructor. The technical role was shifted

over to the IT support services from different MOOC platforms.

Participants in the survey were asked to self-identify their pedagogical roles in delivering

a MOOC. About 40% identified themselves as the “primary instructor”, about 20% were the

“primary designer” and about 20% responded they were “co-instructors.” The analysis suggested

that the roles, in general, were divided into two types: teaching solo or co-teaching with other

subject experts. Among those who co-taught with others, some played a lead role in designing

and developing the MOOC and some did not.

Only a few interviewees indicated that they engaged with learners in their MOOCs

through multiple ways. The rest of them (over a half) stressed the importance of interacting with

students and expressed their concerns about the lack of student engagement in MOOCs although

they elaborated the reasons for not doing that in their MOOCs. These reasons echoed the

findings documented in the existing literature (Allon, 2012; Belanger & Thornton, 2013;

Blackmon, 2018; Hew & Cheung, 2014; Wang et al., 2019). Additionally, interviewees

discussed the competencies needed for a MOOC instructor based on their first-hand experiences.

For example, commitment (time and effort required for MOOC development), content expertise,

understanding of the online teaching context, camera presence, and language accessibility. The

results aligned with what was known from previous work by Johnson (2013), who advocated that

competencies in technology, instructor role transition, and community building were necessary

for online teaching. Lacking knowledge in technology and pedagogy in terms of online teaching

and learning was identified as a significant barrier in his study. However, lacking knowledge in

technology was not reported by participants as a major barrier in this study. Notably, most of the

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MOOCs were designed and delivered in an asynchronous and self-paced format with pre-cooked

learning resources and activities, such as pre-recorded lectures, readings, and automated quizzes.

MOOC instructors might not experience feelings of inadequacy or nervousness and have to deal

with the technology glitches that usually occured in synchronous online meetings (Belanger &

Thornton, 2013; Blackmon, 2018; Hew & Cheung, 2014). MOOC providers normally had

equipped with a tech support center. The technology support was taken care of by a group of

specialists.

Finding 6: Benefits and Challenges of Teaching a MOOC

Benefits of taking a MOOC from a learner’s perspective were well-documented in the

current literature (Baker et al., 2015; Becker, 2013; Leon-Urritia et.al., 2018; Iniesto et al., 2016;

Mallon, 2013; Rodriguez, 2012; Sonwalkar & Maheshkar, 2015). However, there was a dearth of

empirical studies focusing on describing the experience of MOOC instructors and the benefits

and challenges they received through the teaching process. This study provided some insights

and practical strategies and considerations to address these unsolved issues.

One of the most intriguing findings was that teaching a MOOC offered opportunities to

showcase research strengths and improve the academic reputation of these individuals or the

institutions where they worked. MOOC instructors wanted to be acknowledged by their

colleagues and administrators for the hard work involved in MOOCs. The experience of teaching

a MOOC led to continuous improvement in their face-to-face and regular online instruction.

They were granted opportunities to reassess their teaching practices. These findings reinforced

the belief that MOOCs were not only beneficial to learners but can be helpful to MOOC

instructors, as well as their institutions (Evans & Myrick, 2015; Zheng et al., 2016).

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Regardless of these tangible benefits, MOOC instructors had been challenged with

various issues, such as feeling overwhelmed due to a shortage of time for course development,

immense workload in developing the MOOC, not getting acknowledged for the hard work, and

financial concerns (Alario-Hoyos et al., 2014). Participants in this study stated that MOOCs were

not a good fit for all subjects and levels of academic degrees. Understanding copyright and fair

use in the context of MOOC was cited as a concern in this study. The design and development of

proper assessments (Najafi et al., 2015; Yuan & Powell, 2013) as well as low completion rates

(Asiri, 2014; Hu, 2020; Reich & Ruipérez-Valiente, 2019; Vilkova) remained challenges for

MOOC instructors.

The results indicated that preparing to teach a MOOC, just like planning any online

course, was time-consuming, which conformed to previous research (Bonk & Lee, 2017; Gulatee

& Nilsook, 2016). How to get MOOC learners engaged and how to work more efficiently and

productively given the significant amount of time requested for creating a MOOC were

discussed. One of the suggestions for prospective MOOC instructors to consider was to start

planning earlier if possible and develop a manageable timeline to keep track of work no matter

choosing to be a solo MOOC instructor or a co-MOOC instructor with others.

Lacking adequate professional preparation or experience was documented as a barrier in

teaching MOOCs (Doo et al., 2020; Zhu, Bonk, & Sari, 2019). The findings of this study

suggested that MOOC instructors had limited experience in teaching online/hybrid classes before

diving into a MOOC. Most of them had to seek help from professionals, such as instructional

designers, educational technologists, or technological specialists to design and develop their

MOOCs.

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Connection to the Conceptual Framework

The Conceptual Framework (see Chapter 2) in this study was grounded in two theories:

Deci and Ryan’s Self-Determination Theory (1985) and Berge’s Model of Instructor’s Roles

(1995). The findings of this study supported what Deci and Ryan advocated in the Self-

Determination Theory and provided different views when looking at Berge’s model in a MOOC

context to identify the roles of MOOC instructors.

The Self-Determination Theory posited that human beings were intrinsically driven to

engage in activities that would satisfy innate psychological needs (i.e., autonomy, competence,

relatedness) which led to enhanced self-motivation and well-being. In terms of who participated

in the survey and interviews, intrinsic motivators were deemed to have a greater impact in the

decision making to teach a MOOC than extrinsic ones. The findings thus supported what the

Self-Determination Theory stated about the impact of intrinsic motivation on human behavior.

Berge’s model was initially developed to identify the roles and functions of online

instructors in the context of online discussion to facilitate students’ learning. His model classified

online instructor’s roles into four types: pedagogical, social, managerial, and technical,

specifically for facilitating online discussion activities. These roles were not exclusive to each

other. As a matter of fact, some functions and roles in the model overlapped with teaching

practices. That said, the findings of the study were partially aligned with Berge’s statements. The

results found that MOOC instructors used limited strategies to engage learners and foster a

supportive social environment and those efforts happened in only a few MOOCs due to various

barriers such as a shortage of time, heavy workload caused by the massive number of enrollees

per MOOC, low participation of learners, insufficient feedback from learners, no compensation

for the time spent engaging with students, language barriers, time differences, as well as other

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competing duties and responsibilities as a higher education faculty member. The social role was

identified in this study but only in a small number of MOOCs. While evidence revealed that the

primary role performed by a MOOC instructor was pedagogically orientated at the stages of

planning, designing, and delivering a MOOC through multiple activities. The remaining roles

such as technical and/or managerial roles were shifted to a team of professionals from MOOC

providers or student assistants affiliated with the MOOC instructors.

Recommendations for current and prospective MOOC instructors, higher education

administrators, instructional designers, and MOOC platform developers, and implications for

practice were presented in the following sections.

Implications for Practice

Findings from this study had implications for various stakeholders involved in the

development and delivery of MOOCs. In this section, implication for MOOC instructors and

institutional administrators were presented followed by implications for instructional designers

and MOOC platform developers.

Implications for MOOC Instructors and Higher Education Administrators

Empirical studies had shown that creating an online course (including MOOCs) took a

significant amount of time away from the instructor (Asunda et al., 2018; Crawford-Ferre &

Wiest, 2012; Johnson, 2013; Kenny & Fluck, 2017; Pickering, et al., 2017; Shaver, 2017). Many

participants in this study commented that preparing to teach and developing a MOOC were time-

consuming. It is therefore critical for the prospective MOOC instructor to know that in advance

and start the MOOC work as early as possible in order to allocate sufficient time to plan, explore

options, pilot everything, and tinker with changes. This is particularly noteworthy for those

tenure-track junior faculty who are interested in teaching MOOCs but have to juggle competing

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priorities. Developing a realistic timeline and actionable goals may help complete all course

planning work on time. Seasoned MOOC instructors pointed out that forming a team with

professionals, such as instructional designers, video producers, and educational technologists

was crucial to the success of developing their MOOCs. These experts helped ensure the accuracy

of the work and accelerate the development process. It was common to see that one MOOC had

multiple instructors in searches of a course via edX or Coursera. Collaborating with multiple

instructors for crafting content and recording lectures or inviting guest speakers to share the

latest trends in a MOOC is highly recommended. Prospective or veteran MOOC instructors who

feel overwhelmed with heavy workload may consider this advice.

Compared to prospective MOOC instructors, the implications for veteran MOOC

instructors focus on things like keeping content fresh and up to date and increasing student

engagement using various approaches. According to MOOC instructors in this study, constantly

updating content was one way to keep students engaged. The majority of the MOOC instructors

reported that they had difficulty getting learners engaged and obtaining feedback from them in

MOOCs. Only a few of them had built successful learner-to-instructor interactions. A trend

emerged from the MOOCs with a high level of learner engagement was to provide a variety of

opportunities for learners to connect with the content, their peers, and the instructor(s). Some

approaches cited by MOOC instructors in engaging learners including hosting online webinars,

using social media (e.g., Twitter), and offering virtual office hours or offline meeting

opportunities in a specific location.

Regardless of various reasons for MOOC instructors to teach a MOOC, it was found that

MOOC work was not necessarily well understood and acknowledged by administrators or

institutions where MOOC instructors worked. Participants in this study hoped that administrators

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could gain a better understanding of what they had been doing in MOOCs and acknowledge their

hard work in a proper way, such as compensating their time for developing MOOCs, allowing

them to trade off the time spent on delivering a MOOC, or considering adding MOOC work to

their regular teaching load. In addition, they stressed the lack of acknowledgment of MOOC

work in the tenure and promotion reviews. Being recognized and appreciated could encourage

faculty to offer more MOOCs and help them receive more resources to develop MOOCs.

Administrative leaders could promote greater awareness of the effort higher education faculty

members had put together to deliver a MOOC. Acknowledging MOOC work would send a

powerful message to faculty members and keep them motivated to make more. Interviewees in

this study indicated that they had a rewarding experience participating in MOOCs, but they

needed more support in various aspects, such as pre-training, content development, video

production, and recruiting assistants for daily maintenance. These needs can be addressed by

offering professional development training for faculty to attend, recruiting instructional designers

and video producers to work with them, hiring student workers or graduate students or providing

funding for them to use. It was suggested that prospective and experienced MOOC instructors

initiate a conversation with their department chairs (or deans) clarifying how much time and

work needed to create a MOOC before committing to teach one solo or collaboratively.

Implications for Instructional Designers and MOOC Platform Developers

In addition to the implications for MOOC instructors and higher education administrators,

the results had practical implications for instructional designers and MOOC platform developers.

Given MOOCs differed from traditional online courses, instructional designers need to consider

altering approaches used for traditional online classes when working with MOOC instructors.

Registering for one or two MOOC(s) from different MOOC platforms may help gain some

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insights, get a first-hand learner experience, and spark off ideas to help faculty reassess learner

needs, support learner-to-instructor interactions, and promote adequate feedback loops.

It would be helpful to see opportunities are given to MOOC platform developers to

communicate with MOOC instructors (content experts) and instructional designers so that they

have a chance to learn more about the needs of MOOC instructors and instructional designers.

MOOC instructors may want to hear more from MOOC platform developers about what they can

and cannot achieve from the programming standpoint in an effort to incorporate more engaging

approaches and tools into strengthening the learning experience. Prospective MOOC instructors

may be interested in attending an open information session to learn about how to become a

MOOC instructor or look for collaborators to co-teach a MOOC. Perceptions and feedback

collected from MOOC instructors should be considered and included in a thorough analysis

when the platform makes optimization and upgrading.

Limitations

Given this research used a convergent parallel mixed method design, the first limitation

was attributed to the research design. For quantitative and qualitative phases, unequal sample

sizes were adopted to serve different purposes (generalization vs. in-depth understanding). The

size of the quantitative samples was larger than the counterpart in qualitative phase that limited

to a small number of interviewees to gain an in-depth understanding of a given subject.

The findings derived from this study had limited ability to be generalized to all higher

education institutions because this study was delimited to MOOC instructors who were currently

teaching a MOOC or had taught a MOOC previously via edX or Coursera from 2013 to 2017.

Findings were not intended to be representative of all MOOC instructors outside of this context.

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For a study of this type, focusing on edX and Coursera was perceived as limited in scope. The

generalization of the results and recommendations should be considered with caution.

Conclusions were drawn based on the perceptions of study participants. Surveys and

interviews yielded self-reported data and included participant biases to some degree. Participants

might have inaccurate memories of experiences, they might hesitate to reveal their perceptions

on a particular topic, and they might be untruthful or give socially acceptable responses.

It is impossible to develop a meaningful understanding of human experience without

considering how it is affected by the values and beliefs of the researcher (Ary, Jacobs, Irvine, &

Walker, 2013). Another limitation of this study was the researcher’s bias toward data analysis

might influence things like the questions explored and the themes identified in the process of

coding and analysis.

The data collection timing might harm the response rates since recruitment emails were

distributed during the summer break. Some prospective participants (i.e., higher education

faculty members) were off-duty and responded to the recruitment with an automatic reply during

the data collection period.

Recommendations for Future Research

Given the findings and first-hand evidence, some future research endeavors are needed.

In this section, recommendation for future research and framework development are explored.

Investigate Experience of MOOC Instructors Who Drop Out after Teaching a MOOC

While studies (although a few) have explored the experience of MOOC instructors who

had taught a MOOC, far fewer research had investigated why higher education faculty members

drop out of teaching MOOCs after offering at least one. It is recommended that future studies

could focus on exploring the intention of this group of MOOC instructors to gain a better

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understanding of their attitudes and perceptions of MOOCs as well as the challenges or causes

that may lead them not to stay teaching MOOCs.

Investigate MOOC Instructors’ Experience of Delivering a MOOC in Developing

Countries

A comparative study could investigate MOOC instructors’ experience in developed

countries and developing countries. With the rapid development of technologies in online

education, MOOCs emerged as a worldwide educational innovation. Exploring MOOC

instructors’ experiences from all over the world to inform best practices in this field can be

meaningful.

Explore Attitudes and Perceptions of Administrators and Faculty from Higher Education

Institutions That Have Offered MOOCs

Participants in this study relayed a common message that they found getting their hard

work in MOOCs acknowledged by colleagues or administrators considerably challenging. There

is a need for investigation of administrators and more faculty at higher education institutions

regarding their attitudes toward MOOCs and how MOOC teaching work is handled in the tenure

and promotion reviews. Faculty has the majority of voices regarding tenure and promotion

decisions, as well as various assessments and curricula. It would be great to hear more voices

from them to further explore this research topic. A better understanding of higher education

administrators’ perceptions of MOOCs could help make informed decisions and pedagogical,

technological, psychological, and financial support MOOC instructors.

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Investigate MOOC Instructors’ Experience of Delivering a MOOC in a Different Language

Other Than English

The current study draws on participants from MOOCs delivered in English only. Future

studies could be framed to explore MOOC instructors’ experience in delivering a MOOC in

other languages to see if languages have any impact on teaching MOOCs. Courses on edX are

offered in 18 languages, such as Spanish, French, Chinese Mandarin, and so forth.

Develop a Role Model for MOOC Instructors

Future research is suggested to focus on developing a role model for MOOC instructors

in an effort to help them understand what roles and competencies are needed to perform in

MOOC teaching activities and guide them through different stages of making a MOOC, as well

as revamping the definitions of each role defined in Berge’s work to reflect the uniqueness of

MOOC instructors.

Conclusion and Summary

Distance Education (DE) has been introduced and implemented in the United States for

several decades. MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) emerged as an innovative form of DE

and proliferated since 2012. This new modality empowered knowledge providers to reach out to

diverse audiences who enjoy the open educational opportunities and flexibility of learning

anytime/anywhere at their own pace.

This study explored the experiences of higher education faculty members who had taught

a MOOC or were currently teaching a MOOC via edX and Coursera, including identifying the

motivators that influenced them most to participate in teaching MOOCs, understanding the

nature of their roles and the potential issues involved in delivering MOOCs, and learning about

the lessons they received from their MOOC journeys. This study responded to the need to

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explore the experience of MOOC instructors in order to close the gaps between theory and

practice as well as share best practices in supporting higher education faculty members in

MOOC development and delivery.

Through a convergent parallel research design incorporating a web-based survey and

semi-structured interviews, I better understood the intention of higher education faculty members

to teach a MOOC, identified the intrinsic and extrinsic motivators that influenced them to

participate, discussed their roles and competencies needed for teaching a MOOC, interpreted

their experience, and analyzed benefits and challenges of teaching a MOOC.

I learned that the majority of the participants in this study have found their MOOC

teaching experience professionally rewarding and personally beneficial and have expressed their

willingness to teach a MOOC again and upscale their MOOCs. Using the Self-Determination

Theory, I found that participants in this study opted for teaching a MOOC primarily due to the

following intrinsic and extrinsic motivators: a) an opportunity/desire to share

knowledge/expertise with others, b) an opportunity to develop new ideas about teaching and

learning processes, c) a passion for teaching with technology, d) intellectual challenge, e) ability

to reach new audience globally, f) institutional decisions, g) others encouraged participation, and

h) external rewards. It was clear, however, that it’s primarily intrinsic motivation that drove their

wills to teach MOOCs.

Although the application of Berge’s model of Instructor’s Roles was not a good fit for

this study, I managed to identify competencies needed for a MOOC instructor: a) commitment;

b) content expertise; c) understanding of online teaching context; d) camera presence, and e)

language accessibility. There may be better models or frameworks of instructor roles that might

fit MOOC or there may be a need to develop a new model for MOOC instructors.

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Benefits and challenges were thoroughly examined from the perspectives of novice and

veteran MOOC instructors in this study. Based on the participants’ statements, tangible benefits

included a) teaching a MOOC helped a MOOC instructor become more academically visible and

a better teacher; b) MOOCs gave the instructor a chance to serve adult learners and professional

needs, and c) MOOCs helped the instructor to reach a less privileged audience from all over the

world. Challenges in teaching a MOOC were mostly revolved around MOOC instructors,

MOOC learners, and MOOC design factors, including a) MOOCs made instructors feel

overwhelmed due to immerse workload, shortage of time, the difficulty to get work

acknowledged, and the expense; b) the preparation of a MOOC was time-consuming; c) getting

MOOC learners to engage was difficult; d) the MOOC mode did not fit for all; e) rules about

copyright and fair use were unclear in the MOOC context; f) insufficient design of assessments

in MOOCs, and g) high enrollment and low completion rates as well as insufficient learner

feedback. Additionally, this study addressed the significance of instructional design in MOOCs

and faculty members’ critical needs for support in four areas: a) training and feedback; b) content

support; c) video production, and d) assistants/student workers.

Based on the above findings, I have proposed several recommendations for MOOC

instructors (novice and veteran), higher education administrators, instructional designers, and

MOOC platform developers. For instance, creating a manageable timeline and actionable goals,

forming a team with professionals, collaborating with other content experts, engaging MOOC

learners via various channels, developing and providing professional development training to

MOOC instructors in advance, recruiting graduate assistants or student workers to help daily

maintenance work, initiating conversations and clarifying expectations with department head

before committing to teaching MOOCs, offering opportunities for MOOC instructors,

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instructional designers, and MOOC platform developers to exchange insights getting to know

more about each other’s needs.

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APPENDIX A: INSTITUTIONAL REVIEW BORAD APPROVAL

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APPENDIX B. RECRUITMENT EMAILS

Recruitment Letter (Quantitative Phase) Dear MOOC instructor,

I hope this email finds you very well.

My name is Youxin Zhang. I am a doctoral student at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

in the Department of Learning Design and Technology. I am conducting a research study to

understand the teaching experience of higher education faculty members who have taught a

MOOC or are currently teaching a MOOC via. This study is comprised of two phases: a

quantitative questionnaire and a qualitative interview. You are being asked to participate in the

online questionnaire. The questionnaire is to identify factors that influence faculty participation

in teaching MOOCs. Completing the questionnaire will take approximately 15-20 minutes. The

questionnaire questions are mainly multiple-choice.

If you would be interested in taking this survey, please click on this link:

https://tinyurl.com/MOOCs-UH-Manoa. A consent form and instructions for completing the

questionnaire will be provided on the web page. After reviewing the consent information,

responding to the questionnaire will be considered as your consent to participate in this study.

If you have any questions about the study, feel free to call or email me at 808.956.4922 or

[email protected]. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Christine Sorensen-Irvine, at

808.956.3910 or [email protected] or the UH Human Studies Program at 808.956.5007 or

[email protected] to discuss problems, concerns and questions; obtain information; or offer

input with an informed individual who is unaffiliated with the specific research protocol.

Thank you in advance for your time and participation!

Sincerely,

Youxin Zhang

https://tinyurl.com/MOOCs-UH-Manoa

mailto:[email protected]



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Recruitment Letter (Qualitative Phase) Dear [Participant’s First Name],

My name is Youxin Zhang. I am a doctoral student at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

in the Department of Learning Design and Technology. I am conducting a research study to

understand the teaching experience of higher education faculty members who have taught a

MOOC or are currently teaching a MOOC via edX (a MOOC platform provided over thousands

of online courses in a variety of disciplines). This study is comprised of two phases: a

quantitative questionnaire and a qualitative interview. You are being asked to participate in the

interview phase. The qualitative phase will use semi-structured interviews conducted online to

explore the faculty members’ experiences delivering a MOOC. Completing the interview will

take approximately an hour with 16 open-ended questions.

If you would be interested in participating in the interview, you may reply to this email

and indicate the best way for me to contact you to make arrangements for the interview. Detailed

information about the interview will be provided in another follow-up email once I hear from

you. The University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Institutional Review Board requires informed consent

from research participants. Therefore, an electronic copy of the consent form will be sent to you

via email requiring your signature. Please return it to me prior to the interview date.

If you have any questions about the study, feel free to call or email me at 808.956.4922 or

[email protected]. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Christine Sorensen-Irvine, at

808.956.3910 or [email protected] or the UH Human Studies Program at 808.956.5007 or

[email protected] to discuss problems, concerns and questions; obtain information; or offer

input with an informed individual who is unaffiliated with the specific research protocol.

Thank you in advance for your time and participation!

Sincerely,

Youxin Zhang




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APPENDIX C. CONSENT FORMS

University of Hawai'i Consent to Participate in a Research Project

Youxin Zhang, Principal Investigator Project title: Higher Education Faculty Experiences in Teaching MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) Hello! My name is Youxin Zhang and you are cordially invited to take part in a research study. I am a doctoral student at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa in the Department of Learning Design and Technology. As part of the requirements for finishing my dissertation, I am doing a research project. The purpose of my project is to understand the teaching experience of the higher education faculty members who have taught a MOOC or are currently teaching a MOOC via edX. I am asking you to participate because you are listed as the instructor on the website of edX, and you are at least 18 years old. Project Description – Activities and Time Commitment: If you decide to take part in this project, you will be asked to fill out an online questionnaire. The questionnaire questions are mainly multiple-choice. However, there will be a few questions where you may add an open-ended response. The questionnaire is accessed on a website to which I will provide you a link. Completing the questionnaire will take approximately 15-20 minutes. Benefits and Risks: There will be no direct benefit to you for taking part in this project. The findings from this project may be of use to inform administrative decisions about MOOCs and help faculty considering MOOCs to better understand the experience and inform design for better facilitating MOOC learning. There is little risk to you for participating in this project. Confidentiality and Privacy: I will not ask you for any personal information, such as your name or address. All responses will be kept confidential. Voluntary Participation: You can freely choose to take part or to not take part in this questionnaire. There will be no penalty or loss of benefits for either decision. If you do agree to participate, you can stop at any time. Questions: If you have any questions about this study, please call or email me at 808.956.4922 or [email protected]. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Christine Sorensen-Irvine, at 808.956.3910 or [email protected], or the UH Human Studies Program at 808.956.5007 or [email protected] to discuss problems, concerns and questions. Please visit https://www.hawaii.edu/researchcompliance/information- research-participants for more information on your rights as a research participant. To Access the Questionnaire: https://tinyurl.com/MOOCs-UH-Manoa. Going to the first page of the questionnaire will be considered as your consent to participate in this study. Please print a copy of this page for your reference. Thank you for your participation!


https://www.hawaii.edu/researchcompliance/information- research-participants

https://tinyurl.com/MOOCs-UH-Manoa

200

University of Hawai'i Consent to Participate in a Research Project

Youxin Zhang, Principal Investigator Project title: Higher Education Faculty Experiences in Teaching MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) Hello! My name is Youxin Zhang and you are invited to take part in a research study. I am a doctoral student at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa in the Department of Learning Design and Technology. As part of the requirements for finishing my dissertation, I am doing a research project. The purpose of my project is to understand the teaching experience of the higher education faculty members who have taught a MOOC or are currently teaching a MOOC via edX. I am asking you to participate because you are listed as the instructor on the website of edX, and you are at least 18 years old. Activities and Time Commitment: If you volunteer to participate in this project, I will meet with you for an online interview at a time that is most convenient for you. The interview will consist of 16 open-ended questions and I anticipate it will take about an hour. Interview questions will include questions like, “Can you describe your role or roles in developing and teaching MOOCs?” “What do you see as the greatest benefits/challenges of teaching a MOOC?” Only you and I will be present during the interview. With your permission, I will audio-record the interview so that I can later transcribe the interview and analyze the responses. You will be one of about 20 people I will interview for this study. Benefits and Risks: There will be no direct benefit to you for participating in this interview. You may, however, gain personal insights into your MOOC experience. The results of this project may inform administrative decisions about MOOCs and help faculty considering MOOCs to better understand the experience and inform design for better facilitating MOOC learning. I believe there is little risk to you for participating in this research project. If you become stressed or uncomfortable answering any of the interview questions or discussing topics with me during the interview, you can skip the question or take a break. You can also stop the interview or you can withdraw from the project altogether. Privacy and Confidentiality: I will keep all study data secure in a locked filing cabinet and on an encrypted password protected computer. Only my University of Hawai'i advisor and I will have access to the information. Other agencies that have legal permission have the right to review research records. The University of Hawai'i Human Studies Program has the right to review research records for this study. After I transcribe the interview, I will erase or destroy the audio-recordings. When I report the results of my research project, I will not use your name. I will not use any other personal identifying information. I will use pseudonyms (fake names) and report my findings in a way that protects your privacy and confidentiality to the extent allowed by law.

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Voluntary Participation: Your participation in this project is completely voluntary. You may stop participating at any time. If you stop being in the study, there will be no penalty or loss to you. Your choice to participate or not participate will not affect your rights to teach at edX or Coursera.

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University of Hawai'i

Consent to Participate in a Research Project Youxin Zhang, Principal Investigator

Project title: Higher Education Faculty Experiences in Teaching MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) Questions: If you have any questions about this study, please call or email me at 808.956.4922 or [email protected]. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Christine Sorensen-Irvine, at 808.956.3910 or [email protected], or the UH Human Studies Program at 808.956.5007 or [email protected] to discuss problems, concerns and questions; obtain information; or offer input with an informed individual who is unaffiliated with the specific research protocol. Please visit https://www.hawaii.edu/researchcompliance/information- research-participants for more information on your rights as a research participant. If you agree to participate in this project, please sign and date this signature page and return it to: Youxin Zhang ([email protected]) Keep this copy of the informed consent for your records and reference. Signature(s) for Consent: I give permission to join the research project entitled, “Higher Education Faculty Experiences in Teaching MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses).” Please initial next to either “Yes” or “No” to the following: Yes No I consent to be audio-recorded for the interview portion of this research. Name of Participant (Print): __________________________________________ Participant’s Signature: _____________________________________________ Signature of the Person Obtaining Consent: ___________________________________ Date: ____________________________ Thank you for your participation!




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APPENDIX D. SURVEY INSTRUMENT

Survey Title: Higher Education Faculty Experience in Teaching MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) Aloha (Hello), The purpose of this study is to understand the teaching experience of higher education faculty members who have taught a MOOC or are currently teaching a MOOC via edX. If you decide to participate in this study, you will be asked to fill out an online survey (next page). The survey questions are mainly multiple-choice. However, there will be a few questions where you may add an open-ended response. Completing the questionnaire will take approximately 10-15 minutes. There will be no direct benefit to you for taking part in this survey. The findings from this study may be used to help guide administrative decisions concerning MOOCs. The findings may also be used to help higher education faculty considering MOOCs to better understand the MOOC experience, as well as aide in design decisions to better facilitate MOOC learning. I will not ask you for any personal information such as your name or address. All responses will be kept anonymous and confidential. You can freely choose to take part or to not take part in this survey. There will be no penalty or loss of benefits for either decision. You can stop at any time in spite of your agreement to participate. If you have any questions about this study, please reach me at [email protected], or my advisor Dr. Christine Sorensen-Irvine at [email protected]. Thank you very much for your consideration. Please indicate your consent to participating

Yes, I agree to participate.

No, I do not agree. Section 2 Teaching Background

1. How many years have you been teaching in post-secondary education?

2. What level of student(s) do you teach? Please check all that apply.

Undergraduate

Master

Doctorate

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Other

3. Before you taught a MOOC, had you taught an online/blended(hybrid) course previously?

Yes

No

Other

4. Have you taken any online/hybrid courses before?

Yes

No

Other

5. Have you received any online degrees/certificates? Please specify.

Section 3 MOOC Background

6. How many years have you been teaching MOOC(s) via edX?

7. How many students did you have for your first MOOC?

8. Have you taught/are you teaching any MOOC(s) via a MOOC provider other than edX?

Please specify.

9. What subjects have you taught via MOOCs? Please check all that apply.

Architecture

Art & Culture

Biology & Life Sciences

Business & Management

Chemistry

Communication

Computer Science

Data Analysis & Statistics

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Design

Economics & Finance

Education & Teacher Training

Electronics

Energy & Earth Sciences

Engineering

Environmental Studies

Ethics

Food & Nutrition

Health & Safety

History

Humanities

Language

Law

Literature

Math

Medicine

Music

Philosophy & Ethics

Physics

Science

Social Sciences

Other

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10. On average, how many hours per week do you spend preparing for your MOOC(s)?

11. How would you best describe your role in delivering MOOC(s)?

I am the primary instructor.

I am the primary designer for the course.

I am the co-instructor.

I am the co-designer.

I work more behind the scenes: preparing materials, assisting students, grading, etc.,

similar to the role of a TA (teaching assistant).

Other

12. What communication tool(s) do you provide for students to contact you in your MOOC? Please check all that apply.

Email

Phone

Instant messenger

Video conferencing tool or Skype

Online message board or discussion forum

Virtual office hours

Noe

Other

13. Do you believe your MOOC is as academically rigorous as the traditional classroom version of the course?

Yes

No

Other

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14. Before teaching your MOOC, which of the following best described your beliefs about fully online courses?

Very skeptical

Somewhat skeptical


Very enthusiastic

15. Which of the following best describes your beliefs about fully online courses now?

Very skeptical

Somewhat skeptical


Very enthusiastic

16. Has the experience of teaching a MOOC inspired you to change the way you teach in

general?

Yes

No

Other

17. Do you feel satisfied having taught your first MOOC?

Yes

No

18. Would you teach a MOOC again? Please specify your reason(s). Section 4 Self-Assessment

19. Please rate the extent to which you agree or disagree with the following factors motivating you to teach MOOCs.

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Strongly

disagree

Disagree Neutral Agree Strongly

Agree

Opportunity for scholarly pursuit

Opportunity to develop new ideas about

teaching the learning processes

Opportunity to use personal research as a

teaching tool

Opportunity to improve and enhance online

teaching skills

Opportunity to influence social change

Opportunity to share knowledge with

others

Opportunity to diversify program offerings

Support and encouragement from

school/department dean or chair


school/departmental colleagues


institution administrators

Technical support provided by the

institution

MOOC training provided by the institution

Faculty opinions and beliefs about online

courses

Expectation by university that faculty

participate

Requirement by department

Visibility among colleagues within their

discipline

Visibility for jobs at other

institutions/organizations

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Strongly

disagree

Disagree Neutral Agree Strongly

Agree

Monetary support for participation

(stipend, overload)

Grants for MOOC materials/expenses

Increase in salary

Merit pay

Credit toward promotion and tenure

Professional prestige and status

Recognition and awards

Personal motivation to learn and use

technology

Intellectual challenge

Royalties on copyrighted materials

Develop new competencies

Ability to reach new audiences globally

Greater course flexibility for students

Reduced teaching load

Release time

Overall job satisfaction

Job security

Career exploration/development

Section 5 Demographics

20. Gender

Male

Female

Other

21. Age

22. Ethnicity

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American Indian or Alaska Native

Asian

Black or African American

Hispanic or Latino

Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander

White/Caucasian

Other

23. Education (indicate the highest level of education you have completed)

Bachelor's Degree (e.g., BA, BS)

Master's Degree (e.g., MA, MS, MEd)

Doctorate (e.g., PhD, EdD)

Professional Degree (e.g., MD, DDS, DVM)

Other

24. Position title at your current institution

Distinguished, Endowed or University Professor

Professor (full professor)

Associate Professor

Assistant Professor

Research Associate

Instructor

Lecturer

Other

25. What else would you like to share with me?

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APPENDIX E. PERMISSION TO USE SURVEY INSTRUMENT

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APPENDIX F. INTERVIEW PROTOCOL

Script for the beginning of the interview.

Hello, my name is Youxin Zhang. I am a doctoral student from the department of Learning

Design and Technology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. I am here to learn more about the

teaching experience of higher education faculty members who taught a MOOC (Massive Open

Online Courses) or are currently teaching a MOOC via edX. Thank you very much for returning

the consent form via email and for taking the time to talk with me today.

There are no desirable or undesirable answers in today’s interview. I would like you to feel

comfortable saying what you really think and how you really feel. I will be recording our

conversation today if that’s okay with you. I will make a transcript of the audio recording to be

used for analysis. No identifying information will be included in the transcript.

Everything you say will remain confidential. Only my committee chair and myself will have

access to the transcript data. Do you have questions for me before we get started?

Interview questions

1. How long have you been teaching a MOOC?

2. Can you briefly describe each of the MOOCs you have taught, including approximately

how many students were enrolled and the content?

3. How did you get started teaching MOOCs?

4. What factors did you consider in making your decision to teach a MOOC?

5. What was the most compelling factor in the final decision to teach a MOOC?

6. Can you describe your role or roles in developing and teaching MOOCs?

7. Can you describe what you do in a typical week in terms of preparing for and teaching a

MOOC?

8. How is teaching a MOOC similar to or different from teaching non-MOOC classes?

9. What characteristics do you think are important to be an effective instructor in a MOOC?

10. What teaching strategies have you found to be effective or ineffective?

11. Can you tell me an interesting story about an experience you have as a MOOC instructor?

12. What do you see as the greatest benefits of teaching a MOOC?

13. What do you see as the greatest challenges of teaching a MOOC?

14. What do you wish you had known before teaching your first MOOC?

216

15. If you have an opportunity to teach a MOOC in the future, what might you do

differently?

16. Is there anything else you would like to share about your experience teaching a MOOC?

Script for the end of the interview.

Thank you very much for meeting with me today. I enjoyed talking with you. Your time is

very much appreciated and your insights have been very helpful in understanding more about the

experiences of higher education faculty teaching MOOCs. Just as a reminder, I will keep your

responses confidential and you will be kept anonymous in all reports of this study. Feel free to

email me or call me (put my contact information on the sharing-screen) if you have any

questions. There may be a subsequent contact if there is a need for me to clarify. Again, thank

you very much for your participation. Have a great day!

217

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