2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

A data-driven comparison of students’ performance in asynchronous online versus in-person sections of an introductory graduate statistics course

Presented at Graduate Studies Division (GSD) Technical Session 5: Graduate Student Experience and Decision-Making

Many institutions of higher learning have depended on their online programs to survive. In 2006 The Sloan Survey of Online Learning documented the growth of online education and showed that nearly 6 in 10 chief academic officers agree that e-learning is "critical to the long-term strategy of their institution” [1]. The COVID-19 pandemic energized that wave as all educational institutions sent students home and converted their instruction mode to online. The gain in momentum has sustained mainly because of the flexibility of time and space that online education affords students and faculty. Seventy one percent of students surveyed in 2021 reported they would continue at least some form of online learning even post-pandemic [2]. The popularity of online degree programs promises to continue in the future. While the climate is getting back to pre-Pandemic norms, many universities are experimenting in the fully online space. For example, some have started offering mini online sessions in between typical semesters, such as early in January while students are still away from the university before start of spring semester. However online teaching, particularly teaching quantitative subjects can be quite challenging. Of course, there are teaching strategies and technology resources that can be employed to provide online students with the same experiences as are available to their in-person counterparts. But, ultimately, the faculty must ensure students enrolled in online courses have the same learning outcomes as in-person students. This study explores four years of data from all 55 online and in-person sections of an introductory statistics course taught in a 4-year period for a total of 724 students. We explore grades on take-home midterm exams and proctored final exams to determine performance differences. Additionally, we compare performance of sections that are opened early and fill early to those that are opened later to test the conventional wisdom that dedicated/motivated students who are better performing enroll early and populate earlier course sections. Finally, we test differences in the overall course average between online and in-person sections.

Authors

Majid Nabavi University of Nebraska - Lincoln [biography]

Dr. Majid Nabavi is an associate professor of practice in department of Supply Chain Management and Analytics in the College of Business at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. His research and teaching interests include analytical methods, database systems, and application of analytical models for business problem solving. He has developed and taught online and in-class courses in operations and logistics management, business analytics, database systems, and programming. He has published in Quality Management Journal, and a textbook in Business Analytics.
Majid received his MBA and Ph. D. in Operations Management from University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and B.E. and M.E. degrees in Mining Engineering from University of Tehran. Prior to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Majid was an associate professor of Supply Chain Management and Decision Sciences at Bellevue University.
Dr. Jena Shafai Asgarpoor University of Nebraska - Lincoln [biography]

Dr. Jena Asgarpoor is a Professor of Practice in the College of Engineering at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln and the Director for the Master of Engineering Management Program in the College. She received her Ph. D. and M.S. in Industrial Engineering, specializing in Engineering Management, from Texas A and M University in College Station where she had previously earned a B.A. in Political Science (Summa Cum Laude). Prior to UNL, she was a professor at Bellevue University for 26 years, where in 1994 as part of her teaching portfolio she developed and taught the first fully online asynchronous web-based course offered by that institution. Her interests lie in engineering management, quality management, pedagogy, and assessment of teaching and learning, particularly in the online space. She is active in the American Society for Engineering Management (ASEM) and the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE). In recent years she has served as Secretary, President, and Past-President of the Council of Engineering Management Academic Leaders (CEMAL), as a LEAD officer, and is currently serving as Program Chair for the Engineering Management Division (EMD) of ASEE. Dr. Asgarpoor is the 2022-2023 Secretary for the American Society for Engineering Management. Her interests lie in scholarship of teaching and learning specifically in asynchronous online space, assessment of learning, engineering management, and quality management.

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