Online doctoral degree programs in education are popular with professionals and leaders. Join us for a moderated panel discussion on effective strategies for developing online doctoral programs which meet community of inquiry principles and OLC effective practices. Panelists represent a variety of public and private institutions across several Carnegie designations.
The demand for quality online doctoral degree programs in education is increasing particularly for working professionals and leaders. The rapid growth of these programs is especially noted in the non-profit sector including amongst both public and private universities that traditionally offer residential programs. With this rapid growth comes a need for developing effective online strategies suited to the unique needs to doctoral students.
This session will be a moderated panel discussion focusing on effective strategies for developing online education doctoral programs, Ed.D. and Ph.D., which meet Community of Inquiry principles and ultimately, OLC effective practices. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework by Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000, 2001) provides a research-based structure for promoting effective learning in an online environment.
Session Goals: Individuals attending this panel discussion will be able to identify innovative strategies for applying effective online learning in doctoral programming in education. They will be able to articulate the necessary components of online doctoral programs for creating social presence, teaching presence, and cognitive presence. Finally, they will be able to describe how the strategies align with the OLC’s Effective Practices of learning effectiveness, access, scale, student satisfaction, and faculty satisfaction.
Panelists include faculty members from six universities that offer online doctoral degree programs in education - EdD, PhD, or both. A variety of public and private institutions are represented across several Carnegie designations. Below is a list of the panelist’s institutions.
- Institution A: private doctoral research university offering residential and online degrees, 1,200 current education doctoral students in Ed.D. and Ph.D. programs
- Institution B: public doctoral research university offering residential and online degrees, 50 current education doctoral students in an Ed.D. leadership program
- Institution C: public doctoral research university offering residential and online degrees, 200 current education doctoral students in an Ed.D. leadership program
- Institution D: private doctoral professional university offering residential and online degrees, 50 current education doctoral students in three Ed.D. and Ph.D. programs
- Institution E: private doctoral professional university offering residential and online degrees, 330 current education doctoral students in an Ed.D. leadership program
- Institution F: private masters university offering residential and online degrees, 450 current education doctoral students in an Ed.D. leadership program
The panelists will answer the following moderated questions related to the original components of the Community of Inquiry framework - social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence. We also add a psychosocial/human agency presence component which accounts for proposed motivational elements related to Bandura’s human agency or to what Rovai refers to as online learners’ needs, skills, and characteristics in his Composite Persistence Model for online learning.
Social Presence
- How is connectedness, group cohesion and community building created?
- How is collaboration encouraged?
- How do we encourage and support risk-free idea sharing?
- How do students make themselves known and their ideas heard?
Cognitive Presence
- How is academic rigor ensured?
- How is reflection and interaction utilized for meaning making?
- How is student choice and voice fostered?
- How are ideas applied, tested, and defended?
Teaching Presence
- How are LMS and other learning tools used?
- How are dissertation Chairs mentored and guided?
- How is a balance between academic freedom vs standardization created?
- What synchronous and asynchronous systems are used?
- What systems are used to manage dissertation processes?
Human Agency Presence
- How is autonomy created through coursework?
- What components during the dissertation process foster self-directed learning?
- How can self-efficacy be developed?
Level of Participation: At the beginning of the session while walking into the room, participants will respond to a set of engagement questions in an open online poll (https://www.polleverywhere.com/) about their own doctoral educational experiences. Responses will be used to set the stage for the panel discussion. Following the initial set of moderated panel discussion questions, attendees will pose questions to the panelists related to online doctoral programming.
Materials: A google document will be shared with participants that includes a matrix of how each university’s online program addresses the components of the community of inquiry and OLC effective practices.