Investigating College Students Online Learning Experiences at a Large Multi-Campus Institution

Abstract

The design of online courses strongly influences students’ online learning experiences. As the number of students in online courses increased dramatically in the past decade, how students’ experiences of online learning change over the years remain unknown. This study used a mixed-method to investigate college students’ perspectives of online learning experiences. By examining 20958 online Community of Inquiry questionnaires and identifying the major factors variables, the results suggest online instructors should design the class with activates for more social interaction to enable students to share their affections to increase a sense of learning community.