Perceptions of distance education among nursing faculty members in North America

Abstract

A strategy to increase access to nursing education, train nurses for practice, and prepare future nurse educators is distance education. Faculty member shortages are cited as the main reason for not accepting qualified applicants. Faculty members are the core of nursing education. In order to address nursing faculty members' concerns regarding distance education and to assist in faculty member recruitment, retention, growth, and development in order to improve and enhance the quality of distance education, one must answer the question: What are nursing faculty members' perceptions of distance education in nursing? Utilizing a number of databases to locate research specific to this topic, this article provides an integrative review of the nursing literature to ascertain the faculty members' perspective of distance education. The research was analyzed, findings summarized, and limitations mentioned. Utilizing a brief supplementary review of the literature, the implications, recommendations, and need for future research are discussed.

Lead Faculty Workload Model

“…This includes the increased time needed for the preparation before the semester, learning new technology and systems, and interactive or communication process with students outside a defined ''class time'' framework. 13 A study that compared nurse faculty teaching time for Web-based and face-to-face graduate nursing courses reported that Web-based courses required an average of 6.7 more hours per credit hour per semester than face-to-face courses. 14 Although this difference was not considered statistically significant, when aggregated over a semester for a 3-credit course, this equaled 20 additional hours of teaching time per course.…”

A critical examination of the time and workload involved in the design and delivery of an e-module in postgraduate clinical education

“…There is unequivocal support of distance teaching taking more time than traditional teaching (National Education Is the 'e' in e-learning expensive to academics? Association (NEA) 2000; Brogden & Couros 2002;Howell et al 2003;Garrett & MacLean 2004;Pirani 2004;Johnson et al 2005;Ryan et al 2005;Laurillard 2007;Mancuso 2009), yet the academics in this study were not prepared for the amount of work. Rumble (2001) in an inaugural lecture warned that academics, when pressured to create e-learning resources may feel a 'hint of exploitation' and cautioned that academics working on the course development side were particularly vulnerable to the erosion of contractual benefits.…”

“…Although, one of the claims of e-learning is that it will save time and money (Beetham & Sharpe 2010), e-learning is consistently reported to be more time consuming and expensive than traditional teaching (Laurillard 2007;Mancuso 2009;Major 2010). Additionally, there appears to be a lack of clear guidance (Ryan et al 2004) and organizational support (Curtis 2001) for faculty when developing and implementing e-learning.…”

Twelve tips for academic role and institutional change in distance learning

“…Plan and protect delivery time: Four staff hours to one activity hour There is unequivocal support of distance teaching taking more time than traditional teaching ((NEA) 2000; Brogden & Couros 2002;Howell et al 2003;Garrett & MacLean 2004;Pirani 2004;Johnson et al 2005;Ryan et al 2005;Laurillard 2007;Mancuso 2009). As in the development, after carefully tracking hours, the actual delivery of the module took approximately 4 hours staff time (3.6 academic, 0.3 technical and 0.1 administrative) per one of actual online student activity.…”