Students’ perceptions of a food safety and quality e-learning course: a CASE study for a MSC in food consumption

Abstract

Life long training and education in food safety is a crucial issue in particular for professionals working in the field. At the same time there is a need to evaluate the effectiveness of that training in particular when is given in e-learning. The purpose of this explorative work is to evaluate the Food Safety and Quality e-learning course within a Master program offered in the National Distance Learning University in Portugal. Following a case study methodology a mixed methods approached was used, based on an online questionnaire survey to students that enrolled the course, followed by a Focus Group Discussion to better discuss the weak points addressed by the students in the questionnaire. The questionnaire aimed to assess students perceptions about the course organization, recourses, assignments, acquired competences, change attitudes and behaviour and link with the professional activity Students who enrolled the course during 2016/17 and 2017/18 were surveyed in the fourth semester of the curricular year, in the period of development of the master thesis dissertation. In addition a quantitative analysis was conducted in the temporal distributions of messages published on the Moodle platform (learning analytics) to evaluate students' interactions and engagement during the course. This study has shown that overall, students are very satisfied with the course, however they suggested improvements that are needed considering the pedagogical model used and their availability to learn as students with full time jobs, most related with the food science. This explorative research aimed to contribute to the improvement of food safety and quality training based also on recent tools and recommendations within e-learning in science education.

Diseño y validación de un cuestionario de percepciones de estudiantes sobre la enseñanza a través de analogías en docentes de ciencias del deporte. (Design and validation of a questionnaire of student perceptions of teaching through analogies in sports science teachers.)

“…Varios autores, cuestionan la calidad de los estudios sobre las percepciones de los estudiantes sobre los procesos educativos, debido que no existe una caracterización de los cuestionarios de percepción de los estudiantes que se usan en la docencia universitaria. De igual manera, no se reportan claramente las propiedades psicométricas de los cuestionarios existentes, lo que genera interrogantes en la obtención de los resultados por falta de estandarización en la construcción de los instrumentos, y en los procedimientos de aplicación de estos (Akareem & Hossain, 2016;Dicker, et al, 2017;Vaz-Fernandes & Caeiro, 2019;Bijlsma, 2021). Sin embargo, se reconoce el potencial que tiene el uso de las analogías como estrategia didáctica que mejora la capacidad de enseñanza del docente universitario.…”

Distance Pedagogical Education in the Conditions of the Coronavirus

“…The intensification of actions to introduce distance education was influenced by Russia's entry into the Bologna Agreement in 2003 when the opportunities for interaction between Russian educational organizations and other countries expanded. In an article by foreign authors Vaz-Fernandes, P., & Caeiro, S., following the case study methodology, a mixed approach was used based on online student questionnaires on the Moodle platform (learning analytics) to assess student interaction and engagement in e-learning in science education (Vaz-Fernandes, & Caeiro, 2019). Bovermann, K., Weidlich, J., & Bastiaens, T. found significant positive correlations between student readiness for online learning in measuring technical competencies for autonomous motivation (identified and intrinsic).…”

Towards effective e-learning on sustainability: a case study-course on participatory processes in environmental politics

“…On the other hand, several studies prove that e-learning tools can foster learning outcomes and competences (Cole et al , 2019; Förster et al , 2018). Due to greater flexibility, e-learning may better adapt to individual learning styles, for instance by offering either a synchronous and asynchronous learning path (Altomonte et al , 2016;Vaz-Fernandes and Caeiro, 2019). In addition, with the incorporation of learning management systems (such as Moodle or Blackboard) and social media tools (such as Twitter, WhatsApp, Facebook and Slack), knowledge sharing and collaborative group work can be managed easily and social presence and familiarization of students increase (Baudewyns et al , 2018; Sabin and Olive, 2018).…”

“…Although it is generally agreed that statistical analysis works better with a large sample (Hackshaw, 2008), small sample studies can deliver meaningful results when designed well but need to be interpreted carefully. There are several studies in the field of education that have been carried out with small data sets and acceptable reliability, among them Raes et al (2020) ( n = 14),Vaz-Fernandes and Caeiro (2019) ( n = 17), Alnabelsi et al (2015) ( n = 25). This shows that under conditions of highly reliable data, meaningful results can be obtained even with a small sample size (Jung, 2013).…”