Factors affecting professor facilitator and course evaluations in an online graduate program

Abstract

Along with the rapid growth in Internet-based instruction there have been concerns about the quality of online instruction and whether traditional student evaluations of faculty are suitable in online environments. This study uses data collected from ongoing student evaluations of faculty in an MBA program within an online university to investigate the factors leading to student ratings of overall professor facilitator performance and overall satisfaction with the course. Using factor analysis we investigated the underlying factors related to the items on the survey which revealed factors relating to personal attributes of the professor facilitator, learning facilitation and quality of feedback. Results from regression analysis finds that evaluations of overall professor facilitator performance is predominantly driven by both the professor’s attributes and learning facilitation while overall student satisfaction is largely driven by factors associated with learning facilitation.