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Journal of Computing in Higher Education

, Volume 29, Issue 2, pp 331–352 | Cite as

Experienced online instructors: beliefs and preferred supports regarding online teaching

  • Patricia McGee
  • Deborah Windes
  • Maria Torres
Article
First Online:

Abstract

While online courses are becoming a mainstay of college course offerings administrators, staff, instructors and students have different perceptions about how online courses should work. While faculty members are expert in their discipline and institutions provide support for acquiring content expertise, how instructors develop skills in online teaching is neither systematic nor codified in higher education. This preliminary study reports findings from a Delphi study of expert online teachers who identified 11 institutional strategies that best supported their development of online teaching skills. Three major areas of most value were: training, external supports, and prolonged experience.

Keywords

Online teaching Professional development Expertise Distance education 
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Notes

Compliance with ethical standards

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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© Springer Science+Business Media New York 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.The University of Texas at San AntonioSan AntonioUSA
  2. 2.Trinity Christian CollegePalos HeightsUSA

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