Describes a needs assessment at Arizona State University that investigated the optimal instructional content for a foundations course in educational technology; the optimal delivery method; and student attitudes about the use of the Internet for the course. Reports the results of surveys from students, graduates, and faculty. (LRW)

Discusses the interaction between students and technology in online open learning distance education courses. Topics include human-computer interfaces; relationships between course design and learning theories; how students use computer technology and how it can help them learn; and a new framework for evaluating an online open learning course.…

Contrasts student evaluation of a course by the conventional method of final evaluation form with a less conventional approach in which the learner is interviewed on a number of occasions throughout the course. Reveals weaknesses with the end-of-course evaluation form. (Author/VWL)

Describes a student-centered, open evaluation system used in the University of Sydney's problem-based medical program. Describes how quantitative and qualitative student feedback is collected for individuals, groups, and years, and how the feedback is managed to effectively support improvement in course quality. (EV)

Teaching of History of Psychology is likely to become increasingly important as the British Psychological Society's 2002 guidelines for approved undergraduate courses are implemented. Results of a survey of History of Psychology teaching during the academic year 1999-2000 are summarised and discussed in the light of these new requirements. While…

Human service fields, and more specifically public health, are increasingly requiring evaluations to prove the worth of funded programs. Many public health practitioners, however, lack the required background and skills to conduct useful, appropriate evaluations. In the late 1990s, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) created the…

This paper is a discussion of a team-taught interdisciplinary course that was designed to provide cohesion between the 12 departments that participate in the environmental studies major at Salisbury University. This course provides a model for addressing several positive and negative tendencies at work in interdisciplinary programs, and provides…

Context: A major goal of any evaluation is to demonstrate content validity, which considers both curricular content as well as the ability expected of learners. Whether evaluation blueprints should be published and the degree of blueprint transparency is controversial. Objectives: To examine the effect of blueprint publication on students'…

Education of potential professional engineers should take account of the type of employment that they will eventually obtain. The quality of an engineering degree course can be judged by assessing whether the correct balance of "essential attributes" has been effectively obtained. This case study is concerned with assessing the balance…

Online versions of statistics courses have been taught for some time, but more information is needed on the effectiveness of using different approaches to teaching statistics online. The present paper describes a mastery-based approach to teaching an online introductory statistics course and presents data suggesting that the course is effective.…

Purpose--The purpose of this research is to examine participants' response rate on dual style training course evaluation forms. These combine structured and open-ended formats. Pencil and paper forms have a long history of use by trainers in business and commerce and more recently in education. Research methods texts tend to have neglected the…

Learner-centred approaches follow the prevailing tendency in modern University reforms which are primarily concerned about "how people learn". The methodologies can be learner-centred in the sense of placing the student as the main actor of the teaching-learning process by increasing his interactivity and participation, but also…

This study explores the impact of individual ability and favorable team member scores on student preference of team-based learning and grading methods, and examines the moderating effects of student perception of course importance on student preference of team-based learning and grading methods. The author also investigates the relationship…

Qualitative methods can do much to describe context and illuminate the why behind patterns encountered in institutional assessment. Alone, or in combination with quantitative methods, they should be the approach of choice for many of the most important assessment questions. (Contains 1 table.)

An evaluation of the Pride & Prejudice program, which ran in three Tasmanian schools in 2006, suggests that students who completed the program had more positive attitudes towards gay men and lesbians. This finding parallels an earlier evaluation of the same anti-homophobia program undertaken in Victoria. The evaluation leads to a discussion…