The Invisible Professor And The Future Of Virtual Faculty

Profetic: "
12 février 2007
L’augmentation du nombre d’inscriptions en ligne génère des demandes accrues auprès des professeurs qui offrent des cours en ligne. Cet article présente les principaux défis auxquels sont confrontés les professeurs à cet égard et avance que l’enseignement en ligne soulève de nouvelles questions quant à l’avenir des 'professeurs virtuels'. États-Unis. Sammons, M. C. et Ruth, S. (2007, January). International
Journal of Instructional Technology & Distance Learning., Vol. 4 No. 1. ISSN 1550-6908."
Editor’s Note: Alternative education methods involving virtual learning led to controversy among faculty, administrators, and researchers. Many saw it as the end of an era, others as an attack on academe as we know it. Research continued to assert the value distance learning as an alternative paradigm for teaching and learning. The predominant growth in higher education for the past decade has been in distance learning as a supplement to, rather than a replacement of, traditional face-to-face instruction. The stages of transition are made evident by this paper which identifies unsolved problems related to faculty.
The Invisible Professor and the Future of Virtual Faculty
Martha C. Sammons, Stephen RuthUSA
Keywords: faculty online learning distance education motivating future workload responsibilities invisible
Introduction
The Sloan Consortium’s latest report, (“Making the Grade: Online Education in the United States 2006”) estimates that 850,000 more students took online courses in fall 2005 than 2004, an increase of almost 40 percent. Although the online teaching continues to grow in popularity, it places greater demands on faculty than traditional courses. The Sloan report found that this problem exists at all levels of postsecondary education, from doctoral-granting institutions to community colleges. A significant number of full-time professors are thus understandably reluctant to participate in distance learning, and faculty questions about online teaching continue. Traditional professors are disappearing from online classrooms as distance learning has altered their roles and responsibilities, as well as their professional status, job security, workload, rewards, and intellectual freedom. This article delineates some of the most significant challenges and suggests that distance learning has created new questions about the future of virtual faculty.