Learning About Technology and Student Affairs: Outcomes of an Online Immersion

FINDINGS

Pre-, Midsemester, and Post-Surveys

Of the 19 students enrolled in the course, 17 students completed one or more of the surveys. Ten students completed all three surveys, and two students completed only the pre- and post-surveys. The remaining six students completed the pre- and/or midsemester surveys. The data from these six students were included in the basic descriptive analysis but eliminated from subsequent testing.

Scaled Survey Items

Descriptive statistics were calculated for all survey questions. Pre-survey means ranged from 1.50 (SD = .632) for comfort using web-authoring software to edit a web page, to 4.35 (SD = .861) for comfort using word processing software. Answers to the midsemester survey ranged from 1.86 (SD = .351) for the question, "Do you believe student affairs can be practiced in an on-line environment?" to 4.80 (SD = .560). The post-survey mean responses ranged from 1.176 (SD = .438) for the question, "Do you believe student affairs can be practiced in an online environment?" to 4.76 (SD = .438) for comfort using word processing software. See Table 1 for complete descriptive data.

To compare student responses across surveys we conducted a one-way analysis of variance with a Tukey-Kramer HSD post-hoc test of mean differences. This test showed significant positive difference between pre- and post-survey for questions that asked about comfort levels. These included: "How comfortable are you making a newsletter?" (F= 4.4, p

Post-hoc testing further elucidated these variances. For the question, "How comfortable are you making a newsletter?" there was a significant positive difference between the pre-survey and the post-survey (p

Three questions showed significant differences between the pre-survey, and both the midsemester survey and post-survey. The question, "How comfortable are you using web authoring software (Dreamweaver, FrontPage, etc.) to EDIT an original web page?" evidenced significant differences between the pre-survey and both the midsemester (p

The results of the analysis of variance demonstrate that comfort level for five specific skills (making a newsletter, using web authoring software to edit and create web pages, using the internet to find information related to student affairs practice, and using the library website to find research and professional literature) increased from the beginning of the course to the end of the course. While this study provides data to support the claim that immersion will increase self-reported skill level with technology and student affairs, it fails to show significant changes in attitudes regarding the use of technology in student affairs and the practice of student affairs in an online environment. It should be noted that for the question, "Do you believe student affairs can be practiced in an online environment?" the mean response declined throughout the semester although the differences were not significant.

Open-ended Survey Questions

Two questions on each survey provided opportunities for open-ended short responses. The first followed the skills items and asked, "What other technological skills do you have that you can use in relation to student affairs work?" Answers, which did not vary substantially from pre- to post-surveys, included spreadsheet and database software (e.g., Microsoft Excel), drawing programs (e.g., Visio, Arts & Letters), publishing software (e.g., Publisher, PageMaker), web page authoring software (e.g., Netscape Composer), and instant message programs (e.g., AOL Instant Messenger and Yahoo! Messenger).