The literature is rich in studies and examples of how to effectively collect good
student feedback that can be used for enhancement purposes. However, collecting
feedback effectively is not easy and the common problems of inappropriate
questions, low response rates, inadequate analysis of data and failure to close the
feedback loop are also widely reported (Harvey, 2003; Hendry et al., 2001; Leckey
and Neill, 2001; Saunders and Williams, 2005; Watson, 2003).
The extensive experience and research in this field has to-date mainly concentrated
on the collection of student feedback in campus-based courses, where students are
asked to complete a paper questionnaire (Harvey, 2003), though there is an
increasing use of online surveys. This experience of paper based or on-line surveys
in campus-based courses does not necessarily generalise to the context of e-
learning courses, where students are partially or totally at a distance from the
campus and staff may have limited contact with them.
The assurance and enhancement of the growing number of e-learning courses in
campus-based universities has increasingly become a concern for higher education
practitioners and managers. There is much discussion about the appropriateness for
assuring e-learning provision of the existing internal quality assurance and
enhancement procedures in place in campus-based institutions. The literature largely
supports the view that these procedures require some modification if they are to be
applied to e-learning courses, and this position is based on the identification of
distinctive features of e-learning courses which distinguish them from face-to-face
and traditional distance learning courses.
Recognising the key role that the collection of student feedback has in the overall
assurance and enhancement of quality, these distinctive features of e-learning
courses raise concerns about the effectiveness of the strategies used by campus-
based universities to gather feedback from their students on these courses. This
paper reports on a study that set out to identify whether and, if so, then how these
features of e-learning courses impact on the effectiveness of the strategies for
collecting student feedback. The following sections discuss the nature of these
distinctive features of e-learning, the methodology of the present study, the findings
and the implications for both higher education institutions and e-learning
practitioners.
2. Quality assurance in Higher Education
Higher Education Institutions in the UK use a number of internal quality assurance
and quality enhancement procedures to assure the academic quality of their
programmes in line with the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) Code of Practice
(QAA, 2008). This Code of Practice was established to support institutions by
providing a framework that covers the main issues HEIs need to address and it
contains explicit guidelines to institutions on the collection of feedback from students
as a mechanism for the monitoring and review of the quality of the learning and
teaching processes. Over the last few years the QAA has put increasing emphasis
on quality enhancement in its arrangements for institutional audits, and reinforced the
importance it gives to the establishment of student views for an effective
management of quality (QAA, 2006).
Higher Education Institutions have many different ways for collecting student views,
including informal discussions, focus groups, student representation and