{"id":2397,"date":"2025-03-25T18:27:22","date_gmt":"2025-03-25T18:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/thelearningcurve\/?p=2397"},"modified":"2025-03-27T16:50:49","modified_gmt":"2025-03-27T16:50:49","slug":"is-this-thing-on-a-student-turned-professionals-musings-on-the-role-of-instructor-presence-in-online-student-engagement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/thelearningcurve\/?p=2397","title":{"rendered":"Is This Thing On? A Student-Turned-Professional\u2019s Musings on the Role of Instructor Presence in Online Student Engagement"},"content":{"rendered":"

I distinctly remember the first online course I took: \u201cEmpowering Adult Online Learning \u2013 Theory and Best Practices\u201d with <\/span>Dr. Kim Round<\/span><\/a> at Harvard Extension School, my first course in Harvard\u2019s graduate certificate in Learning Design and Technology. The year was 2017 and the frontier of online education was uncomplicated by the pivot to emergency online instruction prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Pre-pandemic, online higher education programs were designed and marketed for a smaller range of student personas, primarily busy<\/span>,<\/span> full-time workers earning their first credential as well as seasoned professionals returning to school in anticipation of a career change. Since, in 2025, nearly all currently-enrolled students have presumably experienced some form of remote learning, the demand for online courses has shifted to include many more \u2018traditional\u2019 college students who benefit from access to a larger selection of courses, more diverse and multicultural student compositions, and the added flexibility and accessibility made possible by virtue of the online modality.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While \u201cEmpowering Adult Online Learning\u201d was a synchronous class conducted over Zoom, my first interactions with Dr. Round, the learning management system, and the course content, were asynchronous. My initial emotions were those of excitement at the novelty of beginning a new academic program combined with immense anxiety and a series of urgent questions: How does the video conferencing software work? When and where do I log on? Why do I need an audio headset and why can’t I get it to connect?! While I don\u2019t think the intensity of my own apprehensions\u2014so panicky that I nearly dropped the course before it began\u2014are typical of the average online student, it highlights the benefits of proactive instructor communication for student retention and engagement. In fact, <\/span>one study (Cole, 2016)<\/span><\/a> found that the single greatest predictor of student satisfaction with online courses was the perceived quality of student-instructor communication. Considering that the attrition rate in online courses is significantly higher than that of face-to-face courses (<\/span>Hobson & Puruhito, 2018<\/span><\/a>), the role of instructor presence as a mediating force for student persistence and success cannot be underestimated.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If we consider the experiences I described as a first-time online student\u2014one that I\u2019ve seen mirrored by the anxious early-semester tickets that come through Loyola\u2019s ITS Service Desk\u2014Berge’s four roles of the online instructor\u00a0(<\/span>1995<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>2008<\/span><\/a>) are helpful for beginning to tease out the ways online faculty can alleviate student trepidation and create a welcoming environment that\u2019s conducive to learning and community-building. Before the course begins, instructors are primarily playing the social and technical roles, and the paramount tasks are acclimating students to the learning environment and videoconferencing software logistics (where applicable); once they get students in the door, whether that\u2019s logged into Sakai or a Zoom meeting, it becomes much easier to provide personalized supports where necessary and to turn attention to the task of learning. It is likewise beneficial for instructors to have an accurate self-awareness of their own technical skills and know what resources exist for both them and their students (e.g., instructional designers and technologists, IT support technicians).<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Some recommendations for online instructors to cultivate presence include:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n