As the number of universities offering fully online-only courses increases, a new set of challenges arises for students and professors. The ability to create professional learning communities (PLCs) amongst peers and professors in their fields has become a challenge for online-only students. Factors such as technological isolation caused by geographical distance and stakeholder digital fluency may hinder the ability of students to receive the full spectrum of support that in-person PLCs provide (Ribon et al. 2013). This leads university professors in search of ways to provide students with a way to build community and networking with their peers in place of in-person community building.
Why Bother?
In a recent study, twenty-four percent of undergraduate students reported seriously considering dropping out of college (Sallie Mae & Ipsos 2024). Outside of financial barriers, the top two reasons students reported considering dropping out were “changes in motivation” and “mental health challenges” (Sallie Mae & Ipsos 2024). Professors who teach online-only courses are often the only connection that virtual students have to their university. We serve as the friendly face of the university and play a vital role in addressing these issues by making connections with our students. The digital classroom structure we generate is an essential element in student motivation and emotional engagement in a virtual classroom where students are not face-to-face with you daily, weekly, or sometimes at all.
Impact of Engagement in VLCs on Virtual Students
The creation of a virtual learning community (VLC) within an asynchronous online course is intended to take the place of face-to-face PLCs and networking opportunities that students would have if they were to attend on-campus courses. VLCs have been described as a virtual society where interactive and collaborative learning are core practices utilized to form a learning-oriented social network (Wu, Li, & Cai 2017; Xia et al. 2018). The social impact of VLCs is critical in reducing attrition rates and making students feel like they are a part of the university community even if they never set foot on the campus.
However, the creation and utilization of a virtual learning community is not something that happens by itself. It must be intentionally designed, implemented, and supported by the course professor to have the intended impact on students. Research has shown that meaningful collaboration and communication are unlikely to occur in an online learning environment without teacher direction (Borup et al. 2014).
This means being intentional with your instructional design and layout for your course. Students feel more connected when professors create conditions where they can express themselves freely and openly, further creating a sense of safe community in the virtual setting. If you structure your course in a way that enables students to collaborate and build relationships with their classmates, you will see increased engagement in discussions and activities because students feel safe and comfortable in that online environment.
Ideas to Help Create an Active VLC
The efficacy of the VLC is often reliant on the teachers creating them as pedagogical strategies may vary by teacher. Find ways to promote community and engagement with your students that fit your teaching style and personality. Here are a few ideas that you can consider implementing in your courses:
Get to Know Your Students
It is difficult to build relationships and get to know students you never meet in person. However, taking the time to get to know them will have a significant impact on their engagement, success, and overall attrition rates. One way to achieve this is to provide a Google Slide deck and ask students to create one slide telling you about themselves. Scaffold what type of information you want them to include on their slide such as a picture, a fun fact, where they live, favorite food, a short-term goal, and a long-term goal for after graduation. This option allows students to tell you about themselves while also providing an easy way for students to also learn about each other. You can then use this information to form groups for discussions and activities.
Active & Purposeful Communication
There are a variety of ways to communicate with your students within and outside of your school’s Learning Management System (LMS) (i.e. Canvas, etc). This can be achieved through email, course announcements, infographics, assignment feedback, and external messaging platforms. The important aspect of this method is to communicate openly, regularly, and through a variety of methods. Professors must model what it looks like to engage and communicate in the virtual setting so that our students can follow suit.
One method to consider is creating interactive announcements, infographics, and course materials using Canva then embedding them within Canvas. It is important to provide students with materials and messaging that is engaging when communicating with them. Let’s face it, plain black text on a white page is boring and is not going to grab their attention. Find a method that works for you but keep in mind that virtual students only interact with you through the messaging you send and the information you present in the course.
Discussion Boards
Love them or hate them, they are a great way to allow students to engage in structured academic dialogue with their peers and professors. One way to make discussion boards more impactful is to create smaller groups and group students based on something they have in common. Establishing common ground will help build familiarity and closeness. Some ideas for small groups include: content area, specialty focus, multicultural/multilingual, closest big cities/out of state, and special interest groups (i.e. music, movies/tv shows, books).
The Canvas LMS allows you to create these groups, assign students, and then choose which groups you want to use for different discussions. This allows you to mix and match so you can create a variety of small groups and build connections amongst students rather than just leaving them in one small group for the entire term.
Synchronous Sessions
Fifty-seven percent of at-risk students reported working off campus while in school (Sallie Mae and Ipsos 2024). However, you can provide opportunities for your students to meet up with you in real time by offering evening or weekend synchronous sessions via Zoom or other meeting platforms. Know your course content and identify modules where your students struggle the most. Offer targeted synchronous instructional sessions outside of the regular school hours to help address those areas of difficulty. Try setting up a sign-up sheet for possible synchronous sessions and having students tell you what days or times would work best. This would ensure you are working to build community but also not wasting your time sitting in a Zoom session by yourself after hours.
Asynchronous Sessions & Recordings
If synchronous sessions don’t work well for you or your students, try utilizing asynchronous sessions. This involves recording yourself teaching your content and posting it within the course for your online students. This technique has been utilized with students from 4th grade up to the college level with great success. Students in asynchronous online sections report on how beneficial it is to be able to listen to the lecture or have a video explanation of important assignments.
There are many methods for recording and posting videos. Some students prefer the all-in-one method where you record the lecture in one long video to watch or listen to like a podcast. Other students prefer the chunking method where you break the videos up into big ideas no more than 10-15 minutes long. What method you utilize may vary each term. Try out both and see what works best for you and your students.
The rise of virtual learning has created a need for us to adjust the way we teach and do more than just post a course and hope for success. Only through active, intentional design will we be able to foster successful VLCs among students. It is up to us to adapt to the growth of online learning and provide a sense of belonging and community for our students.
Michaine Ashley, EdD is an assistant professor of Teacher Education at Texas Woman’s University.
References
Berry, Sharla. “Teaching to Connect: Community-Building Strategies for the Virtual Classroom.” Online Learning 23, no. 1 (2019): 164-183. https://doi.org/10.24059/olj.v23i1.1425.
Borup, Jered, Richard E. West, Charles R. Graham, and Randall S. Davies. “The Adolescent Community of Engagement: A Framework for Research on Adolescent Online Learning.” Journal of Technology and Teacher Education 22, no. 1 (2014): 107-129.
Ribón, Julio César, Luis Javier Villalba, Tai-hoon Kim, and Tomás Pedro Moro. “Solving Technological Isolation to Build Virtual Learning Communities.” Multimedia Tools and Applications 74, no. 19 (2015): 8521-8539. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-013-1542-5.
Sallie Mae and Ipsos. “How America Completes College 2024: Understanding What Helps Students Graduate.” Sallie Mae, 2024. https://www.salliemae.com/content/dam/slm/writtencontent/Research/SLM_How-America-Completes-College-Research-report.pdf.
Wu, Di, Bingqian Li, and Yongqiang Cai. “Analysis of Virtual Learning Community Interaction from the Perspective of Weak Ties Theory.” Distance Education in China 11, no. 1 (2017): 16-21.
Xia, Dong, Hongwei Ke, Meiyun Zuo, Jiaxin Ye, Qingfei Min, and Zhen Wang. “Researches on Modeling Learner’s Collaboration Network in Virtual Learning Community.” In 2018 9th International Conference on Information Technology in Medicine and Education (ITME), 596-600. IEEE, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1109/ITME.2018.00137.