With the rapid growth of online learning at community colleges and the low course completion and performance associated with it, there has been increasing need to identify effective ways to address the challenges in online teaching and learning at this setting. Based on open-ended survey responses from 105 instructors and 365 students from…

One strategy to transform the high attrition rates among community college (CC) students is for CC instructors to utilize the teaching practices shown to most likely lead to student success. CC students and faculty are underrepresented in biology education research (BER), with only 3% of BER articles addressing CC-specific issues (Schinske et al.…

Dean of Math, Science, and Health at Washtenaw Community College, Kristin Brandemuehl describes what it was like taking her first Massive Open Online Course (MOOC). As a teacher, Brandemuehl was intrigued with what a MOOC was and what quality of an educational modality it might be. She also figured that participating in this MOOC would not only…

Critical thinking is a highly desirable goal of online higher education courses. This article presents qualitative data from a mixed-method study that explores how asynchronous discussions within online courses influence critical thinking among students. In this study, online discussions were related to higher levels of critical thinking, but…

Is tutoring online more than just email? Two yearlong studies explored tutoring online in two different modes. One, from Atlantic Community College in New Jersey, looked at asynchronous (not real time) tutoring online using a discussion board. The other, at Pima Community College in Arizona, used synchronous (real time) online software. The…