Does Online Course-Taking Increase Distal Student Success? Examining Impacts on College Graduation Rates and Time to Degree

• In Event: 79.050 - MTCC Roundtable Session 36
  In Roundtable Session: 79.050-9 - Success in Online Higher Education Environments

Abstract

Online courses provide flexible learning opportunities for students to counteract scheduling constraints and to stay on-track for college graduation. This quantitative research study analyzed six years of institutional data for three full student cohorts (N = 13,556) at a large public research university to examine distal effects of students’ online course participation. Logistic regression analysis indicated that online course-taking is associated with higher 4-year, 5-year, and 6-year college graduation rates. Furthermore, linear regression models indicate that online course-taking has a weak association with shortened time-to-degree for students graduating college. The study suggests that providing students with alternative online course-taking opportunities may help them successfully graduate college.

Authors

• Christian Fischer, University of California - Irvine

• Rachel Baker, University of California - Irvine

• Qiujie Li, University of California - Irvine

• Gabriel Orona, University of California - Irvine

• Mark Warschauer, University of California - Irvine