UCF College of Business students complain about 'reduced seat time' courses
09/27/2018
A course key to Kelly Kennedy’s major this semester at the University of Central Florida consists of meeting five times with the professor, completing what she called “busy work” with a group of fellow students, watching a few short videos and poring over a textbook.
It wasn’t Kennedy’s choice to be an online — or distance-learning — student in her College of Business Administration courses, which include no lectures.
“Students are freaking out because we feel like we’re teaching ourselves and learning in the dark,” said Kennedy, a 21-year-old from Winter Park who is studying business and marketing.
She and a group of classmates who started an online petition are frustrated with the business college, where they’re among roughly 1,200 students enrolled in each course and much of their instruction is online. During the past week, the petition has topped more than 2,000 names, including those of students, alumni and parents.
The move is largely driven by finances. Paul Jarley, dean of the business college, said he’d need 72 additional instructors in order to teach all of those courses in lecture settings with 120 students in each class. And he doesn’t have enough classroom space to accommodate all those new course sections, either.
It’s the fourth semester the business college has offered “reduced seat time” classes to undergraduates, but more students are enrolled in them than ever before. In lieu of attending large classes featuring lectures, students watch short videos, read texts and complete quizzes and other exercises. They also meet with their instructors a handful of times for 90 minutes during the semester.
For most business courses, the non-classroom version is the only option available.
About 20 years ago, the college introduced “lecture capture” courses, where instructors taught in rooms intended to accommodate just a fraction of the 800 to 2,000 students enrolled, with the expectation that most would watch online from their homes or dorm rooms. Until this year, students took many of their business courses in that format. But students who wanted to attend the lecture in-person complained when they couldn’t find a seat, and average grades in those courses were lower than others, Jarley said.
“Let's just say students don’t watch those lectures with the regularity you might think,” he said.
Adding to students’ irritation is the $18 per credit hour “distance learning” fee that students must pay on top of tuition. That fee applied to the “lecture capture” classes as well as the newer format.
But state leaders have pushed for more university students to take courses that are partly or wholly online in recent years, touting the benefits both for students, who can complete their work even if they can’t make it to campus, and to institutions, which can award more degrees without building more classrooms.
At UCF particularly, classroom space hasn’t kept pace with the growing student body. There, more than three-quarters of undergraduates took at least one course that was partially or totally online during the 2016-17 school year, compared with 69 percent across the state university system.
Jarley points out that leveraging economies of scale has long been an important strategy for UCF, where enrollment now tops 67,000 students and the stated mission is to make higher education accessible and affordable for as many people as possible.
And aside from offering an economical way for the business college to serve 8,500 undergraduates, Jarley said the new format provides other benefits, including pushing students to take more responsibility for their own learning. University data show students get the best grades in courses that include both traditional and online components, as most business classes do.
“We only win by providing students with a really good education that makes them competitive in the world that they’re going to go into — there’s no reason to focus on anything other than that,” said Jarley, adding, “oh, and my budget, which is definitely not infinite.”
The new format, at least initially, appeared to be a hit. When the college surveyed undergraduates who tried these courses last year, when fewer students were enrolled in them, more than half said rated their experience as “excellent” or “very good.”
Jarley also stressed that students shouldn’t spend most of their time studying from home and the college has a variety of services available, including tutors, to help them. To address lingering concerns, he said, the college will add a workshop for students who are struggling.
“The deal is when you come here, you’ve got to be willing to engage,” he said. “If you don’t, you’re going to have a hard time here.”
But the mostly online courses were a letdown for Ryan Lutes, who envisioned all the trappings of college life when he transferred from Valencia College over the summer. The limited class time provided in his business courses is mostly used up with individual assignments and quizzes he said, not discussing the material with his instructors and classmates.
“It’s supposed to be highly engaging and interactive and that’s just simply not happening,” said Lutes, a 27-year-old who is studying management.
Kennedy also is disappointed that none of her three business courses this semester are in a traditional face-to-face setting, saying she might not have chosen UCF if she’d realized this would be the case.
The stakes are especially high for some students who must earn good grades in specific classes in order to complete their majors. A student majoring in finance, for example, must receive a “B” or better in an accounting class that is available only in mostly online format this semester.
But even students who aren't stressed about their grades might feel like they’re missing out said Kennedy, who said she wants the college to offer in-person options.
“I’m not a struggling student,” Kennedy said. “I just do not like the format. I think we’re going to be scammed out of our money.”
By Annie Martin