Do On-Campus Students Write Better than Their Distance Learning Counterparts in Engineering and Technology Fields?

摘要

Over the last several years, distance learning courses have become an important and effective teaching method in many universities in the United States. The performance of distance learning students compared to their on-campus counterparts has been of great interest to many researchers. Writing skills are of particular interest for engineering and technology students since they have such an impact on career success. However, there are no studies that examine measures of quantitative performance in writing skills. This paper contributes to the literature on distance learning performance and compares the writing skills of a sample of distance learning and on-campus students in the Engineering and Engineering Technology Departments at a large urban university. Results of a junior level course and results of an exit-writing exam are used to assess the writing proficiency of both on campus and distance students.