Claremont Colleges Scholarship @ Claremont CGU Theses & Dissertations CGU Student Scholarship Summer 2020 The Impact of a University/Online Program Management Provider Partnership on Faculty Approaches to Teaching Design: A Case Study Using Activity Theory Swati Ramani Claremont Graduate University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgu_etd Part of the Educational Leadership Commons, Educational Technology Commons, and the Higher Education and Teaching Commons Recommended Citation Ramani, Swati. (2020). The Impact of a University/Online Program Management Provider Partnership on Faculty Approaches to Teaching Design: A Case Study Using Activity Theory. CGU Theses & Dissertations, 195. https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgu_etd/195. This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the CGU Student Scholarship at Scholarship @ Claremont. It has been accepted for inclusion in CGU Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Scholarship @ Claremont. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Impact of a University/Online Program Management Provider Partnership on Faculty Approaches to Teaching Design: A Case Study using Activity Theory By Swati Ramani Claremont Graduate University 2020 © Copyright by Swati Ramani, 2020. All Rights Reserved Approval of the Dissertation Committee This dissertation has been duly read, reviewed, and critiqued by the Committee listed below, which hereby approves the manuscript of Swati Ramani as fulfilling the scope and quality requirements for meriting the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Information Systems & Technology. Dr Lorne Olfman, Chair Claremont Graduate University Professor of Information Systems & Technology Dr Shamini Dias Claremont Graduate University Director of the Preparing Future Faculty Program Dr George Bradford Keck Graduate Institute Director of Instructional Design and Development ABSTRACT The Impact of a University/Online Program Management Provider Partnership on Faculty Approaches to Teaching Design: A Case Study using Activity Theory By Swati Ramani Claremont Graduate University: 2020 As the number of online courses increase in Higher Education, many higher education institutions outsource online course development to an Online Program Management (OPM) provider because of a lack of budget, staff, and technology. Current research indicates that OPMs often do not have instructional design (ID) services tailored to a specific university. This research uses a Case Study in order to analyze how the nature and dynamics of a business partnership between a research university and an OPM provider impact faculty engagement and development of pedagogical and technological knowledge. They Activity Theory conceptual framework was used to direct inquiry and analysis. Results show a miss in the project management approach from the OPM side which made the process appear more like a start-up company and caused some faculty to lose motivation about the instructional design process. Impact on faculty pedagogical knowledge and development is different for each faculty and is dependent on faculty assumptions, personality, attitudes, training in pedagogy and technology, and past online teaching experiences. A Design Thinking approach from the OPM side and a learning mindset from the faculty side are very important to reap the most benefits of this relationship. DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my mother, Gayatri Ramani. Her inspiration and motivation have encouraged me to complete this work. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Acknowledgements are first to my mother Gayatri Ramani who has kept me motivated to complete this work and has supported me both emotionally and financially. I would next like to thank Dr Shamini Dias. Your faith in my work has helped me explore this topic. You have been like an angel, throughout my journey. Without your presence, I would not have been able to complete this project. I am also fortunate to receive support and collaboration from Dr George Bradford. Thank you, Dr George, for all your advice on critical revisions pertaining to Activity Theory figures and for all your care and kindness in helping me complete this project. I would also like to thank Dr Lorne Olfman. Dr Lorne, without your guidance and support this project would not have been possible. Thank You very much for supporting and collaborating with me throughout this journey. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................ 5 Andragogy ..................................................................................................................................... 6 Good Pedagogical Practices ......................................................................................................... 7 Challenges Faced by Faculty to Implement Good Pedagogical Practices ............................. 13 Adherence to Teacher-Centered Teaching Methods ................................................................. 13 Faculty Perceptions of Identity ................................................................................................. 14 Risk of Change .......................................................................................................................... 15 Lack of Support for Change ...................................................................................................... 15 Online Teaching and Learning .................................................................................................. 19 Instructional Designers and the Instructional Design Process in Higher Education ........... 27 Instructional Designer and Subject Matter Expert (Faculty) Interaction ............................ 33 Online Program Management (OPM) Providers ..................................................................... 37 Summary ...................................................................................................................................... 45 Purpose of this Study .................................................................................................................. 46 CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ......................................................... 48 Research Design .......................................................................................................................... 48 Sources of Data ............................................................................................................................ 49 Activity Theory ............................................................................................................................ 49 Activity System ......................................................................................................................... 50 Research Methodology ............................................................................................................... 53 Population Studied .................................................................................................................... 53 Recruitment Procedures ............................................................................................................ 54 Data Collection Procedures ....................................................................................................... 55 Participant Observation ............................................................................................................. 57 Documents ................................................................................................................................ 58 Human Subjects Consideration ................................................................................................. 58 Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................ 59 Triangulation ............................................................................................................................. 60 vii Credibility and Validity ............................................................................................................ 61 CHAPTER FOUR: ANALYSIS & RESULTS ........................................................................ 64 Preamble ...................................................................................................................................... 64 Research Participants ................................................................................................................. 64 Findings ........................................................................................................................................ 70 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 70 Themes ...................................................................................................................................... 72 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 121 CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION, CONCLUSION, LIMITATIONS, IMPLICATIONS & RECOMMENDATIONS .......................................................................................................... 122 Introduction ..............................................................................................................................