Importance of Developing Community in Distance Education Courses

The separation of student and instructor is the core characteristic of distance education (Simonson et al., 2012, p. 28), contributing to one of the biggest challenges to distance education—attrition (Dueber & Misanchuk, 2001, p. 2). By the very nature of distance education, students are different locations from one another and their instructor. The instructor’s challenge is figuring out how to make students feel connected and able to succeed in this new learning environment. The development of a sense of community is an effective and efficient way to help ensure the success of the distance education program and can directly address the challenge of distance education attrition. By developing a sense of community, an instructor can create an environment that is conducive to student success. This importance was demonstrated when the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Department of Romance Languages and Literatures (ROML) transitioned their introductory Spanish course to a hybrid model.