From an Online Cohort towards a Community of Inquiry: International Students' Interaction Patterns in an Online Doctorate Program.
The current study explored the interaction patterns of a cohort of international students in a Professional Doctorate of Higher Education program (EdD) in order to establish the extent to which (if at all) the cohort evolved into an authentic online learning community. Phase 1 of the study consisted of a retrospective audit of three out of the nine modules taught in the program (beginning, middle, and end) The audit explored a cohort of students' interaction patterns within and between the three modules. In phase two, eight cohort members participated in thorough interviews designed to gain insight into the issues that were identified in phase 1 of the study. Using the Community of Inquiry model, we discovered that a majority of the students did not feel their cohort resembled an authentic online learning community. Although cognitive and teaching presence was evident, social presence was less evident in the modules. Among the literature reviewed, there has been no single agreed definition of "Online learning community" Tu and Corry (2002) define online learning community as electronic interactions of students as they engage in learning and activities. This definition implies that any group or cohort of online learners becomes an online learning community. Contrary to that perspective, Ke and Hoadley (2009) pointed out that not all learning environments are learning communities. Ke and Hoadley (2009) further argued that "online learning communities evolve from simple cohorts when learners elevate their engagement with each other to an emotional sense of community" (p. 489) Therefore, community members have a sense of belonging and commitment to individual and group needs (McMillan Chavis 1986 as cited in Ke and Hoadley, 2009) According to Palloff and Pratt (1999) and Rheingold (2000) a learning community needs to be designed and continuously nurtured in order to evolve online, otherwise, it may run the risk of becoming a static entity. McConnell (2006) who carried out a study on an online master program, adds that "the cornerstone of the online community lies in the presence of 'socially close, strong, intimate ties' the development of trust, shared values, and social organization" (p. 23) In the present study, we conceptualized online learning community as it was defined by Garrison and Anderson (2003) According to Garrison and Anderson (2003) the main three elements of "community of inquiry" are cognitive presence (as a higher order learning intent, reflection, and discussion) social presence (as emotional and social connection with other students) and teaching presence (as the mediator and facilitator actor between cognitive presence/learning and social presence) Journal of Interactive Online Learning Crosta, Manokore, and Gray 46 Cognitive Presence According to Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2010) cognitive presence creation depends on how the learning environment encourages deep and meaningful learning. Using Garrison's (1991) model of critical thinking, Newman, Johnson, Cochrane, and Webb (1996) identified indicators for deep and surface learning approaches. Deep learning indicators include welcoming new ideas and linking ideas. Surface learning indicators include repeating information without inferences (Newman et al. 1996) Cognitive presence in an online community of inquiry is therefore more than just completing the task; it is about participants being able to construct meaning through sustained ways of communicating (Garrison, Anderson, Archer, 2001) Though cognitive presence is about interacting with curriculum materials and learning the concepts, it is not enough on its own to sustain learning communities as teaching and social presence are equally important (Garrison, Anderson, Archer 2010) Social Presence Previous research has linked the benefits of online learning communities to students' satisfaction and consequently retention (e.g. Palloff Pratt, 1999; Rovai Wighting, 2005) For example, Swan (2002) gave 3,800 students enrolled in 264 online courses multiple choice questionnaires to explore their satisfaction and found out that online social interaction was highly related to student satisfaction in those courses. Boston, Gibson, Ice, Richardson, and Swan (2010) distributed the Community of Inquiry questionnaire (CoI) to undergraduate students over six semesters to explore the relationship between different components of CoI and retention. The authors identified that social presence and online interaction in an authentic online community was one of the most important factors that may enhance students' retention in online learning environments (Boston et al. 2010) Contrary to other studies, Drouin (2008) reported that a sense of community was not necessarily connected with student retention in an online course, though it was connected with student's satisfaction. In other words, Drouin's study highlighted how some students might not feel that being part of a community was a necessary aspect of their online learning experience and stability on the course. Teaching Presence Shea (2006) developed a Teaching Presence Scale which was tested for validity and reliability through a random sample of online students. It was a multi institutional study with 1057 technology students studying in 32 different colleges. Shea (2006) found that teaching presence constituted a key positive factor in improving the perceptions among students of their sense of learning community. Hence, a more participative teaching style contributed to students developing a sense of connectedness and learning, which is crucial to an online environment. Interestingly, Liu, Magjula, Bonk, Lee (2007) discuss how the sense of belonging to a learning community was positively related to instructor's presence and facilitation. Regular course announcements, feedback, and the use of non content related strategies (icebreakers, online coffee house, and so on) helped to boost the online sense of community and interpersonal relationship. Neither faculty nor students expected that studying online implied having some sort of social expectations (Liu et al. 2007) Additionally, research has shown that teaching presence was key in building and establishing both social and cognitive presence, as well as a community of inquiry and students' satisfaction (Garrison, Cleveland Innes, Fung, 2010; Joo, Lim, Kim, 2011; Kim, Kwon, Cho, 2011) Journal of Interactive Online Learning Crosta, Manokore, and Gray 47 Swan (2002) also found that student student interaction and student instructor interaction enhanced students' satisfaction in an online course. However, this is in contrast to Drouin (2008) who found that the greater sense of community reported by students reflected the ability to communicate with peers rather than with the instructor. According to McConnell (2006) some of the advantages of collaborative work in a learning community are related to both high quality of reasoning and learning; and a distribution of power between teacher and student. Ford and Vaughn (2011) conducted a phenomenological study of 3 year online doctoral students (n=14) Using the results from semi structured interviews, they argued that trust was another key element for building a community. In order for participants to perceive each other as a community of members, they need to experience social, emotional, intellectual, and cognitive presence (Garrison Anderson, 2003) Hence, building or facilitating the creation of an online community is also an effective matter that involves social presence and is more than a technical one where online students are simply expected to complete a task (Conrad, 2005) However, Hodgson and Reynolds (2005) warn researchers that the positive belief attached to a learning community can become oppressive and conformist if someone deviates from the norms and, thus, becomes marginalized. Lapoint and Reisetter (2008) in a qualitative study found that while some students perceived the presence of an online learning community helpful for their learning, others perceived it as superfluous and unnecessary. Among literature reviewed, the gap in knowledge is not about whether authentic online communities enhance learning and encourage students' persistence; but rather, it is about how learning environments support the evolution of online cohorts to the formation authentic online learning communities. At the time of this study, there was evidence that not all online learning cohorts are learning communities; neither do they all evolve into authentic online learning communities (Shackelford Maxwell, 2012) The aim of the study was to explore if the EdD international students' interactions and collaboration within the learning environment resembled an authentic online learning community of inquiry. In addition, we were interested in exploring whether the design of the program supported the evolution and elevation of EdD cohorts to online learning communities. Given the international nature of students and faculty in the EdD program, the following research question guided our study: "is the online learning environment enabling learners to build, form, and sustain learning communities, where they support each other throughout their doctoral journey and increase their on going motivation through online interactions?" We deliberately added the focus on students' on going motivation to explore if being in a community, fostered or hindered their engagement in the course. Methodological Perspectives We used Garrison and Anderson's (2003) explanation of the three tenants of communities of inquiry as a lens to categorize and code students' asynchronous texts as they interacted with the learning environment. As researchers, we made interpretations about students' texts using the interpretive paradigm (Cohen, Manion, Morrison, 2011) Interpretive paradigm acknowledges that people give meaning to their experiences in an e