Technology Use in Teaching at UNC-CH

During the past five years, the interest in technological advances as tools to improve teaching abilities and enhance the learning environment at Carolina has shown tremendous growth. However, concerns have been raised as to the degree to which these tools and technology-enhanced classrooms are used or even desired by teaching faculty and staff.

In the spring of 2003, the Classroom Design and Advisory Committee (CDAC) generated a survey for faculty and instructors to study these concerns. This survey was distributed (via the Web) to gauge:

• Faculty satisfaction with existing classrooms;
• Faculty needs for future classrooms;
• Faculty use of existing classroom 'features'.

The survey was administered by the Office of Institutional Research during February 2003 to a target population that consisted of all teaching Faculty and Assistants (TAs) from the College of Arts and Sciences and the Schools of Education, Journalism and Mass Communication and Information and Library Science.

An email announcement was sent to individuals with valid, unrestricted email addresses that directed them to a specific website and instructed them to complete the survey online. The target population, adjusted for cases with invalid contact information, totaled 1,718. A total of 519 responses were received for a 30.2% overall response rate.

The data were analyzed in total as well as by rank and department. A few highlights of the results are presented in the following section.

Classroom technology

Faculty and TAs were asked to rate their use of 24 classroom technology features.

• Laptop connections and overhead projectors were the two most frequently used technologies with overheads used by over 80% of the faculty and TAs.
  
  
• The three technologies rated most often as “would use if available” were wireless mouse/pointing device (34.7%), in-house computer (33.9%) and wireless internet connection (33.2%).
  
  
• Almost 75% of the respondents use technology of some type in all their classes.
  
  
• Students were expected to use laptops in classrooms, at least occasionally, by 36% of respondents, while 59% do not care whether students use laptops or not.
  
  
• The hot line phone was reportedly used by 57% of respondents for at least some class periods.
  
  
• Technologies unfamiliar to faculty were slide-to-video converters (27%) and smart boards (19%).
  
  
• An in-house computer in the classroom was expected by 55% of respondents. The most common features expected on an in-house computer were a floppy drive, a USB port on the front and a zip drive with software for web browsers and presentations on a Windows platform.
  
  
• Problems mentioned in the comments included using a Mac laptop with the classroom laptop connections and the need for in-house computers until CCI can provide all faculty with laptops.
  
  
• The Faculty was generally not that different from TAs in their use of technology.

Classroom design:

Faculty and TAs were also asked opinions about room sizes and layout designs.

• For classes with fewer than 25 seats, moveable tables and chairs were overwhelmingly preferred, along with one projection screen in the middle of the room.
  
  
• For rooms of more than 65 seats, fixed tablet arm chairs were preferred with projection screens in the middle or on both sides (especially for rooms over 100).
  
  
• A moveable podium was preferred by the majority of faculty and TAs.
  
  
• Blackboards were preferred over green boards or white boards, and instructors wanted as much writing space as possible.
  
  
• Almost 75% of the respondents wanted windows in the classroom.

Constraints on using technology:

Constraints are often present in the use of technology in teaching, so faculty and TAs were asked to respond to some common concerns.

• Almost half (45.9%) of the respondents indicated their greatest constraint to classroom technology was the lack of a guarantee for getting scheduled into a classroom with the desired technology.
  
  
• Other constraints included time investments that were too great (23%), no access to a laptop when scheduled in a lap-top capable classroom (16.4%), and lack of technological skills and knowledge (11%).
  
  
• Some faculty (12.3%) maintained that technology was not philosophically and/or pedagogically appropriate for their course(s).
  
  
• TAs did not perceive the time investment to be as important a constraint as other faculty did.

Findings from this survey provided the Classroom Design Advisory Committee with a baseline of opinions from which to address concerns about the use of technology in teaching. We wish to thank all faculty and TAs who participated in the survey.