Adults Contemplating University Study at a Distance: Issues, themes and concerns

This study identifies and explores a range of themes, issues and questions that commonly confront adults contemplating enrolment in university, and why they persist. The study focuses particularly on issues facing prospective adult distance education learners. From a range of interviews, six themes were identified including fears, motivation, support from home, academic preparedness, suitability of programs, and identity change. It is argued that the more effective we become at information provision, guidance and preparation of adult pre-entry open and distance learners, the more likely students will experience a smooth transition to study, thus improving both student satisfaction and retention rates. Successful intervention with prospective distance education learners at this early point should aim to assist the process of informed decision making, which could result equally in an individual deciding not to pursue university study. The findings in this study should be particularly useful for those academics, course advisors, student counsellors, teachers in preparatory programs, and university information and support officers, and others who provide adult distance students, with pre-enrolment information and advice.

[1]  K. Brown,et al.  The role of internal and external factors in the discontinuation of off‐campus students , 1996 .

[2]  Peter J. Smith,et al.  Flexible delivery in the Australian vocational education and training sector: Barriers to success identified in case studies of four adult learners , 2001 .

[3]  Helen Saenger,et al.  Learning Strategies for Distance Learners: Do They Help? , 1998 .

[4]  Marcus Powell,et al.  Open and Flexible Learning in Vocational Education and Training , 2000 .

[5]  J. Mezirow.  Transformative Dimensions of Adult Learning , 1991 .

[6]  P. Candy,et al.  Self-Direction for Lifelong Learning , 1993 .

[7]  M. R. Garland,et al.  Student perceptions of the situational, institutional, dispositional and epistemological barriers to persistence , 1993 .

[8]  Alistair Inglis.  Teaching‐learning specialists' conceptions of their role in the design of distance learning packages , 1996 .

[9]  A. Strauss,et al.  The Discovery of Grounded Theory , 1967 .

[10]  A. Baxter,et al.  Becoming a Mature Student: Gendered narratives of the self , 1999 .

[11]  J. Mezirow.  A Critical Theory of Adult Learning and Education , 1981 .

[12]  S. Bourke,et al.  EVALUATION OF AN EQUITY PROGRAM FOR UNIVERSITY ENTRANCE , 1998 .

[13]  F. Marton,et al.  The Experience of Learning , 1984 .

[14]  Ference Marton,et al.  Phenomenography-a research approach to investigating different understandings of reality , 1986 .

[15]  Charles Anderson.  The Experience of Learning: Implications for Teaching and Studying in Higher Education (2nd edition) , 1997 .

[16]  Meg O'Reilly,et al.  Assessing Open and Distance Learners , 1999 .

[17]  Mary Thorpe,et al.  Open learning for adults , 1987 .

[18]  D. Hounsell.  The Experience of Learning: Implications for Teaching and Studying in Higher Education , 1997 .

[19]  유창조.  Naturalistic Inquiry , 2022, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design.