Paper Title
Promoting the use of Community Inquiry as a Framework for Course Redesign
Abstract
Online education provides intriguing opportunities for adult learners to meet their educational needs along with
fulfilling other life obligations simultaneously. Because of the learning flexibility, online courses have gained the popularity
and become an important component in higher education. Nonetheless, the high attrition rate has long been criticized as the
key issue in the online environment. This paper investigates the usefulness and helpfulness of course redesign in an online
graduate course of healthcare administration program. The Community of Inquiry model (CoI) serves as the theoretical
foundation for course design and delivery in this revised course. The preliminary findings derived from this study reveal that
both students’ engagement and academic performance are favorable in the revised course. This study suggests that educators
should adopt the methodologies of CoI framework when developing and/or redesigning an online course to build a learning
community that supports learners socially and cognitively.
Keywords- Online Education, Community of Inquiry, Learning Community, Course Evaluation, Learning Outcomes.