Faculty perceptions of webcasting in health sciences education

Abstract

Pre-recorded lectures (podcasts) and recordings of live lectures (lecture-capture) are now everyday occurrences on many college campuses. Student use and opinions of these technologies have been frequently studied. However, there has been little reported on how faculty perceive these technologies. This article reports the results from a 2010 survey of dental, medical, and nursing faculty about their experiences with podcast/lecture capture technologies as teaching tools. A 46-item survey was distributed electronically to full-time faculty at the schools of Dentistry, Medicine, and Nursing on the campus of Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) in Fall 2010 to determine their experiences and perceptions of podcast/lecture capture technologies as teaching tools. Of the 398 respondents, 32% employed lecture capture while only 2% used podcasting. Of those faculty not currently recording materials, 83 (68%) stated that they plan to do so in the next 2 years. Lack of time, 26 (24%) and training, (22%) are major reasons stated for not recording course content. Although a large number of faculty believe student learning has improved through the use of these technologies (74%, n=86), few stated that test scores have improved following implementation of electronic delivery of course materials (29%, n=34). There was no correlation between the use of podcast/lecture capture technologies and faculty gender, school, or years of teaching. A wide array of technologies to record lectures and present additional course materials electronically are in use at the health sciences programs on the IUPUI campus. Overall, faculty view these technologies in a favorable light.

Keywords

• podcasting
• lecture capture
• health sciences
• faculty perceptions