Creating a Virtual Learning Community with HUB Architecture: CLEERhub as a Case Study of User Adoption

Abstract

The research aim of this article is to investigate the adoption patterns of HUB platforms that create and support virtual learning communities (VLC). The adoption patterns of one particular HUB called the Collaboratory for Engineering Education Research or CLEERhub, is presented as an example of how HUBs may be used as VLCs. After explaining the affordances of the HUB architecture, the article uses two approaches to discuss the adoption of CLEERhub by users. First, the authors link the five stages of Rogers’ Diffusion of Innovation model with various CLEERhub user metrics. The resultant mapping suggests that CLEERhub users are primarily in early stages of adoption. This is not an unexpected finding given that CLEERhub has been recently created. The second approach to studying adoption investigates the experience of a group of college students who used CLEERhub to aid them in completing a group assignment. A CLEERhub Usage Survey was developed and implemented during the last part of the semester to collect information about students’ experience with CLEERhub. Student reactions to CLEERhub were generally positive. After the two approaches are presented, the paper connects the approaches by speculating on how student experience (adoption approach 2) might be mapped to the five stages of Rogers’ model (adoption approach 1). The paper ends with considerations and suggestions for best practices.

Keywords

• CLEERhub
• Diffusion of Innovation
• Virtual Learning Communities