Spies, Maria
(2023)
Managing Partnerships for Online Learning: An Institutional Work Perspective.
Doctor of Education thesis, University of Liverpool.
|
Text
201290905_Apr2023.pdf - Author Accepted Manuscript Download (5MB) | Preview |
Abstract
Online education is increasingly important to universities with continued pressure for new forms of revenue, ambitions to service more diverse learners and meet the expectations of students. Accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, many institutions have implemented online programs, with a growing number doing so in partnership with an Online Program Management (OPM) provider. However, little is known about how these partnerships operate on the ground, the impact on universities, or how these arrangements might evolve over time. This exploratory qualitative study examines the day-to-day work of academic leaders with responsibility for university-OPM partnerships. The research sought to develop a clearer understanding of how academic leaders influence the provision of online learning at their institution, and how partnerships might evolve over time. Data was collected through semi- structured interviews with 15 academic leaders. Institutional work forms the theoretical basis for this study, offering scope for explanations of the flows of influence between daily practices of academic leaders, organizational change, and field level influences, with consideration for organizational boundaries and new institutional arrangements for online learning. The study found that academic leaders engage extensively in varied forms of institutional work related to online learning and OPM partnerships, focused on ‘creating’ and ‘maintaining’ institutions and identified new forms of institutional work related to monitoring the external environment, enacting new ways of operating and corralling stakeholders toward endorsed models. The research outlines online capabilities being built at universities and offers insights into how university-OPM partnerships are evolving over time. Findings suggest that academic leaders exercise practical and projective agency regarding their institutions’ immediate and long- term arrangements for online learning and are central to the development of university partnering capability. The knowledge gained from this study is expected to further stakeholders’ understanding of how organizational change related to online learning and university-OPM partnerships happens over time, using institutional theory to highlight the mechanisms by which new practices and norms may become embedded and institutionalized, a topic that remains relatively unexplored, but is of increasing importance for universities.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Doctor of Education) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | online programs, OPM, online program managers, institutional work, academic leadership, higher education, online learning, public private partnerships, agency, proto institutions |
| Divisions: | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of Histories, Languages and Cultures |
| Depositing User: | Symplectic Admin |
| Date Deposited: | 17 Aug 2023 11:49 |
| Last Modified: | 17 Aug 2023 11:49 |
| DOI: | 10.17638/03170394 |
| Supervisors: |
|
| URI: | https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3170394 |
Dimensions
Dimensions
