Student Perceptions of Hybrid Courses: Measuring and Interpreting Quality

One popular teaching approach is a hybrid format balancing traditional face-to-face classroom instruction with online components. The authors used strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats methodology to examine if hybrid formats meet student expectations and the M. T. Miller and D. E. Husmann (1996) classification system to identify elements affecting the perception of quality. Results indicated that hybrid classes continued to exhibit the same weaknesses of the online format, and the addition of face-to-face interaction did not minimize weaknesses. The authors present a rationale for the variability of student responses, the same element as a strength and weakness. The authors discuss (a) opportunities for and threats to academic institutions and (b) areas for future research.