Socioeconomic repercussions of the pilot course on administration by UAB as seen by its graduates and coordinators

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to identify the factors that led former students to take the pilot online course on Administration delivered by the Open University of Brazil (UAB), the virtual socioeconomic benefits and the difficulties that were perceived by them and by the course coordinators. Data collection took place in two phases. The first step was quantitative and of a descriptive/exploratory nature, conducted with a survey applied to graduates. In this phase, a descriptive and multi-varied analysis was performed (cluster analysis) on the data acquired. The second phase was qualitative and also of descriptive/exploratory nature, during which the course coordinators were interviewed, in an attempt to identify their impressions about the course and any difficulties and benefits that it had provided the former students with. In total, 332 graduates responded to the study. I was able to find that the factors that mostly drew students to course were the flexibility allowed by the online education and the fact that the course was free of charge. The social benefits, including greater capacity of argumentation and increased self-confidence, exceeded the economic benefits such as increased income and a change of job. The major difficulties indicated were: lack of time to perform the course activities and difficulty to learn on one´s own. For the course coordinators, the social benefits achieved by the former students also exceeded the economic advantages. However, there were contrary perceptions between the view of graduates and course coordinators. Conclusion was that the pilot course became a landmark to several Public Institutions of Higher Education so that they could expand the offering of online courses, while it managed to provide higher education to people who would not stand a chance in the traditional ways.