We are living in an era where the importance of education is more than ever.
And in these hard times of pandemic, the importance of online education is at its peak. But the quality of online courses vary drastically and this quality is directly correlated to the retention of online students. But there are various factors to student retention; the interface of online platform, attention to individuals and quality of online courses. This article will explore the ways in which we can improve student retention.
Humanizing the learning experience
Let's make a simple analogy here. The students are your customers and your course and teaching is the product/service. No matter how good of a product you provide, the customers won't be satisfied if you haven't established a connection. Just like various products, there are innumerable options available to the student.
As a teacher, you must attend the queries of every student and make sure that they are following up on every thing that is taught. Online Courses might leave a student feeling lonely if the teacher isn't attentive. He will believe that you don't care about his academic progress. This will eventually lead to him leaving the course. So, it is of utmost important for the teacher to maintain affinity with the student in order to retain him.
Understand the patterns in engagement and performance
This is one of the few realms in which you can adapt the on campus learning tactics for online learning too. Try to understand which all methods led to better engagement with the students and resulted in better performance. For example, if teaching through PPTs and video examples led to better performance, you must come up with courses with similar attributes of learning.
This increase in performance will stick the student to your course as he will be learning it well and its impact will be clearly seen in his performance. Hence, you can achieve high student retention.
Alleviate the distance aspect of online learning
On campus learning has a different aura because the students don't only learn from the teacher but also through each other. Peer learning is an important aspect in a student life. Online teachers can solve this problem by adapting to a platform which enables forums and discussions.
Utobo is a great example for it and we plan to keep it user-friendly and efficient in order to make sure that the student focuses of the learning and not the nuances of the interface. This way, the teacher can create a healthy atmosphere of competition and learning.
