Factors affecting students' perception of effectiveness of university professors

Higher education institutions have experienced a significant increase in the numbers of online courses being offered and the amount of part-time faculty being hired over the past 20 years. The purpose of this study was to determine if these increases result in an effect on the quality of won from the students' perspective. Data from quality assessment programs at Capella University (an online institution) and George Mason University (a traditional institution) was collected from survey instruments given to students at the end of each course during the fall of 2002 and was made available to the researcher. This study validated these internally developed its as used in the evaluation process. Once the survey results were validated, comparisons were made between the overall evaluation scores for classes taught by full-time and part-time professors at each of the schools and for the scores from Capella University, for those participating in online course development as compared to those that did not to determine if the students' perceived quality of instruction differed.