The adoption of online student services in Texas colleges and universities: An analysis based on Roger's diffusion model (Everett M. Rogers)

This study was a two-phase, mixed methods study to examine the adoption of online services, the rate of adoption of these services, and the successes and barriers colleges in Texas encountered when adopting online student services. These online services were examined to determine how they could supplement and improve an institution's student information system (SIS).; Phase I of the study included three parts. The first examined the predictability of services adopted online based on the enrollment, institution type, and the SIS in use at the institution. The second part determined the rate at which institutions have adopted a group of online student services and then categorized the institutions based on Rogers (2003) diffusion model. The final part of Phase I of the study determined if there was a correlation between the enrollment, the type, and the SIS in use at the institution and the rate at which the technologies were adopted.; Phase I analysis of this study found that for most of the services studied, those universities that were public and those institutions with high enrollment probably have adopted the serviced online, while private institutions and those institutions with low enrollment have probably not implemented the service online.; Phase II of the study used interviews with a subset of the Phase I population to build case studies about the barriers and successes encountered when attempting to adopt new online student services. Phase II of the study found that resistance to change and the lack of resources were the two most often reported barriers to adoption of online services. Phase II of the study found that student successes including improving accessibility, increasing control over their college experience, and meeting their expectations and data successes including improving data and increasing data load time were most often reported.