Instructional design: Seminary faculty teaching experience and spiritual formation in an online environment

Online learning offers institutions a competitive advantage provided that faculty members are receptive and supportive of the mission and direction. Traditional faculty members' apprehension and stress comes from the transition to online teaching responsibilities and the oversight of instructional designers and administrators in supporting online facilitators' concerns and needs. The intent of this research was to synthesize and interpret the unique phenomenon in the experiences of traditional faculty transitioning to online teaching roles and how they create community in an online seminary program, in order to provide useful information to administrators and instructional designers faced with the challenge of developing online programs. Research questions covered the following: What experiences do traditional seminary faculty face in transitioning to the online learning environment? How do seminary faculty members adapt to the online learning environment? How do seminary faculty facilitate community in the online learning environment? What instructional strategies and resources do faculty depend on? Results and recommendations of this phenomenological study serve in reinforcing the participation of faculty in distance education, improving instructional design for online learning, and informing instructional designers with best practices for supporting transitioning faculty members. Conclusions and implications provide administrators, instructional designers and faculty members with best practices for implementing the development of distance education programs and the support of traditional faculty in transition to online learning. Recommendations for further research in this area are also stated.