With the outbreak of the global pandemic, the higher education industry navigated many numerous challenges over the last year, including the transition to online learning. When given a chance to reflect on the last year, the majority actually gave learning in the new normal a decent grade.

As a matter of fact, more faculty and administrators gave pandemic learning a ‘B’ grade, whereas, more students gave it an ‘A’ grade, as per the fourth and final statement of the Digital Learning Pulse Survey .

The survey across 856 institutions of 1,486 students and 1,286 faculty and administrators was conducted by Bay View Analytics on behalf of the WCET (the WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies), Online Learning Consortium (OLC), Canadian Digital Learning Research Association (CDLRA), University Professional and Continuing Education Association (UPCEA), and primary partner and underwriter Cengage, a global education technology company.

The survey found that students, faculty and administrators are aligned on key challenges of students, although differ on institutional support: ‘stress’, ‘having to do coursework’, and ‘level of motivation’ were the top challenges facing the students. Although, students saw institutional support, or lack thereof, as a bigger problem than administrators or faculty.

Faculty, Students and administrators rated on how optimally their courses met educational needs during Fall 2020 and Spring 2021, with more students giving As, and more faculty and admins giving Bs:

Fall 2020:

“A” Grade – 36 percent of Faculty; 18 percent of Admins; 43 percent of Students

“B” Grade – 45 percent of Faculty; 56 percent of Admins; 30 percent of Students

“C” Grade – 18 percent of Faculty; 23 percent of Admins; 16 percent of Students

Spring 2021

“A” Grade – 43 percent of Faculty; 25 percent of Admins; 47 percent of Students

“B” Grade – 46 percent of Faculty; 56 percent of Admins; 29 percent of Students;

“C” Grade – 10 percent of Faculty; 16 percent of Admins; 13 percent of Students;