International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
Volume 1, Number 2, 2007
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Abstract
Value Drivers in Business Course Design: A Student Stakeholder Perspective
As one of the important stakeholders in the academic process, students and their preferences should be considered when the instructor selects the various course design features. Although students are not the only stakeholders in the academic process, their receptiveness to classroom instruction is clearly a central focus of that process. This paper examines a large sample of business student data on their preferences with respect to fourteen controllable course design features. The preferences are examined in light of their relative ranked importance and relative intensity. Additionally, the data is examined in light of potential differences in student preferences relative to various demographics. The paper summarizes the ranked contributions of different course design features from a student perspective. These findings should assist instructors in designing course parameters to meet student considerations without compromising an instructor’s personal choice and academic freedom.
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John Knight
University of Tennessee at Martin
Martin, Tennessee, USA
jknight@utm.edu
I am a Professor of Operations Management and Statistics in the Department of Management, Marketing, and Political Science at the University of Tennessee at Martin. I hold a BS, MS and Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology. My research interests include quality control and improvement through design of experiments, productivity improvement through lean operations, and pedagogical development. I have published articles in the Journal of Operations Management and the Production and Inventory Management Journal. I currently teach courses in operations management, statistics, and quality improvement. During my years of teaching, I have had numerous consulting experiences in production management and quality control.
Daniel Tracy
University of South Dakota
Vermillion, South Dakota
dtracy@usd.edu
I am an assistant professor of Operations Management in the Department of Production, Statistics, MIS & Quantitative Analysis at the University of South Dakota. I hold a BS and MBA from the University of South Dakota, and a Ph.D. in Decision Sciences from Washington State University. My research interests include data envelopment analysis, production planning, lean management, and pedagogical development. I have published articles in the Journal of the Operational Research Society and the Journal of Business Research. I currently teach undergraduate and graduate courses in operations management and management science. I am an academic member in the Production and Operations Management Society, Decision Sciences Institute, and APICS. My non-academic experience includes retail, restaurant, construction, and manufacturing management/consulting.