LAMASS@DiLea

Deutsch

Learning Analytics, Monitoring and Ambition for Study Success in Distance Learning

The project is associated with the research center CATALPA.

Why do some students drop out while others continue successfully? Data on this is based predominantly on the present teaching of traditional universities. If we want to know more about the factors in digital studies, it helps to look at distance learning universities as a comparison group.

Project goals and research questions

The data basis of study success and dropout has been primarily drawn from the face-to-face teaching of traditional universities. Likewise, research on factors influencing student success and dropout in digital study formats has been poorly researched in both the national and international context. Due to their consistently high amount of digital teaching and learning formats, distance learning universities are an excellent field to develop a comparison group between digital and face-to-face studies and to generate new insights into the effectiveness of digital higher education with regards to study success and dropout. In the research project LAMASS@DiLea, Prof. Dr. Claudia de Witt's department of educational theory and media pedagogy investigates factors for academic success and dropout in digital study formats and compares these insights directly with traditional studies.

The goal of the project is to explore the factors of student success and dropout for digital study formats and their interactions at the individual, curricular, and institutional level. With the interdisciplinary consortium of researchers from educational science, computer science and economics, the LAMASS@DiLea project will for the first time create a research and knowledge base that analyzes factors of dropout in digital study formats in a differentiated manner and reviews them for sustainable recommendations for action.

All partners are working together to investigate factors of study success and dropout in digital study formats as well as in the comparative study. In addition, each project partner is also focusing on its own research module in accordance to its research interests:

The team of the FernUniversität in Hagen focuses additionally with the investigation module on the relevance of self-regulated learning and digital literacy, which are primarily investigated on the individual level in relation to digital study formats.

The DIPF research team is responsible for data analysis andinvestigates the development prospects of learning analytics for academic success in digital study formats in their research module.

The contribution of the DFKI ensures that the entire research data management and lifecycle remains transparent and that research data comply with the FAIR principles. In their investigation module, development perspectives for the use and design of AI procedures as well as for user-adaptive measures to increase study success are explored.

The partner AKAD University is focusing in particular on curricular influencing factors. The team compares strict, semester-oriented and flexibly individualized study models in relation to study success and dropout.

Objectives of the FernUniversität in Hagen

As the project managing institution, the FernUniversität in Hagen primarily pursues the assurance of scientific results. The nationwide research project on study success and dropout in digital study formats is meant to close the remaining research gap in comparison to face-to-face studies. The main aim of the research module is to further develop the spectrum of services offered in digital study formats from a learner-centered perspective in a forward-looking manner. Furthermore, the research should contribute to the improvement of digital learning formats at distance learning universities. At the same time, these findings can also be used for the economic improvement and further development of digital offerings at presence universities. Overall, the results obtained in the project can lead to the directed use of interventions or restructuring in (digital) study programs and thus result in a sustainable improvement of dropout rates and study success.

In addition to the classic disseminations in scientific journals and at conferences, the FernUniversität in Hagen is pursuing an open access publication of the study in the LAMASS@DiLea project.