Improving e-learning quality through evaluation: the case of the Cuban University

The emergence of new scenarios in the professional formation as a result of the integration of information and communication technologies in the educational process, demands the identification of new criteria for evaluating the quality of the processes, services and products. The expectations that have been created around the eLearning, together with the increasing interest in educational quality, have awoken the necessity to propose and develop new models of evaluation that defy the conceptions, criteria and methods of quality evaluation according to the old educative paradigm. However, the different views and perspectives around quality, together with the variety of approaches, have demonstrated the complexity of the concept. The diversity of approaches existing in the field of eLearning has lead the main efforts to be focused on proposing models and methodologies where evaluation is reduced to validation of commonly accepted standards and do not analyze whether the levels of virtualization adopted by schools contribute to the development of individuals and the society. Moreover, the application of different models of quality evaluation for eLearning does not identify the next step to transform the existing eLearning. This paper presents a research proposal for a doctoral thesis whose main objective is to propose a prospective model of quality evaluation that will allow Cuban universities to improve their eLearning.

ISBN:978-1-908272-05-8

Publication year:2011

Keywords:eLearning, quality of eLearning, quality evaluation, quality assessment, model