Internet and Higher Education 15 (2012) 96101

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Internet and Higher Education

Project DAVES: An exploratory study of social presence, e-mentoring, and vocational counseling support in community college courses
Lynne Schrum , Mary C. English, Lyndsie M. Galizio
George Mason University, United States

a r t i c l e

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a b s t r a c t
A FIPSE-funded project was designed to provide support and training to community college faculty electronically, and to develop a model to offer innovative, interactive strategies to support their students' academic and career needs. The goal of the mentoring/coaching program has been to support instructors in their online efforts, provide resources and assistance to students, and create a community of learning for all. The examination of the process was framed and guided by the concept of social presence theory. Data collected included mentors' weekly logs, researcher-generated weekly prompts, and bi-monthly focus groups. All data were analyzed qualitatively using open and axial coding. Results indicate that creating social presence may depend, in part, on having an authentic, clearly dened role. Reections throughout the process required continuous revisions to the plans. 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Available online 26 August 2011 Keywords: E-mentoring Social presence Community colleges Vocational counseling

1. Introduction and statement of problem A federally-funded three-year project, Developing Authentic Vocational and Educational Supports (DAVES) was designed to provide support and training to community college faculty online, and to develop a model to offer innovative, interactive strategies to support their students' academic and career needs. The program includes a cadre of online mentor/coaches who provide pedagogical support to community college instructors as well as study resources and career counseling to students. The goal of the online mentoring/coaching program is to support instructors in their online efforts, provide vocational counseling support to students, and create a community of learning for all. This research study investigates the phenomenon of online communication that occurred as part of this online mentoring/coaching program. Specically, this research project was designed to identify the types of support requested and provided by instructors and students, and to understand the skills, knowledge and experiences deployed and needed by the mentor/coaches. The data are examined through the lens of social presence theory, and through the literature on e-mentoring. 2. Context and courses The courses supported by the online coaches were employed as part of Project DAVES are known as ACHIEVE, a turnkey solution for higher education hybrid/online learning, and have been under
Corresponding author. Tel.: + 1 703 993 4017. E-mail addresses: lschrum@gmu.edu (L. Schrum), Menglis2@masonlive.gmu.edu (M.C. English), lgalizio@masonlive.gmu.edu (L.M. Galizio). 1096-7516/$ see front matter 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2011.08.001

development at a Southeastern State College since 2005. These remedial and general education courses are focused on displaced workers and working adults who may benet from alternative methods of course delivery. Each course is provided as a complete package that includes course content, learning objects, discussion questions, and assessments. The courses, which have been developed for online, classroom, or blended delivery at community colleges (as determined by the institution or by the instructor), follow a textbook replacement model, with materials for most online courses available for $48. According to information on the ACHIEVE website, the courses are based on learning and motivation research and employ mastery learning, constructivist learning, and cooperative learning. This model illustrates the trend toward changes in instructional strategies and tools (Heider, Laverick, & Bennett, 2009). Traditional textbooks are often being replaced by digital textbooks and other electronic materials, reecting changes in instructional delivery methods and cost reduction efforts. As of 2005, textbooks were cited to represent 72% of the total college costs at 2-year institutions (Bartlett, 2005). Digital materials available on websites, eBooks and DVDs are not only less expensive, but offer improved portability, interactivity, and ability to be updated. Some publishers are working with colleges and universities to create materials specic to their courses. In one such collaboration, Vital Source Technologies and seven dental schools worked together to develop 4 years of textbooks, course syllabi, and images that were packaged and distributed on DVD (Hendricson et al., 2006). 3. Background literature It was important to understand the role and challenges of being a coach, the perspectives of community colleges, and also complexity of

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the courses. The literature reviewed brought together these three aspects of the project. 3.1. Instructional coaches This project began with the identication of six doctoral students to take on the role of coach to the instructors of the community college courses and to their students. The term coaching is used in many ways in many different elds. In education, coaching is typically considered to be a multifaceted and ambiguous challenge for both the coaches and for those who are coached (Blachowicz, Fogelberg, & Obrochta, 2005). The concept of instructional coach has evolved as a way of sharing leadership within schools, and in particular as a way of promoting teacher leadership (Gallucci, Van Lare, Yoon, & Boatright, 2010; Mangin & Stoelinga, 2008; Taylor, 2008) but also has been adapted to other situations. Basically, all uses tend to be designed for professional growth through inquiry, collaboration, and experimentation (Gross, 2010, p. 133). Joyce and Showers (1981) suggest peer coaching as the most effective type of professional development in transferring learned skills to an educator's practice. Instructional coaching is typically content-based (e.g., math or literacy coaching) and intended to support instructors to meet goals of instruction (Gallucci et al., 2010). Coaching is considered both embedded and situated in the typical conception in schools in which the coaches conduct observations of classroom teaching, demonstrations of exemplary practices, and conferences with practitioners (Gallucci et al., 2010). In addition, the literature suggests that successful coaching requires skills in communication, relationship building, and understanding of teacher leadership (Knight, 2004). In other words, A coach is a mentor, supporter, teacher and guide who actively helps players improve performance through instruction on best techniques, supervised practice, and application with feedback (Kaplan & Owings, 1999, p. 83). Clearly the coaches in this situation were not expected to ll all these roles. Blachowicz et al. (2005) recommend several ways to begin and evolve a coaching relationship. They suggest the importance of establishing the coaches' credentials, locating and organizing materials that can improve instruction, and in particular to make student learning the focus (p. 56). Additionally, Burkins and Ritchie (2007) suggest that coaches must know the subject matter, but also have knowledge of adult learning theory, creation of learning communities, and relationship building. In researchers' efforts to establish the organizational structure and accomplish the goals of this project, these recommendations were considered. 3.2. Community colleges' roles In the United States, community colleges are an important component of the higher education system. According to National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) in 200607, there were 1045 community colleges in the United States, enrolling 6.2 million students (or 35% of all post-secondary students enrolled that year) (Provasnik & Planty, 2008, p. 2). Their focus seems to be adaptability, cutting edge innovations, and receptiveness to the needs of the community (Mendoza et al., 2009). There also appears to be an increased attention to remedial student preparation and programs geared to increased curricular program success rates (Horn, McCoy, Campbell, & Brock, 2009). With the current uctuating economic climate, community college programs are also expected to meet the needs of the constantly changing workforce (Davis, 2008) and displaced workers. From 2007 to 2009, the enrollment of community college students has been steadily increasing (American Association of Community Colleges [AACC], 2009). In 2009, the AACC surveyed its member institutions to examine changes in enrollment and the factors that inuenced these changes. AACC (2009) found that nationally The number of students enrolled in credit-bearing courses at community

colleges in fall 2009 increased by 11.4% and full-time enrollment increased to 24.1% (p. 4). The predominate factors related to this increase were found to be due to increased unemployment for workers and for students' re-training for skills important to keep their jobs. It appears that in order to adapt to the wide-ranging needs of today's students and the enrollment expansion, community colleges may need to change how they are preparing students. To understand how community colleges have adapted over the years with their increasing enrollments, it is useful to examine their evolving mission statements. Levin (2000) reported that the mission of community colleges during the 1990s shifted from serving local communities to serving the economy (p. 19). Also, according to Mendoza et al. (2009), In the current economic climate and job market, combined with a progressive globalized industry marketplace, meeting market needs demands renewed adaptability and innovations from the community college workforce development initiatives (p. 867). This conrms the assumption that vocational and workforce training has gained an increased emphasis within today's community colleges by preparing students for work preparation and further education development. Additionally, it seemed important to understand the nature of mentoring, which requires the development of consistent, sustained contact between a mentor and protg (Cothran et al., 2009, p. 553). However, at a distance, other means must be created to establish that contact and connection. O'Neill, Wagner, and Gomez (1996) dened the concept of electronic mentoring as the use of email or computer conferencing systems to support a mentoring relationship when a face-to-face relationship would be impractical (p. 39). The reality is that these mentors/coaches would be required to blend the technology with effective communication to establish the community needed for success in this project (Stewart & Carpenter, 2009). Mentors need to be approachable, good listeners, respectful and deserving of respect, interested, trustworthy and encouraging. They also need to have well developed skills in clinical and analytic reasoning, reection and evaluation, and listening. In addition, the asynchronous nature of e-mentoring can facilitate more thoughtful interactions needed to address complex problems (Wade, Niederhauser, Cannon, & Long, 2001). 4. Theoretical framework In order for online mentoring to be effective, all participants must be comfortable and condent in participating. Unfortunately, experiences have shown that online interaction can be perceived as distant, impersonal, or ineffective (So & Brush, 2008; Sorensen & Baylen, 2000). To frame and guide this research, researchers examined the concept of social presence theory, originally developed by Short, Williams, and Christie (1976); this theory suggests the notion that one's degree of social presence (represented along a continuum) is directly related to one's ability to be aware of another person in a communication interaction. At one time it was believed that face-to-face communication had the most social presence and text-based communication was antisocial and impersonal. More recently, especially given the ways online communications are enhanced technologically, researchers have used this theory to guide research (Gunawardena & Zittle, 1997; Richardson & Swan, 2003; Tu, 2000, 2002) but have modied it to focus on how people use the communication rather than inherent characteristics of the technology (Lowenthal, 2009). Now social presence is used to mean the degree to which participants in computer-mediated communication feel socially and emotionally connected; in particular, this theory has been used to investigate the development of a community of learners (Leh, 2001; Rourke, Anderson, Garrison, & Archer, 1999; Rovai, 2002; Rovai & Bamum, 2003), and perceived learning (Richardson & Swan, 2003; So, 2009). Studies also concluded that social presence can be seen as a mediating variable between teaching and cognitive presence

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(Shea & Bidjerano, 2009), and question the challenges that participants face in making sense of the text communications (Jacobson, 2001). In general, it appeared important to take the results of such studies to guide the development of this project by showing genuine emotions, using humor, and encouraging self-disclosure (Aragon, 2003), as well as incorporating audio and video, posting introductions, and providing frequent feedback (Tidwell & Walther, 2002). Thus, it seemed appropriate to use social presence theory to guide and frame this research. Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000) developed a Community of Inquiry framework to support the understanding of online interactions for teaching and learning, but also for other types of interactions, including shared development of meaning from content and from processes. Shea and Bidjerano (2009) conducted a study examining the nature of epistemic engagement in an online environment. They discovered that over 70% of the variance in students' levels of cognitive presence was based on their reports of their instructors' skills in fostering teaching presence and their own abilities to establish a sense of social presence (p. 543). These factors and others became very important in considering ways to provide social and cognitive presence in this online project. Given this theoretical framework that informed the researchers, this study began with the following research questions: 1. In what ways are online mentors/coaches approaching their tasks, meeting the needs of their mentees, and developing relationships with these participants? 2. What do these mentors/coaches report as their experiences during their time in this project, particularly in the types of characteristics, activities, and support structures they are asked to provide to the community college faculty members and to their students? 5. Methods The research questions required the gathering of deep narratives from the participants' perspectives; thus, this study employed qualitative tools for data collection and analysis to understand the experiences of the mentors/coaches who participated in the rst year of Project DAVES. 5.1. Participant selection The participants in this initial study included the entire population of mentor/coaches involved in this project. This population consisted of six doctoral students from a college of education at a large public institution in the mid-Atlantic region. This population is typically comprised of classroom or district educators, employees at private or government agencies, and others involved in some aspect of education. Twenty-four individuals submitted applications in response to a call for participants; from that initial group, thirteen were selected for telephone interviews, based on an examination of their previous experiences in online education, counseling, and community college practices. From the interviews, four women and two men were selected, representing a wide variety of backgrounds, cultures, and ages. Training was provided to these six individuals, and signicant resources were gathered and developed to support the initial efforts. 5.2. Data sources Data came from three primary sources: weekly logs kept by the mentors/coaches detailing the number and types of interactions, email exchanges, and requests for information from community college instructors and their students; weekly prompts for incidents and reections on interactions and experiences; and face-to-face focus groups held each semester to discuss and document problems, challenges, and recommendations for improving support for community college

faculty and their students. Finally, four of the six coaches were interviewed to gather their individual thoughts on the process; the four were selected by convenience. Additionally, the three researchers met routinely to compare issues, discuss developments, and reect on the progress toward the goals of the project. 5.3. Data analysis Researchers analyzed the entire corpus of the data using the constant comparative method (Charmaz, 2006; Corbin & Strauss, 1990), a systematic technique that employs various levels of coding to theorize the phenomenon being studied. They emphasized two specic phases of coding: open and axial and began the analysis using open coding within each type of data source to identify themes that emerged from the participants' perspectives, seeking to identify, categorize, and describe the phenomena. The axial coding then sought to take the codes and begin the process of relating codes to each other across the data sources, in search of relationships between mentor/ coach experiences and requests/comments/interactions with their community college instructors and students, as recommended by Creswell (1998). As he suggested, axial coding consists primarily of relating categories of information to the central phenomenon category (Creswell, 1998, p. 239) and this is what the data analysis required to develop meaning from the participants' perspective. Focus groups and collection of weekly or bi-weekly data allowed the researchers to examine ever more deeply the experiences and reections of the participants over time. One aspect of this constant comparative analysis was particularly important in this type of study; modications and additions to the activities of the coaches were routinely made based on the feedback. 6. Results 6.1. Activity descriptions 6.1.1. Coach preparation and training Prior to the rst training session, the research team gathered and developed numerous resources, including Project DAVES program information, study skills resources, online learning information, and links to support services of the participating community colleges. To disseminate these resources to the participants, a Project DAVES website was created using a template-based Google Site. This site included pages for each subject area and for each coach, where participants could post their own documents, links to external resources, and other content. The pages were created to be RSS-enabled so that users could subscribe to receive notications as new content is added. Participants attended a training and orientation session one evening in late summer of 2011. During this session, participants learned about Project DAVES and the ACHIEVE course work. Researchers discussed the social presence theory as well as differing online coaching experiences. Furthermore, the participants were oriented to their roles, responsibilities, and the required activities of being an online coach for this project. Additional resources were presented and discussed, including participant record-keeping documents and prompts for data collection. The general and pervasive feelings during the workshop were facing the unknown and let's get going. 6.2. Research question one: trajectory of the project Over the past 8 months, the coaches and support researchers have been in an evolutionary process. While researchers began with one set of expectations and plans, data collected from the coaches led to the generation of new efforts to reach the target population. The Google Site and email were the primary means of establishing social presence initially. Individual video introductions and a Facebook page were later added.

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Each coach sent an individual introductory message to their set of assigned instructors (approximately six for each coach in the fall) that included background information about themselves and the project, along with a link to their web pages. To gain insights into the courses and to better enable them to provide relevant material, the coaches requested copies of the course syllabi. The coaches posted subjectspecic content on the Google site for students and instructors such as links to free online math workshops and tips for overcoming writer's block. In addition to subject-specic content, coaches also posted information on study skills, job-seeking activities, and other vocational information. Each Sunday, the coaches sent instructors a link of the week or other information that would be useful to the students, and encouraged the instructors to share with their students. The frequency of this communication was eventually reduced to every other week. Throughout the course of the semester, the coaches regularly added content to their web pages, sent communications to instructors, documented their reections about the experience, and logged their interactions in a spreadsheet. During the fall semester, the six coaches sent a total of 240 email messages, thus an average of approximately 40 messages per coach. Over the three and a half months of the semester, the coaches received approximately 90100 responses from course instructors, or an average of 1516 responses each. Most responses t into one of four categories: 1) acknowledgment of or appreciation for the information, 2) irritation with the e-mails, 3) questions about the role of the coach, or 4) questions and comments about ACHIEVE courses. The coaches met at mid-semester and at the end of the semester to reect on their experiences and to plan for the next semester. The primary focus of the meetings was to assess progress by identifying ways to more clearly dene the role for instructors, to enhance interactions, and by nding better ways to reach students. From these meetings, decisions were made to: 1) create 30-second videos of each coach, 2) launch a Facebook page and try to create content to lure students to it, 3) develop surveys to identify student needs, and 4) to seek assistance from Project DAVES personnel to link the coaches and their roles to the instructors of the courses. Each of these enhancements has been implemented, with the exception of the surveys, which will be distributed at a later date. Videos were posted on the project's Google site and on the Facebook page. Coaches sent instructors a link to the Facebook page, with encouragement to send it to students who can Like the site to receive automatic updates. In addition, Project DAVES program staff will be distributing a yer announcing the availability of the coach support, including names, subject area expertise, and contact information for each coach. 6.3. Research question two: coaches' perspectives Analysis of the coaches' thoughts during the focus groups, biweekly responses to prompts, and the four interviews provided insights into this experience from their perspectives. Each researcher analyzed and coded these data individually and then the coding and interpretations were collaboratively discussed and analyzed. Ultimately, three major themes emerged from the data. 6.3.1. Disconnects abound The data clearly showed that many things were confusing and seemingly unrelated or unorganized, especially at the beginning of the project. These unknowns caused some stress and concern for all the coaches. Perhaps the most pervasive confusion related to how this part of the project and thus these coaches t into the larger Project DAVES. 6.3.1.1. Roles of coaches and instructors. At rst researchers believed that the coaches were to support the instructors and not the students. As one coach stated, My main interaction has been with being asked

questions where instructors were confused as to whether I was their instructor or sitting with their instructor or whomever. Another added, I had a professor actually ask me, like, Oh, what contact information do you want me to give to my students? And I just told him, like, No, I'm actually here to support you Later, after the rst semester, it became clear that the goal of these coaches was to support the students in their study skills and vocational goals. Thus, the coaches felt as if they had been given incorrect information. Nevertheless, coaches tried to reach the instructors' needs and to support their use of the ACHIEVE courses. The coaches felt at a disadvantage in not having a rm grasp of what they would be doing. One coach said, I feel like maybe it got off to a sort of strange start, because the professors and we didn't have a clear idea of what we the services that we provided. The coaches were clearly concerned about the mixed messages sent to the instructors. One commented, If there's a technical question, you go to [one person]. If there's a content question, there's a specic content person for each of the content [areas]. If there's a general ACHIEVE course question, you go to someone else. The coaches reported frustration in not being able to answer all the instructor questions by themselves. The disconnect between the expectations and plans for the coaches' access to instructors, providing support to them, and through them to their students, proved to be a difcult challenge during the beginning phase of this project. 6.3.1.2. Lack of information. Over the course of the 8 months of this project it became clear that everyone involved suffered from a lack of knowledge about a variety of topics. The coaches articulated that they did not know enough about the ACHIEVE courses and were unable to see each syllabus, even though the coaches did request these. The coaches and research team had only a syllabus template containing some basic information, but designed to be customized by each instructor. As one coach stated, And the other thing I thought is, it seems like our demo syllabus for the class doesn't match up with what they're actually doing. Another coach, after sending some links she thought would be useful, commented on the outcome, [the instructor] said This isn'twhat you said isn't appropriate for my students. And so that made me think, you know, I don't really even know these students. I don't know what they need. So, that makes it hard, I think. The coaches also realized they did not know enough about community colleges, students who attend them, and most important, who at each community college made the decision to use the ACHIEVE courses or assigned specic instructors to teach ACHIEVE or other courses. They were puzzled as to the lack of responsiveness but then realized the reality is that these instructors may be teaching four to six classes each semester, and perhaps having large class sizes as well. As one said, If I knew a little bit more about the student population, then I could reallyI feel like I could be more helpful. 6.3.2. Creating relationships and interactions Overall the coaches were disappointed that they received little feedback during the rst semester. One said, It is like Horton Hears a Who. I just really, thinkand we're out here going, Hello? Hello? Hello? They worried about ways to build a relationship without bugging the instructors; one mentioned, I worry we send them lots of noise rather than real information. Despite the challenges, the coaches remained hopeful. One coach described how she changes what she sends, hoping to nd what the instructors want or need. I try to really switch up the types of stuff, like, one day it'll be content specicand thinking, maybe they don't care about content, maybe they need more of this, more of thatreally trying to have a lot of variety of the resources. Another coach describes similar strategies. I've almost turned it into a game to try to get them to respond back. All the coaches learned to celebrate minor successes and share with each other. One coach related, This past week, when I sent off

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the weekly tip, there was an instant reply back. I got so excited! I started doing a happy dance on the inside. And then when I clicked it, it was an out of ofce reply. In another example, This week I sent out an email to my college success instructors and one of them responded back great, thanks a lot we are discussing this in class and she thinks she could use it. Another coach stated she had tried sending different types of things that were specic to composition and then other kinds of online things, or group work kinds of things. And I've gotten several thank yous. And another: The highlight was when one of them wrote back and said that she was going to use something I'd said in a PowerPoint presentation to the class. So that was the highlight. 6.3.3. Generating ideas These six coaches were determined not to give up. They are all intensely passionate about education and clearly are dedicated to doing their very best. Throughout the project, but especially as the second semester was about to begin, the coaches brainstormed a wide variety of possibilities to reach the instructors, and also as many students as possible. 6.3.3.1. Assistance. The coaches were determined to nd ways to support and be useful to the instructors and their students and they began to think of new ways to reach these individuals. One idea for getting students' attention was to offer vocational support. If we put ourselves out there and if we have direct access to the students and we put out there some related to help with job seeking stuff, I think there'd be a lot of action. Some worried that perhaps their messages were going into SPAM lters. One suggested possible telephone calls to the instructors, You know, in addition to an introduction letterI guess the goal is to try to do everything online, but I think it would be nice to have a phone conversation with a person. Next the coaches made the suggestion to create a video about themselves to personalize their introductions. These were created and placed on the DAVES website. During the focus group another idea was offered: create a Facebook page as a way to reach the students. As one coach suggested, I think Facebook is a really good idea because I don't think the emails are going to make their way through the channel. All communications now include the Facebook link and students have started to friend the page. The next stage is to create short surveys for the students and the instructors to more accurately identify their needs so as the coaches may be better able to meet them in the future. Perhaps the most important suggestion was meant to bridge the gap between the primary dispenser of ACHIEVE courses (Southeastern State College) and the coaches' availability and expertise. The group created an introduction letter that will now be put into each package of course materials, and will also be included with promotional information. 7. Discussion: if you build it, they may not come The growth of prepackaged materials for online and hybrid learners has expanded at a rate beyond expectation, and research surrounding the issues, goals, considerations, and challenges have also expanded (Allen & Seaman, 2008). This research sought to gain a deep understanding of ways to provide support, mentoring, and resources to community college instructors and their students, many of whom are new to post-secondary education. The lessons learned may also provide information that can support a goal of closer collaboration between community colleges and other post-secondary institutions. In the course of the life of this project much has been learned. It is important that all parts of any project plan and explicate the shared goals and purposes together; this is especially relevant when different institutions are involved. The goals of this project, from the

researchers' perspective, changed over time. Additional coordination would have been helpful; instructors of each of the ACHIEVE courses could have been better prepared to be contacted by the coaches, and would have had a shared expectation about the reasons and purposes of those coaches. Further, an analysis of instructor needs could more clearly shape the role of the coach, ensuring authentic needs are recognized and addressed. The coaches themselves proved to be remarkably resilient in the face of little feedback from the instructors. Through the months of this project they generated messages, links to appropriate materials, suggestions for teaching, and yet it was very difcult to develop a relationship with the instructors. Despite all their efforts, not one coach had developed a meaningful relationship with an instructor. This is similar to the results of research on social presence theory (Richardson & Swan, 2003; Rovai, 2002; Rovai & Bamum, 2003; Shea & Bidjerano, 2009; So, 2009). An authentic reason for interaction was not established and thus, it was a challenge for the coaches to make themselves valuable or relevant to the instructors, much less through them to their students. In terms of the electronic mentoring (O'Neill et al., 1996) it is clear that so far, this project has not reached a deep and reciprocal level of interaction. While it is still the expectation that in the coming semesters this will change, at this point in the project, researchers have not been able to assess this aspect of the research. Additionally, the mentors/coaches developed a strong bond as they shared ideas, examples, and success stories with each other. While not part of the original plan, this serendipitous result bears further study. Thus, the researchers can conclude that the coaches were dedicated and persistent in their efforts to reach the instructors, and through them to the students of the ACHIEVE courses; of interest is that all six coaches have signed up to again be part of the project. 7.1. Limitations This study had several limitations. The start of the project was slow, and the instructors of ACHIEVE courses were not aware of the role or potential support the coaches could provide. The goal to reach students of the ACHIEVE courses was also unrealized; from the limited reaction to the coaches it is unlikely any students learned of the opportunities for support in vocational or academic pursuits. 7.2. Recommendations for further research Future research may seek to understand more from the perspectives of the community college instructors, and their students. In an effort to better understand the motivation for these community college instructors to teach ACHIEVE courses, the researchers did ask the coaches to contact their most responsive instructors and try to reach them by telephone. The information gathered from a convenience sample did not become part of the corpus of data for the analysis but does shed some light into possible reasons for little response, tentative though these may be. Community colleges could have many reasons for purchasing ACHIEVE courses but nancial goals may be the driving force (increase student enrollment with fewer development costs). Whether instructors volunteered for or felt compelled to teach these classes is unclear, however, there was a sense that some training prior to teaching with them would have helped. Finally, it is possible that instructors would like their students paying attention to course assignments and to on-campus resources, rather than interacting with external resources (the coaches). These questions bear much further study over the course of this project and also from other similar projects. Educators would benet from deeper understanding of the issues, goals, and academic needs of displaced workers over time. Increased knowledge shared between and among academic institutions would also assist students in the goal of articulation from secondary through

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post-secondary entities. It would be helpful to know more about the ways instructors at each level design their courses, communicate their expectations, and assess students' learning. Information about these topics might assist future researchers in better understanding what it takes to establish an authentic role, which could lead to increased social presence and personal relationships. 8. Conclusion This study looked through a lens of social presence theory to gain understanding about a complex project designed to support community college instructors and students during their use of pre-packaged course materials. The goal of the research was to understand what coaches actually did and what they reported about their experiences, interactions, and perceptions. The interactions and development of relationships were far different from the hoped for results; however, the research provided a deep understanding of the complexity of the goals. Perhaps underestimating the challenges turned out to be a positive outcome. The coaches' continuous efforts, commitment, and desire did produce some responses of acknowledgment and appreciation. References
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