Abstract:

Almost every university today applies digitization or e-learning strategies. The main objectives are often to increase the quality of teaching and to offer as motivated teaching as possible. Therefore, most universities employ experts. Of course, in addition to these e-learning experts, lecturers will also influence the way of teaching and are very important for the digitization process. However, very often the whole process forget about a very important “thing”: the student. This study starts exactly there. One third of all students enrolled in the distance learning course “Business Administration” at Merseburg University of Applied Sciences took part. The study provides insight into the students’ wishes and requirements. The special environment of the distance learning offers a particularly interesting perspective: Distance learning students - who are generally fully involved in professional life - are normally highly motivated, but are also interested in optimizing their studies. The participants were therefore specifically asked about possible applications of e-learning. Furthermore, it was surveyed which types of e-learning would help most (theory videos, exercise videos, podcasts, etc.). In addition, the necessary contact to fellow students and teachers was discussed, as well as technical requirements.

Sample and data collection process:
Sample of this paper are students of the distance learning bachelor “Business Administration” at the Hochschule Merseburg. The students are enrolled in different semesters. In total 160 students are registered, 52 students participated (33% of the sample). A questionnaire was used to collect the data. The advantage of a questionnaire strategy is that it provides standardized answers that make it simple to compile data. Because the topic of the paper is a very complex one, quantitative (yes and no) as well as qualitative data were collected to triangulate findings. The collected data was analyzed with the objective of establishing links between the wishes of students and the e-learning strategy of the university.

Measures:
To raise data about the opinions of distance learning students the participants were asked regarding different topics. The used items for the quantitative and qualitative analysis were fully developed by the authors.

Keywords:

Distance learning students, student requirements, e-learning, digital learning.