Motivation and Incentives for Distance Faculty

Abstract

Colleges continue to offer growing numbers of courses and programs of study through distance education technologies. Yet despite this growth, relatively little is known about what inspires faculty to teach with a technology-mediated approach. The current study was designed as an exploration into the incentives that faculty perceive as motivating. The analysis of over one hundred articles lead to the conclusion that faculty generally teach in distance education programs for the same reasons (incentives) they teach traditional courses; for intrinsic rewards. The study identified self-satisfaction, flexible scheduling and wider audience as the intrinsic rewards and stipends, decreased workload, release time and new technology as the extrinsic motivators. A profile of the distance educator was developed to assist administration assigned the task of motivating faculty toward distance delivery.