Learning Effectiveness: A Study on Effectiveness of Webcast

This study investigates if providing delayed webcast of college lectures would improve the retention of students enrolled in an introductory computer science class over a span of six semesters. The population for this study was undergraduate engineering students enrolled in the same course at a major research university in a western state in six different semesters. The same instructor taught all sections of the course, the same textbook and software were used, and the number of lab/teaching assistants were also exactly the same. Assignments and exams were changed but were kept at the same level of difficulty. Some students were enrolled in the courses where Webcasting was not utilized as a tool, while others took the same course where delayed Webcasting was used.