Question

MARKETING RESEARCH

Now that online education has become a rescue or a contingency plan that all schools and higher educational institutions have used to cope with the global pandemic. AUST was among the pioneering institutions in shifting its lectures into LMS Blackboard without any single interruptions. However, being a new paradigm in education especially in Lebanon, the university council is wondering whether the current online practices in terms of class materials, course delivery, interactions, and so many other performance indicators are satisfying the major stakeholders in education. Even institutions who have been in existence for more than 150 years in Beirut are not sure about this move; however, it is a must for life to continue. In one of the TV programs yesterday, both Dr. Fadlo Khoury, President of AUB, Rev. Salim Daccash, President of USJ, and few days before Dr. Riad Sakr. Vice President of AUST raised their concern about the importance of online education so that the academic year 2019-2020 is rescued and students will not face delays to look for jobs, or continue their graduate and post-graduate education on time next year once this pandemic is over.

Assuming you were hired as a researcher by AUST to uncover the current situation of LMS Blackboard and identify certain areas for improvement in order for the university council know how to make this experience more pleasant and satisfactory. You may proceed by answering the below questions:

1- What is the management decision problem facing AUST's university council and what are the environmental factors surrounding this problem? (10 points; 150-200 words)

2- Who are the stakeholders in this case and why? (10 points; 50-100 words)

3- Transform the management decision problem into a marketing research problem; identify at least fours specific components. (10 points; 100-150 words)

4- Select any of the specific components identified in question 3, and derive from it two research questions and then two hypotheses for each question (i.e. a total of 4 hypotheses). (15 points; 100-150 words)

5- What are the different types of research design and explain why and how shall you use each one of them in this case? (15 points; 200-300 words).

6- How can secondary sources help you in this case study and what type shall you consider using? (15 points; 150-200 words)

Answer 1

Part 1 .

MDP or Management Decision Problem is defined as the main problem specific to the given context which needs to be effectively solved i.e what the decision maker is concerned about and for that subsequently the MRP or Marketing Research Problem is formulated which deals about the type of data which needs to be collected to solve the MDP . In this scenario the

MDP is : Is online collegiate educational coursework provided on LMS effective in training and acting as a substitute for classroom based learning for prepping the students for future jobs ?

The environmental factors concerning this MDP is :

1. The Political Environment : The political framework surrounding this problem will define the scenario regarding the ability to provide alternatives to solve the problem .

2. The Technological environment : The Technological environment and infrastructure will be able to decide the scope of the problem and the ability to provide fast and reliable solutions ,

3. Demand : The demand of the service from the customers side will also act as an environmental factor .

Part 2.

The stake holders in this case are : The students who will gain the knowledge and resources , The university authorities: i.e the faculties : who will provide the resources , content creation team , the college management , the industries who will absorb the students on the successful completion of their course .

Part 3.

The MDP can be transformed into a MRP or Marketing Research Problem when we talk about the data which needs to be collected and the ways to collect it and the analysis of the same to provide alternative solutions to the problem .

MRP : The Marketing Research Problem for this will be to collect the data which is feedback from the students in terms of perceived quality for them for the courses they are receiving through online medium and the feedback from the industry experts who can provide their expert opinions for their perception for the same on various defined parameters . These data can be collected on the surveys  .

The four specific components for the same are :

a) Feedback data of students on their perception of the knowledge delivery , quality of the content , ease of understanding of the online educational courses provided on the LMS.

b) Feedback from the industry experts on the basis of the skill gap fulfilment of the online educational courses using LMS

MRP : To determine the effectiveness of the online educational courses provided on the LMS on the basis of student-industry feedback .

Part 4.

The hypothesis that can be put forward for the specific components defined in the above question are as follows :

Component 1 :

Feedback data of students on their perception of the knowledge delivery , quality of the content , ease of understanding of the online educational courses provided on the LMS.

Research Questions :

Q.1 .

On a likert scale of 1-7 , how do you rate the quality of the online course that is provided on the LMS ? (1 being the least and 7 being the highest )

Q. 2

On a likert scale of 1-7 , how do you rate the ease of understanding of the online educational course received on the LMS ? ( 1 being the least and 7 being the highest )

Hypothesis :

Hypothesis 1 : The student perception on the quality of coursework received online on LMS is better than the physical classroom experience .

Hypothesis 2 : The ease of understanding of the online coursework available on LMS is more than the physical classroom based experience .

Component 2 :

Feedback from the industry experts on the basis of the skill gap fulfilment of the online educational courses using LMS

Research Questions :

Q.1 .

On a likert scale of 1-7 , how do you rate the effectiveness of the online course in terms of filling industry skill gap that is provided on the LMS ? (1 being the least and 7 being the highest )

Q. 2

On a likert scale of 1-7 , how do you rate quality of content in terms of industry applicability on the basis of the online educational course received on the LMS ? ( 1 being the least and 7 being the highest )

Hypothesis :

Hypothesis 1 : The expert perception on the ability of the coursework to fill the industry-institution skill gap received online on LMS is better than the physical classroom experience .

Hypothesis 2 : The expert perception on the quality of coursework received online on LMS is better than the physical classroom experience .