Implementation evaluation study: Flipped classroom professional development with faculty members to enhance students' engagement in higher education

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore student engagement in higher education by evaluating training provided by experienced faculty members for those faculty desiring to implement a flipped classroom. A case study was utilized; data were collected in the form of online observation, in-class observation, student focus group interviews, faculty individual interviews, and artifacts. The researcher used the utilization-focused evaluation (Patton, 2008) as an implementation evaluation framework for the study. Data were analyzed using deductive analysis that depended on five implementation evaluation elements as general components (effort, monitoring, process, component, and treatment specification). The participants in this study included three trained faculty members from three different disciplines (anthropology, sociology, and business) and 14 students from these three faculty participants’ classes. The findings indicated faculty experiences of successful implementation of a flipped classroom were related to whether these faculty members fully provided the main flipped classroom elements for the lesson or only tested a partial implementation. Faculty and student perceptions of student engagement were positive and supportive of the idea that the flipped classroom enhanced student engagement. Students who experienced all the elements of the flipped classroom in the lesson extended their engagement from just inclass activities to embedded online activities. The findings also provided valuable recommendations from faculty and student participants related to improving student engagement in the flipped classroom. The study presented limitations of the study and recommendations for future research. Generally, this qualitative study with all the resources used to collect the data reflected successful practices and components of flipped classroom examples that could benefit educators in terms of enhanced student engagement