An Instrumental Case Study of the Online Learning Experience of Macau University Students During Covid-19: What Kind of Online Presence Matters?

Under the influence of Covid-19, most universities worldwide transitioned from face-to-face pedagogy to online hybrid learning. As a result, scholarly publications about this transition are rapidly accumulating. However, to date, there are few studies published in international journals investigating online education in Macau during the pandemic, particularly on the feeling of presence when Macau students study online. Using an instrumental case study at a university in Macau, this research explored online learning during the pandemic. The interviewees reported a lack of embodied presence in online learning. Nevertheless, many of them enjoyed this learning mode, as it provided a more reciprocal classroom, flexibility and convenience. The interviewees also believe the lack of physicality is not the determining challenge affecting online learning, suggesting that joint efforts and collaboration between peers, better-designed pedagogy for teachers, smoother teacher-student communication channels, the university’s online policymaking, and the support of infrastructure, online teaching quality could all be improved. This result questions the emphasis on bodily presence in the online learning environment and the drawing of a stark divide between online and offline. In contrast, it endorses the concepts of presence under a framework of a Community of Inquiry, which is a more post-digital view, welcoming the seamless combination of the online and offline world within contemporary society.