Development of Online Post-COVID Intervention Program for Students: Ensuring Effective Reintegration in the Physical Learning Space

Abstract

This study will develop an online intervention program to effectively support students reintegrating into the face-to-face learning space after the COVID-19 pandemic. It will provide an avenue for debriefing, sharing experiences, and listening to students’ narratives and experiences. In addition, the online program will also include a self-paced socialemotional assessment to identify students who need more support. Using the conservation of resource theory, we will employ a sequential exploratory mixed-method design. Thirty students will be recruited for focus group interviews to explore students' views, perceptions, preferences, and issues in returning to face-to-face classes. The results of the focus group interviews will be analysed to develop a survey to understand the perspectives of a wider student population. The survey results will be analysed using a factor analytic approach to develop a reliable and valid self-assessment tool. Findings from both qualitative and quantitative phases will be used to inform the development of the Online post-COVID intervention program for students (OPIPS).

Rationale

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought significant disruptions across different sectors of our society. Government and non-government organisations quickly responded, addressing the critical needs such as health, food, water and safety, and educational needs of students. A range of research evidence shows that students were distressed being locked down in their respective houses, suffering many social-emotional issues (Fawaz & Samaha, 2021; Fitzgerald & Konrad, 2021) and many economic issues, limiting their participation in online classes due to limited access to technology (Herold & Chen, 2021). Interruptions to learning can have long-term impacts, especially those vulnerable groups (Van Lancker & Parolin, 2020) with limited access to information and computer technology, support and resources. With the ease of restrictions, face-to-face learning is permitted, and this transition disrupted the learning routine of students. There are reports that students have been developing coping mechanisms, increasing their satisfaction and eventually getting used to distance learning (Reisenwitz & Fowler, 2021).

While the academic community well-received the idea of resuming face-to-face learning, the social-emotional disruptions during lockdown have a long-term impact on student well-being and learning engagement and achievement (Middleton, 2020; Werner & Woessmann, 2023). With the move of the Philippine Commission on Higher Education (CHED) to allow limited face-to-face learning in 2022, some students are distressed and expressed their desire to continue face-to-face learning. There are reports that students transitioning to limited face-to-face learning suffer many personal, social, emotional and psychological issues. These include limited motivation and engagement, anxiety, fear of contracting coronavirus, difficulty in handling academic workload and expectations, pressure to perform well in schools (Fitzgerald & Konrad, 2021), preference for online learning and integration of technology-enabled learning in a face-to-face environment (Stoian et al., 2022). These reports prompted this study to be conceptualised to support students for fully face-to-face classes in the mid-2023 start of the academic year. To optimise students’ learning, students need to be supported to ensure their well-being through psycho-educational interventions. Engaging educational psychologists to support students individually would be very costly for the university. An online intervention program that will account for students’ trauma, distress, boredom, anxiety, and many emotional disturbances will address cost efficiency and reach challenges. Our study aims to develop an online post-COVID intervention program to support students (OPIPS) for effective reintegration into the physical learning space. To achieve these, we will answer the following research questions:

1. What are students’ specific needs (social, emotional, cognitive, cultural, information, and contextual) to effectively reintegrate into the physical learning space?

2. What is the most appropriate design for the OPIPS?

3. What mechanism is needed to implement the OPIPS effectively?

The OPIPS will support all students for effective reintegration into the face-to-face learning space. It will provide an avenue for debriefing, sharing experiences, and listening to students’ narratives and their experiences. The program will also include a self-paced social-emotional assessment to identify students who need more support and professional interventions. The full implementation of the program will be in August 2023, anticipating the full implementation of face-to-face learning.

Theoretical Framework

This study will be guided by the Conservation of Resource (COR) theory. Hobfoll et al. (2018) argue that individuals are motivated to protect and build their resources, which include material, psychological, social, and energy resources. The basic tenet of COR theory is that humans tend to acquire, conserve, and enhance resources for survival. Resources are broadly defined as anything individuals value and perceive as instrumental in achieving their goals or well-being. These resources can be tangible, such as money or possessions, or intangible, such as social support or psychological attributes. If key resources are threatened or lost, or humans fail to acquire the resources even with significant effort, stress happens, which has significant implications on survival (Wells et al., 1999). This theoretical lens links personal, social and psychological functioning and protective factors around individuals. These protective factors promote positive psychological well-being that can be personal, environmental, and contextual resources. This theoretical lens is deemed appropriate for this study as we are trying to identify personal resources (e.g., job, finances, housing), social (e.g., peers, clubs), organisational (e.g., student services), psychological (e.g., academic preparedness, well-being, efficacy, autonomy), and protective factors (e.g., security, support for special needs) impacting students’ adjustment in going back to face-to-face learning.

Methods

We will use a mixed-method design, particularly the sequential exploratory design (Cohen et al., 2012), to gain rich data for a broader understanding of students’ social, emotional, cognitive, cultural, information, and contextual needs for effective reintegration. The qualitative data will be collected first, and analysed independently, which then informs the development of the questionnaire for the quantitative phase. The rationale is that neither quantitative nor qualitative approaches will be sufficient to capture the contextual perspectives of students under investigation. The qualitative data will be analysed independently. In the final step, the two data sets will be integrated to identify curriculum content and design.

Setting

This study will be conducted at the Davao Oriental State University (DOrSU), Mati, Philippines. It is a public university mandated to advance the creation, application, and dissemination of knowledge. Also, the university promotes inclusive sustainable development via research-based higher-quality education and technical skills and is receptive to the requirements of the local and global community. The university is committed to providing students with a holistic education that promotes academic excellence, social responsibility, and cultural sensitivity. It offers undergraduate programs in engineering, industrial and information technology, agriculture, life sciences, education, development communication, business, criminology, and health science. It also offers graduate programs in teaching, environmental science and business administration, Doctor of Education and Doctor of Philosophy in Environmental and Biological Science.

The university has several campuses distributed in different municipalities of Davao Oriental, including San Isidro, Banay-banay, Cateel, Baganga, and Mati City. The main campus is in Mati City, where a larger proportion of students are enrolled. For the academic year 2022-2023, the university has 12,978 students on all campuses, with 400 teaching staff and 262 non-teaching staff. During the pandemic, the university shifted to distance education, combining synchronous online and modular learning and teaching. All teaching staff were provided with laptops. Due to limited connectivity across the province, staff and students were provided with internet connectivity within the campuses, and they could get special permission to enter the premises for academic purposes, observing the national government protocol. Significant adjustments to the assessment were implemented, including extended submission of outputs and a provisional grading system. The university’s guidance centre provided virtual counselling, telecounseling, mental health webinar series, and information services via social media. The university also used Moodle as a learning management system across all courses. For practical classes, academic staff implemented modified simulation activities that could be conducted in students’ homes, meeting the same learning outcomes. These processes have been implemented for more than 2 years.

Participants

All students enrolled in DOrSu will be invited to participate in this study. We aim to recruit 30 students for the focus groups and 600 for the survey.

Recruitment of Participants

Participation in this study is entirely voluntary and anonymous. Participants will be recruited through email. The research assistant will send the email along with the Participant Information and Consent Form and consolidate the list of our participants to be interviewed and respond to the survey. We aim to recruit 30 students for the focus group interviews. There will be five focus groups composed of six students per group. To pilot the survey tool, we will aim to recruit 100 students. For the main survey, we aim to have 600 valid responses. We will send the recruitment email to all students to ensure equal access and participation from students across different year levels and different disciplines. The diversity of participants is desirable for our project to have perspectives from students with various socio-economic-demographic profiles. The sample size for interviews and the survey are sufficient to meet our research aims and to answer our research questions. The 30 participants in the focus group interviews will allow us a rich exploration of the research topic (Bryman, 2016). In addition, the 600 participants for the survey are large enough for factor analysis (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2007).

Risks to the Participants

We do not anticipate any harm to the participants. Their participation is entirely voluntary, and they can discontinue participating in research anytime they feel uncomfortable or for whatever reason. Participants will not incur any expenses related to their participation. If participants suffer from any psycho-emotional trauma associated with participating in this research, they will be directed to the University’s Guidance and Counseling Services Unit.

Privacy and Confidentiality

The focus group interviews will be audio-recorded, but no identifiable information will be recorded. The audio recording will be transcribed, and after, it will be destroyed. For the survey, demographic information, including gender, age, year level, program, and employment status, will be gathered for cross-sectional analysis. The raw data will not be shared with other researchers outside the project team. The de-identified data will be stored for 5 years after the publication of the research findings.

Data Collection

The data that will inform the development of the OPIPS will be collected in two stages. There is additional data gathering after the pilot implementation of the program to inform its revision.

Stage 1. Focus Group

Focus group interviews will be conducted to explore students’ views, perceptions, preferences, and issues in returning to face-to-face classes. Five focus groups (five to six members) will be conducted following the guidelines described in Appendix A. The focus group recordings will be transcribed, and any words not in English will be translated. Member checking will be done to ensure the rigour of the interview data. We will send a copy of the transcript to the group members and ask them to comment on their responses. The results of Stage 1 data analysis, described below, will inform the development of the survey tool.

Stage 2. Survey

The development of the survey tool will follow both theoretical and empirical approaches. We will begin with a theoretical approach following the work of DeVellis (2003). First, we will clearly define the construct of “student adjustment to face-to-face” and its dimensions. This definition will be based on our literature review and later on validated by the results of our focus group interviews. Second, we will construct the item pool. The items will be identified from the analysis of our interview data with cross-checking from the literature to ensure the inclusion of a range of items that covers the measurement of the construct. Third, we will establish the appropriate format of the measure. The survey tool will be farmed using a 6-point Likert scale, using the following scale: (1) Disagree very strongly (2) Disagree strongly (3) Disagree (4) Agree (5) Agree strongly (6) Agree Very Strongly. Fourth, we will recruit experts to review the items. These experts will be chosen based on their track record in psychology or tool development. Fifth, we will conduct pilot testing to determine the tool’s reliability and validity. Also, pilot testing will give us insights into how the large-scale survey would look, and we can adjust our logistics and resources. Based on the analysis of the interview data (see below), The aim of the survey is two-fold: 1.) to establish the dimensionality of students’ adjustments for face-to-face learning, and 2.) to explore if a wider student samples share the views of students in the focus groups. This will ensure that the content and design of the OPIPS will address the needs of the whole student population. A critical output of Stage 2 is the Student Adjustment to Face-to-Face Tool (SAFT). For the empirical approach, we will adhere to the best practices on scale development outlined by Worthington and Wittaker (2006). This empirical approach is described in the next section.

Data Analysis Plan

We will employ thematic analysis, following the six steps outlined Braun and Clark (2022), to identify the adjustments needed by students to resume the face-to-face classes. The first step will involve familiarising the data by re-reading it several times. Second, the first and third authors will independently generate codes and collate data relevant to each code. Third, they will search for potential themes and organise the codes based on these themes. Fourth, the second and fourth authors will review the themes, focusing on similarities and disagreements. Any disagreements will be discussed, and in cases where the disagreements cannot be resolved, all other authors will veto the decision. Fifth, the themes will be named. The ongoing analysis will refine each theme’s specifics and the overall narrative. Each theme will be clearly defined. Finally, the final report will be written. Interview extracts will be carefully selected and embedded in the narrative to provide compelling evidence.

The survey data will be analysed primarily by the first and fourth authors. This is the empirical approach to tool development. Before pilot testing the tool, expert validation will be carried out. Two experts will be recruited to review each item, ensuring we have captured the constructs we are measuring and the items are properly worded. The pilot test results will be analysed for reliability and validity measures. The results of the pilot test will be used to revise the tool. The final analysis will involve exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis. The survey data will be screened for outliers, and missing values will be imputed using full information maximum likelihood (FIML). EFA will be performed using SPSSv23 and CFA using AMOS Graphics 23, JASP and WarpPLS. Data screening and initial analysis for factorability will be conducted using the conventional method, including item correlations, Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin of sampling adequacy and Bartlett’s test for sphericity. In determining the final EFA model, we will investigate the eigenvalues, scree plot, and cross-loadings, and we will include only items with factor loadings greater than .30 (Kline, 2010). For the CFA, fit indices will be used to evaluate the most parsimonious model, including non-significant chi-square statistics. The Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI), and Weighted Root Mean Square Residual (WRMR) values should be closer to 1, and Root Mean Square Error Approximation (RMSEA) value should be less than .05 (Kline, 2010; Tabachnick & Fidell, 2007).

Development of the Online Intervention Program

The survey results will be discussed with the research team, psychologists, and curriculum designers to develop the program, including the modules (the details and the number of modules will be determined after data analysis), and the process for implementing the OPIS. The content, activities, and process will be determined based on the survey results and interview data. We will employ educational developers and graphic artists for the digital uplift of the online program. Part of the output is a policy brief outlining processes, support and resources teachers and students need.

The proposed design of the OPIPS involves the following mechanisms. Students will undertake self-assessment using the SAFT developed in Stage 2. The results will be analysed at the backend of the OPIPS platform. The results will generate suggested critical areas of adjustments (dimensions) for individual students. These key areas are aligned with the modules developed to help students develop specific approaches to address those areas needing more support. Although a certain number of modules is suggested, students can engage in all modules.

The OPIPS will be piloted with 20 students to test its consequential validity. These students will be recruited, and after completion of the program, they will be interviewed to identify aspects of the program that need improvement. The OPIPS will become an integral learning activity for all students of DOrSU. An induction program will be conducted to guide students on how to use the online resource. The DOrSU administration commits one person to monitor the engagement of students. Students’ engagement in and completion of the program will be analysed for further action and policy articulation.

After every iteration of the OPIS implementation, an ongoing evaluation will be employed to gather useful information for the improvement of the program (Owen, 2006). The evaluation activity will utilise a systematic approach using short-term impact evaluation to assess the progress and effectiveness of the proposed intervention program (Fitzpatrick et al., 2012). This type of evaluation is typically used to gather information on the immediate outcomes and impact of the program. It helps the technical group to modify, continue or discontinue the intervention program.

Risk Assessment and Management Plan

This section outlines the risk assessment and management plan to ensure timely completion of the research. The risks that will potentially impact any aspect of the research are identified and a contingency plan is outlined (see Table 1).

Table 1.

Risk Assessment and Management Plan.

Potential Risk	Level of Impact	Risk Level	Consequences	Anticipation Plan	Contingency Plan
Stratification of sample	High	Medium	Data will be skewed only to certain demography of students	Strengthen the recruitment of participants and monitor the number of students for each demographic variable.	Extend the data gathering for another 2 weeks if the target number of students is not yet reached.
Online survey technical glitch	Medium	Low	Sudden disruption to the internet connection while answering the survey will lose the data.	The online survey will be designed for automatic saving.	Students are given multiple access to the survey to continue answering in case disruptions occur.
Limited availability of resources to address the needs of students	Medium	Medium	The content and program design will be limited	Explore what resources are available from other SUCs that express their interest in the program.	Collaborate with other psychologists in other SUCs.
Vulnerable students (psychologically and intellectually distressed students)	High	Medium	Data will be limited, as well as the program design.	Under any circumstances the respondents/students feel distressed during the survey, he/she may withdraw from the survey.	Ensures the students/respondents the confidentiality of the activity and assists in the conduct.
Withdrawal of data (participants) after the survey is conducted	High	High	Data will be skewed	When respondents withdraw from their participation, the team will recruit another respondent.	Discuss the confidentiality of the activity and recruit another respondent.