Facilitating cognitive presence in online professional doctoral education: implications for practice-based programs

ABSTRACT This study employs the Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework to examine strategies that foster cognitive presence in a specific discipline context – the professional education doctorate (EdD). The article presents the results of a qualitative inquiry revealing how a cohort of doctoral students (n = 15) developed cognitive presence in an online Practicum course that aimed to move students through the dissertation process. We analyse participants’ perceptions of how instructional strategies impacted their skills in conducting practitioner research and to what extent they were able to apply the new learnings to practice. The findings indicate that engaging students in an authentic, dissertation-focused pilot study, as well as regular discussions of progress with peers enhanced cognitive presence related to practitioner inquiry. Although teaching presence was key in building a community of inquiry, instructors need to also be purposeful in course design to develop cognitive presence to support students’ dissertation progress. The study underlines approaches for using CoI in online EdD education to design spaces for collaborative construction of knowledge, development of practitioner-research skills, and the application of solutions to problems of practice as key tenets of scholarly practitioner preparation.