The Benefits and Limitations of Online Peer Feedback: Instructors’ Perception of a Regional Campus Online Writing Lab

The socioeconomics of the working-class area where our openadmission regional campus is situated have resulted in a struggle to prepare and retain our underprepared students. The campus tutoring center is central to our retention efforts; to address the needs of our population, we offer both face-to-face and online tutoring. The article reports the findings of an empirical study that looks at writing instructors’ perception of these tutoring services, with emphasis on the online component. The study reveals the participants’ preference for online versus face-to-face tutoring, which has been driven by their students’ socioeconomic characteristics. It also shows a clear preference for the campus online tutoring service that is favored by our instructors over eTutoring, a tutoring service serving students from many Ohio universities. Despite their support for the campusbased online tutoring, our participants pointed out several areas of improvement, such as the need to focus more on higher-order concerns and to address the delays in tutor response. The research emphasizes the need for more tutor training and, more importantly, more resources to be directed toward campus-based online tutoring services.