Distance Education in Websites for Women

Candemir Ö.

International Women Online Journal of Distance Education (Wojde), cilt.5, sa.2, ss.28-42, 2016 (Hakemli Dergi)

Özet

The websites intended to women and lifetime websites, are comprehensive platforms, whose target groups are women and the context is fashion, personal care, health, relations between women and men and decoration for providing content and information sharing. It is observed, that in Turkey people, who are interested in distance education, created communities with the title “distance education” and discuss subjects in these forums. The “uses and gratifications” of the website users for the mass media are examined, which institutions and issues over the case “distance education” were raised, which expressions for the communication were used, which response of this sites for the needing of the users were used. The study is a web-based content analysis. The analysis results have been reached in accordance with the basic context of the research, of the obtained data and a overall assessment were made. It is appointed, that the site users have shared subjects in themes of Anatolian, Atatürk, Istanbul University and the examinations of the Ministry of education for open and distance education applications, the working of the distance education system, registration procedures, learning methods, group sharing, social relations, second university, the factors of distance education in finding a job, learning environments, fees, military and diploma. It is appointed, that the sharing of the users are firstly a neutral discourse, cause the sheer number of messages for getting information. This was followed by respectively negative and positive discourse about distance education. It is seen, that the persons, who are associated in a way with distance education, not only have made sharing regarding education, but also social relations. In this context the websites for women forums, returned to a platform for questions of people, who are interested in distance education, answers, comments, good wishes, feelings of belonging to a group and friendship feelings, fears, worries, and the shared criticism, and even the marketing of products and services regarding distance education. It is seen, that the websites for women forum are a open way for creating of a community feeling and establishing a emotional bond. This situation makes a current issue for the institution managers of distance education to review their services on student-student interactions or the need to include a more different information channel in the system operation.

Keywords: Women, woman, distance education, open education faculty, education, social Media, woman sites, distance learners, uses and gratifications,Turkey, Anadolu University.