Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The information in the article is good and interesting, but I think the following changes should be made before advising its publication:

The article should be structured in the following sections:

1. Introduction – I see this section correct.

2. Review of Literature – I see this section correct.

3. Methods and Procedures – This section should begin with the information you have in sections “3. Purpose of the Study” and “3.1. Research Questions”, and then put what you have in section “4. Methods and Procedures”, but the latter must be much more detailed. It should talk more about the methodology used, what type of studies it is used for and whether its use is correct for this type of study, all this must be accompanied by adequate bibliographic references. In addition, you should also comment on how the interview is structured and describe in greater detail the profile of the interviewees, to give greater significance to the results.

4. Results and Discussion – I see this section correct.

5. Conclusions – This section should begin with the conclusions reached in the study (which you have at the end of the “Results and Discussion” section) and then add the information you have in the “6. Limitations of the Study” and “7. Implications for Future Research”.

Also, you should add more current references in the "References" section. But don't forget to cite the references you add in the text.

Do not forget to enter the author and affiliation details of the authors under the title.

And add this information before the “References” section (as it comes in the template): Supplementary Materials, Author Contributions, Funding, Data Availability Statement, Acknowledgments and Conflicts of Interest.

Author Response

Please rereview as an article and not a research paper

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper has high originality, but  less generalizability 

Author Response

Please rereview as an article and not a research paper

Reviewer 3 Report

The purpose of this article is to examine the perceptions and attitudes of administrators regarding online learning, as well as their experiences in various online learning environments.
It uses a qualitative study as a tool to achieve its objective, but it is excessively limited. Only 7 people were interviewed via telematic means. All from the same university, and no further information is available. Areas of responsibility, fields of knowledge represented, ....
Although the authors finally state that the objective of the study is to serve as a guide for the planning of online training, the scope of the work is excessively limited. I consider that, if the final result of the work is the detailed design of a comprehensive study to achieve the initial objective, the article may be of interest; otherwise, I do not consider its publication in this journal to be appropriate.
In the event that this redefinition of the article is considered by the authors:
The introduction would need a reconsideration according to the changes in the body of the article.
The literature review is correct, although it should serve as a starting point for the design of the broader study, and thus confirm or disagree with some of the aspects pointed out in this section.
A reformulation of the purpose of the study is necessary.
The methods and procedures section should detail the context of the study (number of interviewees, areas of knowledge, administrative responsibility, ....), as well as details of the questions raised for confirmation or rejection.
The results section should include the detailed design of the new study.
The discussion section should include the hypotheses to be tested and the specific results obtained, taking into account the literature reviewed and the novelties incorporated in the article itself, which should be considered as a guideline for the definition of the new design.
For all these reasons, I consider that if the objective, purpose, methods and procedures are reformulated, a new revision could be considered after these major modifications.
Alternatively, it would be to reject the article and suggest to the authors a reformulation of the work to be taken into consideration in a new submission.

Author Response

Please rereview as an article and not a research paper

Reviewer 4 Report

ID: education-1347961, entitled " Administrative Perceptions Regarding Supervision of Online Teaching and Learning" EDUCATION SCIENCIES

Reviewer: VMS

1         Summary of the research and your overall impression

1.1         Reviewer comment:

The manuscript studies administrators’ perceptions, attitudes, and experiences managing various online learning environments.

First of all, congratulate the authors for their choice of topic and their interest today. As they say “understanding administrators’ experiences and perceptions can facilitate better course design for future courses, which can result in better student and instructor experiences and may even improve class retention”.

This article is intended to provide, in a concise and conversational manner, practical recommendations to leaders of online programs.

However, a few brief comments regarding major issues to review are made below in case the author wants to take them into account.

2         Discussion of specific areas for improvement

2.1         Major issues

2.1.1        Reviewer comment:

2.1.1.1        Methodology

This section requires more subsections and explanation about the participants of the study, the instruments of evaluation, the process, the statistical analysis etc. The article provides very little information on this.

Code, Codifying, Categorizing, families etc.

The discussion does not present any reference or contrast with other studies

Another thing that is curious is that the article do not present conclusions.

A statement could have been followed.

Author Response

Please rereview as an article and not a research paper

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Although some changes related to the structure have not been made (changes that were advisable, but not mandatory), it is true that they have improved the information and its publication is recommended.

Author Response

Dear Reviewers:

We would like to express our gratitude for providing us with part of your valuable time to review our manuscript. We will address the modifications to the manuscript based on your feedback.

“3. Methods and Procedures – This section should begin with the information you have in sections “3. Purpose of the Study” and “3.1. Research Questions”, and then put what you have in section “4. Methods and Procedures”, but the latter must be much more detailed. It should talk more about the methodology used, what type of studies it is used for and whether its use is correct for this type of study, all this must be accompanied by adequate bibliographic references. In addition, you should also comment on how the interview is structured and describe in greater detail the profile of the interviewees, to give greater significance to the results.”

We renumbered and moved the sections to read as your feedback indicted. More detail and citations were added to the Methods and Procedures section. A clarification was added as to why this type of qualitative research is the appropriate for the problem being studied. Given the Northern Arizona University Institutional Review Board guidelines, we could not provide greater detail of the profile of the interviewees.

“5. Conclusions – This section should begin with the conclusions reached in the study (which you have at the end of the “Results and Discussion” section) and then add the information you have in the “6. Limitations of the Study” and “7. Implications for Future Research”.

Thank you for identifying the existing sections that could serve as conclusions. A “Conclusions” section has been added.

“Also, you should add more current references in the "References" section. But don't forget to cite the references you add in the text.”

We added more references and, to our knowledge, all of them are cited in the body of the manuscript.

“Do not forget to enter the author and affiliation details of the authors under the title.”

Done. We could not add the specific citation on the left column given to problems with text formatting. For some reason, the column would lose its measures and provoked that the entire manuscript moved to an undesirable format.

“And add this information before the “References” section (as it comes in the template): Supplementary Materials, Author Contributions, Funding, Data Availability Statement, Acknowledgments and Conflicts of Interest.”

Done.

Again, thank you so much for your feedback and for taking the time to rereview our manuscript.

Reviewer 3 Report

The authors' response seems to me neither sufficient nor satisfactory, since it does not use any specific argument.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer Three:

We would like to express our gratitude for providing us with part of your valuable time to review our manuscript. We will address the modifications to the manuscript based on your feedback.

 "The purpose of this article is to examine the perceptions and attitudes of administrators regarding online learning, as well as their experiences in various online learning environments. It uses a qualitative study as a tool to achieve its objective, but it is excessively limited. Only 7 people were interviewed via telematic means. All from the same university, and no further information is available. Areas of responsibility, fields of knowledge represented.”

Our study is very limited in both number of participants as well as being from the same institution. These two limitations are purposeful as we direct findings from this small initial study at our own institution and at those individuals who have been working, planning and providing program and course planning first.

“Although the authors finally state that the objective of the study is to serve as a guide for the planning of online training, the scope of the work is excessively limited. I consider that, if the final result of the work is the detailed design of a comprehensive study to achieve the initial objective, the article may be of interest”

The answer to this question is yes. This initial study will lead us to the development of a much more comprehensive study which is already in the planning stages.  

“In the event that this redefinition of the article is considered by the authors:

The introduction would need a reconsideration according to the changes in the body of the article.

The literature review is correct, although it should serve as a starting point for the design of the broader study, and thus confirm or disagree with some of the aspects pointed out in this section.

A reformulation of the purpose of the study is necessary.”

Thank you for the suggestion. We included it in the text of the revised article.

“The methods and procedures section should detail the context of the study (number of interviewees, areas of knowledge, administrative responsibility, ....)”

Please allow us to point you to lines 255 and forward for this information.

“The results section should include the detailed design of the new study.”

As indicated above, the study is already in the planning stages, but it is not yet ready to share in this manuscript.

“The discussion section should include the hypotheses to be tested and the specific results obtained, taking into account the literature reviewed and the novelties incorporated in the article itself, which should be considered as a guideline for the definition of the new design.”

Thank you again. We have added a good amount of literature reviewed to strengthen our discussion of the results. 

Reviewer 4 Report

In particular, I would have liked to receive an individual response for each of the comments made.
From my point of view, the improvements are insufficient and must be improved. Especially the methodology section.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer Four:

We would like to express our gratitude for providing us with part of your valuable time to review our manuscript. We will address the modifications to the manuscript based on your feedback.

“1         Summary of the research and your overall impression

1.1         Reviewer comment:

The manuscript studies administrators’ perceptions, attitudes, and experiences managing various online learning environments.

First of all, congratulate the authors for their choice of topic and their interest today. As they say “understanding administrators’ experiences and perceptions can facilitate better course design for future courses, which can result in better student and instructor experiences and may even improve class retention”.

Thank you so much. We appreciate your comment.

“This article is intended to provide, in a concise and conversational manner, practical recommendations to leaders of online programs. 

However, a few brief comments regarding major issues to review are made below in case the author wants to take them into account. 

2         Discussion of specific areas for improvement

2.1         Major issues

2.1.1        Reviewer comment:

2.1.1.1        Methodology

This section requires more subsections and explanation about the participants of the study, the instruments of evaluation, the process, the statistical analysis etc. The article provides very little information on this.

Code, Codifying, Categorizing, families etc.”

We have made considerable modifications to the Methodology section. We disclosed as much information about the participants as allowed by the Northern Arizona University Institutional Review Board. We also added a more detailed explanation on the qualitative ethnographic research methodology to illuminate the issue of the research process. Because we used qualitative research methodology, we did not include any statistical analysis. We hope that the clarification will answer the issues you identified.

“The discussion does not present any reference or contrast with other studies”

We have added many citations to help understand our results on the context of published research.

“Another thing that is curious is that the article do not present conclusions. A statement could have been followed.”

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We have identified a section of the document that should have been labeled Conclusions in our first draft.

Again, thank you so much for your feedback and for taking the time to rereview our manuscript.

Round 3

Reviewer 3 Report

I thank the authors for their efforts to incorporate and adapt the text to the recommendations made. I am also grateful for the detailed response to the questions raised in my review.
I believe that the text has improved substantially and I consider that it meets the requirements for publication in this journal.
However, I believe that a detailed description of how this study will influence the new study proposed for the future would give greater value to the present work.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer Three:

Again, thank you so much for your willingness and dedication to help us produce a well-developed manuscript. We will address the modifications to the manuscript based on your feedback.

“I thank the authors for their efforts to incorporate and adapt the text to the recommendations made. I am also grateful for the detailed response to the questions raised in my review.

I believe that the text has improved substantially and I consider that it meets the requirements for publication in this journal.”

Thank you for your comment.

“However, I believe that a detailed description of how this study will influence the new study proposed for the future would give greater value to the present work.”

We addressed your comment starting on line 617. We hope this is what you were looking for.

We hope that the changes addressed your concerns. Thank you again for your invaluable help and time spent on your reviews of our manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 4 Report

First of all, thank you for the effort and significant improvement you have made to the manuscript.

The methodology is still missing the flow diagram or the tree of categories, domains, codes, etc. of the qualitative analysis.

The conclusions should be limited only to answering the main objective of the study. They should be short and concise.

Before accepting the article I would like to see these small improvements and contributions.

Sincerely,

VMS

Author Response

Dear Reviewer Four:

Again, thank you so much for your willingness and dedication to help us produce a well-developed manuscript. We will address the modifications to the manuscript based on your feedback.

“First of all, thank you for the effort and significant improvement you have made to the manuscript.”

Thank you so much. We appreciate your comment.

“The methodology is still missing the flow diagram or the tree of categories, domains, codes, etc. of the qualitative analysis.”

We added more explanation of the analysis of data as well as a flow diagram entitled Figure 1: Inductive Data Analysis Process. The figure has been included as a supplemental material as we did not find specific directions regarding the inclusion of figures within the body of the manuscript.

“The conclusions should be limited only to answering the main objective of the study. They should be short and concise.”

We added the research questions to the Conclusion, starting on line 549. We believe that this addition will provide better background to the written conclusions, as we believe they are relevant to answer the research questions.

“Before accepting the article I would like to see these small improvements and contributions.” 

We hope that the changes addressed your concerns. Thank you again for your invaluable help and time spent on your reviews of our manuscript.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf