Internet and Higher Education 21 (2014) 53–58

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Internet and Higher Education

Graduate student perceptions of eportfolios: Uses for reflection,development, and assessment

Diana K. Wakimoto a,⁎, Rolla E. Lewis b

a University Libraries, CA State University, East Bay, 25800 Carlos Bee Blvd., Hayward, CA 94542, USAb Department of Educational Psychology, CA State University, East Bay, 25800 Carlos Bee Blvd., Hayward, CA 94542, USA

⁎ Corresponding author at: California State University, EHayward, CA 94542, United States. Tel.: +1 510 885 4287

E-mail addresses: diana.wakimoto@csueastbay.edu (Drolla.lewis@csueastbay.edu (R.E. Lewis).

1096-7516/$ – see front matter © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rihttp://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2014.01.002

a b s t r a c t

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Accepted 29 January 2014Available online 5 February 2014

Keywords:EportfolioElectronic portfolioJob searchAssessmentCounselor education

While there is discussion of eportfolios in many fields in higher education, there is little literature on eportfoliosin the helping professions fields of school counselor and school psychology education. This study sought toexplore graduate students' perceptions of the value of creating eportfolios and ways of improving the eportfolioprocess. Overall, the students found the construction of their eportfolios to be useful in reflecting on theircompetencies and in gaining confidence in using technology. The students also valued the hands-on trainingsessions, peer review opportunities and model portfolios, and technological skills built by creating theeportfolios, which they stated may be useful in job searches. Suggestions for improving the eportfolio processfor future students include having all students only create eportfolios, being more explicit about reflection, andmeeting with students earlier to expose them to the eportfolio platform in order to lessen technology anxietyand increase time for reflection.

© 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Many disciplines and professions have long used physical portfoliosfor assessment, personal development, career searches, and toshowcase work (Bartlett, 2006; Boes, 2001; James & Greenwalt, 2001;Wang, 2010). Many of these disciplines and professions have embracedthe shift to eportfolios, also known as electronic or digital portfolios, as away tomore easily share, update, and collaboratively share the contentsof the portfolios (James & Greenwalt, 2001; Lin, 2008). Previous studieshave explored student perceptions of the value of eportfolios (Kabilan&Khan, 2012; Lin, 2008), instructors' perceptions of eportfolios (Fonget al., 2014), and how eportfolios can contribute to student self-efficacy, creation of communities of practice, and authentic assessmentpractices (Shepherd & Bolliger, 2011; Tang & Lam, 2014; Wang, 2010).Inmany disciplines andfields, theuse of eportfolios has gainedmuch at-tention over the past few years, with the concurrent rise in interest inonline teaching and learning. This interest in eportfolios is unsurprisinggiven the increased interest in online learning and using online technol-ogies in higher education and in the K-12 environment. Helping profes-sionals (i.e., school counselors and school psychologists) work withinthe K-12 environment and need to be current on online learning tech-nologies and tech savvy themselves to be able to succeed as profes-sionals. It would seem logical then to look into using eportfolios ineducation of students in helping professions as eportfolios have been

ast Bay, 25800 Carlos Bee Blvd.,..K. Wakimoto),

ghts reserved.

embraced by other fields as ways of increasing technology skills andshowcasing work (Bartlett, 2006; Kabilan & Khan, 2012; Yu, 2012).However currently, although there is some literature on portfoliosmore generally (Curry & Lambie, 2007; Murphy & Kaffenberger, 2007;Sink, 2009), there is a dearth of eportfolio research in the fields thatmake up the helping professions. This is an important gap to fill to de-termine the value of eportfolios to the professional development andtechnological development of students in helping professions, especial-ly with the drive for evidence and result-based practice (Carlson &Yohon, 2008).

In other fields, eportfolios have continued to gain traction and thereis a lively discourse in the literature about the best practices, uses, andvalue of eportfolios, as well as numerous case studies (Pelliccione &Raison, 2009; Shepherd & Bolliger, 2011). Three main themes emergefrom these previous studies: using eportfolios for summative assess-ment (Cobia et al., 2005), as formative developmental process tools(Cheng & Chau, 2013; Flanigan & Amirian, 2006), and as importanttools for job searches (Boes, 2001; Yu, 2012). Yu's (2012) study ofhuman resource managers showed that recruiters were positive aboutviewing eportfolios submitted by job applicants as awayof gaugingper-formance and abilities, although Yu (2012) noted that eportfolios stillseem to be in their nascent usage in job searching. Eportfolios are obvi-ously not a panacea for learning and can takemuch time and knowledgeon the part of the instructors to implement successfully (Vernazza et al.,2011). For full engagement with eportfolios, studies have shown thatstudents need technological guidance as well as an understanding ofthe goals/outcomes for the eportfolios in order to help the eportfoliotranscend merely as being a collection of documents (Oner & Adadan,2011).

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1.1. Purpose

Eportfolios are being used and extensively studied in many profes-sional disciplines (Bartlett, 2006; Okoro, Washington, & Cardon, 2011;Shepherd & Bolliger, 2011;Wang, 2010) as both formative and summa-tive teaching and learning devices that are able to be translated to careerdevelopment tools and into documents capturing evolving professionalcompetence. However, there is very little published literature for help-ing professions regarding pathways for using eportfolios for profession-al development (Carlson & Yohon, 2008) and no known researchstudies. This multi-year study, encompassing three cohorts of studentsseeks to contribute to the nascent literature of eportfolios in the helpingprofessions and to the larger discourse on eportfolios in higher educa-tion. The study sought to explore students' perceptions of the value ofcreating eportfolios, their potential uses in job searches, and ways ofimproving the experience for future cohorts.

2. Methods

2.1. Setting

Professional Practice Portfolios have been required by the authors'university for graduate students in a combined school counseling orschool psychology with marriage and family counseling program forover 15 years. The portfolios provide a way for students to demonstratetheir professional competencies that are defined by the standards of theCalifornia Commission on Teacher Credentialing, the State body chargedwith credentialing all educators in California. Additionally, those com-petencies are aligned with standards set by the California Associationof School Counselors and the National Association of School Psycholo-gists. The portfolio could also be used in interviews with potential em-ployers as evidence of successful professional practices as notedFlanigan and Amirian (2006) and Yu (2012). Given ubiquitous natureof the Internet in professional work, the program decided that aneportfolio option offered a flexible platform where the students couldshowcase their work, as showcasing work for job searches was seen asthe most noted use of eportfolios by students in a study by Bartlett(2006). This format was most convenient and useful in sharing withprospective employers, as noted previously (Yu, 2012). Additionally,the eportfolios could be used in creating a learning community wheresharing one's professional portfolio with trusted colleagues could be-come integral to an ongoing reflective professional development pro-cess as shown by the positive results in using communities of practicein eportfolio assessment by Wang (2010). The authors selected GoogleSites as the eportfolio platform (http://sites.google.com). Google Sitesis a free website creation and hosting service, which can be easilyadapted to the creation of professional eportfolios without knowledgeof coding.

2.2. Participants

A total of seventy students from the helping professionals (schoolcounseling or school psychology with marriage and family therapy)cohorts from 2010–2011 academic year to 2012–2013 academicyear participated. The participant demographics were: 47%European–American, 25% Latino–American, 7% African–American,and 21% Asian–Pacific Islander–American. The students were splitevenly between the two helping profession programs. Participantswere in their second-year of a two-year school counseling andmarriage–family therapy program or their second or third year of a3-year school psychology and marriage-family therapy program.This study received approval from the Institutional Review Boardand all study participants completed informed consent protocolsapproved by the University.

2.3. Data collection instrument

Researchers developed an online questionnaire (see Appendix A),similar to those used by (Herner-Patnode & Lee, 2009; Lin, 2008).There were ten quantitative questions and six open-ended questions(see Appendix A). Using a Likert scale, the quantitative questionscovered the students' opinions about the usefulness of the eportfolioconstruction in fostering their reflectiveness on their learning (ques-tions 2–4, 8, 9), gaining confidence in using technology (questions 5,7), and using the eportfolio in searching for employment (questions 1,10). For example, the students were asked, “Did constructing theeportfolio help you to see your growth in skill and knowledge acquisi-tion?” as one question related to using the eportfolio for fostering reflec-tion. All other questions used in the questionnaire can be found inAppendix A. These three areas of interest correspond to the themesfound in the literature on eportfolios (Kabilan & Khan, 2012; Oner &Adadan, 2011). The six open-ended questions asked the students toprovide examples of what worked for them during the construction oftheir eportfolios, what areas of their experiences were best capturedin the eportfolio formats, and their reflection of their learning processes(see Appendix A).

2.4. Procedures

During their time in the helping professions program, students cre-ated eportfolios using Google Sites. All cohorts attended three hands-on training sessions in a computer lab on campus on how to constructeportfolios using Google Sites led by a member of the library facultywho has extensive experience using and teaching others to use GoogleSites. Prior to these training sessions, students received rubrics describ-ing the expectations for the eportfolios and the standards that would beused to evaluate the eportfolios by the educational psychology facultymember. Each of these training sessions lasted for an hour. The libraryfaculty member also provided each student with a detailed handouton creating and customizing their eportfolios. This handout has gonethrough ten revisions to incorporate answers to common studentquestions and the changing interface on Google Sites. In order to cre-ate a dialogical community of practice, students presented theireportfolios-in-progress to receive formative feedback from theirpeers in class. They also went through an online peer evaluation pro-cess guided by the eportfolio rubric being used by the faculty in theirsummative evaluation. The educational psychology faculty memberalso provided formative and developmental feedback throughoutthe process.

The eportfolios served both as a developmental tool for thestudents and as a summative assessment at the end of the program.At the end of the academic year, students presented their eportfoliosin class and the instructor graded the eportfolios against the rubric.The students also completed the online questionnaire about theirexperiences at the end of the academic year, after completing theireportfolios (see Appendix A).

2.5. Data collection and analysis

Data were collected through the online questionnaire and the re-searchers analyzed their responses collectively. Descriptive statisticswere used to analyze the quantitative data from the surveys. Inferentialstatistics were not completed due to the small cohorts of students.Structural coding was used to analyze the qualitative data and find cat-egories and patterns in the participants' responses (Saldaña, 2009). Tworounds of coding were completed. The first round coded all the datafrom the responses into categories based on the concepts written bythe students. The second round of coding checked the codes and catego-ries so that patterns could be illuminated. Results were also comparedacross cohorts to determine if there were any differences in theresponses.

Table 1Students agreeing with statements about helpfulness and usefulness of constructing e-portfolios.

E-portfolios were useful in: 2011 Counselors 2012 Counselors 2012 3rd yearPsychologists

2013 Counselors 2013 2nd yearPsychologists

2013 3rd yearPsychologists

Understanding professional strengths and weaknesses 10 (100%) 12 (92.3%) 8 (80%) 8 (89%) 5 (50%) 4 (40%)Reflecting on competence related to the CTC standards 9 (90%) 12 (92.3%) 9 (90%) 9 (100%) 4 (40%) 4 (40%)Recognizing greater confidence in competence relatedto the CTC standards

9 (90%) 13 (100%) 8 (80%) 8 (80%) 4 (40%) 6 (60%)

Recognizing areas for improvement in competence 10 (100%) 13 (100%) 9 (90%) 9 (90%) 6 (60%) 5 (50%)Recognizing growth during program 10 (100%) 11 (84.6%) 9 (90%) 9 (90%) 6 (60%) 6 (60%)Gaining confidence in using technology 9 (90%) 12 (92.3%) 9 (90%) 8 (80%) 8 (80%) 7 (70%)

Other information:Constructing an e-portfolio was a valuable activity 10 (100%) 12 (92.3%) 10 (100%) 9 (90%) 7 (70%) 6 (60%)Creating an e-portfolio was confusing 4 (40%) 7 (53.8%) 6 (60%) 3 (30%) 4 (40%) 4 (40%)Model e-portfolios and sharing was valuable 9 (90%) 13 (100%) 9 (90%) 8 (80%) 7 (70%) 6 (60%)Planning to share e-portfolios with potential employers 10 (100%) 12 (92.3%) 8 (80%) 8 (80%) 8 (80%) 4 (40%)

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3. Results and discussion

Overall, the students found the construction of their eportfolios to beuseful and helpful in reflecting on their competencies and in gaining con-fidence in using technology. Similar results are seen across years and be-tween the school counselor cohorts and school psychologist cohortsexcept for the usefulness of eportfolios in understanding professionalstrengths and weaknesses, reflecting on competence related to theCalifornia Commission on Teacher Credentialing Standards, recognizinggreater confidence in competence, and plans to share eportfolioswith po-tential employers as can be seen in Table 1. Responses to the open-endedquestions showed that the students overall found the eportfolios to beuseful in reflecting on their work and showcasing their skills and knowl-edge. The students also valued the hands-on training sessions, peer re-view opportunities and model eportfolios, and technological skills builtby creating the eportfolios that could be leveraged in job searches.

3.1. Developmental tool

This section discusses the results as they relate to using theeportfolios as a tool to aid in the developmental process of the students.The creation of eportfolios can aid in student reflection on their profes-sional development and growing competencies throughout theprogram. Part of this development is also added by contributing to acommunity of practice built through sharing, helping, and evaluatingeportfolios from fellow students.

3.1.1. Reflection of students & competenciesThe results of this study demonstrate that eportfolios help graduate

students with their reflective process and in creating a documentwhichthey can share with potential employers and add to throughout theircareers. Themajority of the students found that the eportfolios facilitat-ed reflection on their professional practice, especially in relation to thecompetencies they had developed throughout the program. Being ableto see “work as a whole” enabled students to see their growth. Theyalso remembered the work they completed as students, and notedthat they had forgotten some of their accomplishments. In the processof remembering their work, the students both gained perspective onthe developmental nature in becoming professionals and also thecapacity to recall valuable examples of competencies to discuss withpotential employers.

While the majority of the students responded that the eportfolioprocess assisted in reflecting on their work and becoming more reflec-tive practitioners, there were some who did not find the process en-hancing their reflection and noted that “it was more of a task to becompleted.” This may be indicative of the issue that Doig, Illsley,McLuckie, and Parsons (2006) noted, whereby some students becomeso focused on the technological and organizational aspects of eportfoliocreation that they do not reflect on their work. This issue deserves

further exploration and perhaps adaptation of the eportfolio project toincrease awareness of the reflective aspects of the eportfolio creationand to make more explicit the importance of professional and personalreflection in the eportfolio process.

The issue of reflection demonstrates the differences seen betweenthe school counseling students and school psychology students, whichmay have to do with whether the eportfolio was the only portfolio cre-ated by the students. While the school counseling students create oneeportfolio, the school psychology students create both a paper portfolioand an eportfolio. This difference may account for why in the resultsfrom 2013 less than half of the third year school psychology studentssaw the eportfolios as useful for understanding strengths and weak-nesses and for reflecting on competence. These results also showedthat less than half of the second year school psychology students viewthe eportfolio as useful in reflection. As a third year school psychologystudent wrote, “Creating the eportfolio felt redundant because we al-ready created a hard copy portfolio.” This sentiment was echoed byothers who felt that the portfolio helped with reflection while theeportfolio did not and by the second year school psychology studentwho wrote that “writing the real [i.e. paper] portfolio helped me reflectonmy skills but uploading to awebsite did not helpme at all.”However,one third year studentwrote, “I much prefer the eportfolio format tomyhard copy portfolio,” which shows that these feelings were not univer-sal. The tension between the paper portfolio and eportfolio could ex-plain the lower levels of agreement with the usefulness of eportfoliosseen in the responses to the survey. Interestingly this difference inresults was only seen in the 2013 cohorts and not in the 2012 cohorts,even though the school psychology students each year created bothformats of portfolios. The reason for this difference is unclear.

3.1.2. Importance of training and communities of practiceHands-on training in the computer labs and ability to work with

their peer colleagues were two of the most important aspects thathelped students with their eportfolio constructions. The majority ofthe responses on the survey noted that having help at the time ofneed was incredibly valuable. As one student noted, having help duringclass time “definitely eased our anxieties about the process.” This wascorroborated by other students, such as one who wrote, “I was reallyoverwhelmed butwith the help of [the librarian] itmade it somuch eas-ier.” Thesefindings support earlier research byKabilan andKhan (2012)who found that instructors are crucial for the success of the eportfolioprocess. Also of importance to the process were the peer review oppor-tunities and the availability of model eportfolios developed by studentsfrom previous years. The peer review process took place prior to theprofessor's summative eportfolio evaluation. The eportfolio peer reviewprocess consists of: one, ensuring that there is no mere exchange ofportfolios that would enable a peer to evaluate the portfolio ofthe peer who is evaluating his or her portfolio; two, the use of the as-sessment rubric developed by the professor that is used in the

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summative evaluation of the eportfolio; three, the encouragement ofhonest, direct, professional, and formative feedback to peers; four, theopportunity to revise the eportfolio prior to submitting it for final eval-uation by the professor. These opportunities fostered a community ofpractice for the students and were seen as a valuable part of theeportfolio creation process as noted by the positive responses on thequestionnaire that asked about the value of sharing with others andviewing model eportfolios (see Table 1). The peer evaluation processwas then considered part of the overall reflection process in creatingthe eportfolios. Additionally, providing an extensive handout to the stu-dents was very important, especially for use when working indepen-dently to finish the eportfolio. As the students respond well to in-classtrainings, which lessen anxiety caused by learning new tools (such asGoogle Sites), professors who want to incorporate eportfolios intotheir programs need to become very familiar with the technologies inorder to facilitate eportfolio creation.

Successful implementation of eportfolios requires training for bothinstructors and students in the use of the eportfolio platform(Vernazza et al., 2011). Some students, despite being the so-called Dig-ital Natives, are more likely partial “technophobes,” as one student putsit, and not comfortable with website creation. However, if successfullyimplemented, eportfolio creation can help build technology confidenceand skills in students (Kabilan & Khan, 2012; Peters, Chevrier, LeBlanc,Fortin, & Malette, 2006). Professors should take advantage of collabora-tions with other professionals on their campuses when undertakingeportfolio projects. Collaborations, such as those with academic librar-ians or academic technology staff, can enhance the students' experienceand ease both the students' and professor's anxiety over using newtools. This also frees the professor to focus on the reflective and develop-mental aspects of the eportfolios while their collaborator can concen-trate on the technical aspects of implementing eportfolios.

3.2. Continued development, job searches, and future uses

In addition to being used as a professional developmental tool, themajority of students felt that eportfolios are important in aiding in jobsearches and continuing career development. The recognition thatbeing tech savvy was important for future employment was evident inmany of the responses and is a practical reason for incorporatingeportfolios into the educational experience. Respondents wrote, “Notmany programs use an online portfolio so I felt this gave us an edge inthe job search,” the eportfolio was a “very snazzy presentation of mywork,” and it was “something to share with prospective employers.”The findings support the previous work by Peters et al. (2006) and thework by Bartlett (2006) that found that students were most interestedin using their eportfolios when applying for jobs.

While themajority felt that having an online eportfolio was of valueto showcase technological skills and work with potential employers, aminority felt that the eportfolio would not be useful in job searching.As one student wrote, “I believe our audience, the hiring psychologistsare not tech savvy enough to want to use an eportfolio.” Only 40% ofthird year school psychology students from the 2013 cohort were plan-ning on sharing their eportfolios with potential employers; it should benoted that the job market for school psychologists is quite robust andschools are desperate to hire credentialed school psychologists. Thethird-year school psychology students' response should be contrastedwith 80% of the school counseling students and second year schoolpsychology studentswhoplanned on sharing their eportfolioswith pro-spective employers. It is difficult to determine the reason behind thisdifference, although school counselors are expected to know somethingabout and integrate career counseling and development into their pro-fessional work. Also, it might be related partly to the fact that themajor-ity of the third year school psychology students had received job offersprior to completing the survey. In addition, not sharing portfolios withpotential employers by school psychology students might be coloredby the belief that hiring employers are not “tech savvy” and would not

see the value in the eportfolios because the focus of their work will beon assessing students for special education and other services. This isanecdotally countered by reports from school counselors who havegraduated from the program and reported successfully using theireportfolios as part of their job interviewing process. Research into hiringpractices in the school psychology field, similar to the study by Yu(2012), may be able to better illuminate potential reasons for this dis-crepancy and determine if student perceptions of employers not being“tech savy” are accurate.

There are key differences between school psychologists and schoolcounselors in terms of the way career development is viewed from aself-reflective professional perspective, how other educational profes-sionals view each profession, and in terms of how they view their ownjob search. The school counselor's role is much broader than the schoolpsychologist's role. School psychologists are not trained in careercounseling as part of their profession, whereas career counseling is inte-gral to the school counseling profession. School psychologists focus ondemonstrating their psychometric competence and frequently concen-trate their efforts on assessing the special education population, where-as school counselors are trained to develop counseling programs thathelp all K-12 students understand career, academic, and personal socialdevelopment as lifelong processes. The broad program focus of theschool counselor on personal, social, academic, and career developmentorients them to serve the entire school community. Regular and specialeducators view school counselors as delivering more services thanschool psychologists (Gilman & Medway, 2007). Hence, our study mayshed light on those deep differences between the professions and howeach profession sees career development. More research would beneeded to understand how their perceptions of professional role impacttheir understanding of career development and perceptions ofeportfolios. The eportfolio functions primarily as a self-reflective e-learning tool for both groups, but the school counselors in our studyfound that the eportfolio has both professional development and jobsearch functions.

There is a need for more study and dialog about eportfolios as e-learning tools, job search tools, and tools for building communities ofpractice. Although the categories overlap, how the eportfolio is usedand viewed may shift from context to context, as well as person to per-son. For instance, in school psychology the eportfolio may function asmore of an e-learning tool that promotes dialogical exchanges in thecommunity of practice than as a job search tool. For school counselorsthe eportfoliomay function in the samemanner as promoting dialogicalexchanges in the community of practice, but because career counselingis a key domain in their profession and the job market for schoolcounselors is very competitive, the eportfoliomay take onmuch greaterimportance for those school counselors who want to build careercounseling programs or land a job.

Because Google Sites is a free platform, it is available for use by grad-uateswhen they are employed in the school districts and can adapt it foruse in the schools in addition to being able tomaintain their ownprofes-sional eportfolio as they continue their work. As one school counselingstudent noted, “now that I have experienced an eportfolio construction,I will be able to potentially help students (or staff, or schools…) createthem as well.” In this way, the eportfolios are seen as not static, butevolving and something of value to sharewith otherswhen the studentsbegin developing their own school counseling programs.

3.3. Improvement of process

The implementation of eportfolios for students has been a positiveand dialogical process, but there are ways in which the process may beimproved including earlier contact with the students, more explicit in-structions for reflection, and the possibility of creating only eportfolios.Introducing the eportfolio earlier will allow students the opportunity toconsider what evidence to include in their eportfolios as they movethrough the program and more time for reflection. Also, having earlier

Question 1 2 3 4 5

1. Did you find the process of constructing youreportfolio helpful in understanding yourstrengths and weaknesses as a future counselor?

2. Did you find the eportfolio helped you to reflecton your skills and knowledge in relation to theCTC standards?

3. Did constructing the eportfolio help you to seeyour growth in skill and knowledge acquisition?

4. Did constructing the eportfolio help you gainconfidence in your skills and knowledge inrelation to the CTC standards?

5. Did you gain confidence in using technologythrough constructing your eportfolio?

6. Did you find constructing your eportfolio avaluable activity?

7. Did you find the experience of creating youreportfolio confusing?

8. Did the process of constructing your eportfoliolead you to recognize any area or areas where youhave to put more effort in developing yourcompetence and confidence?

9. Did having eportfolio models and sharing with othershelp you construct a higher quality eportfolio?

10. Have you shared/will you share your eportfoliowith potential employers when you are searchingfor employment?

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contact should ease the process of creating the eportfolios by increasingthe number of training sessions thereby allowing the students to becomemore comfortable andmore proficient at using Google Sites.While beingable to use Google Sites is a very important part of creating eportfolios,equally important is the reflective aspect of the process. In order to em-phasize reflection, the instructors will need to find ways to make the re-flective process more explicit for those students who view theconstruction of the eportfolios as only a “method of delivery.” Orientingstudents to eportfolios as a reflective developmental process earlier inthe programmay offer the opportunity for them to introduce eportfoliosin their ownmiddle school and high school placements in order to inte-grate eportfolio development into the school career programs. As part ofthe process of making reflection more explicit, the instructors may alsoconsider moving to only using eportfolios. Creating both paper and digi-tal portfolios seemed to create a disconnect for some school psychologystudents as seeing the paper portfolio as the “real portfolio” and theeportfolio as superfluous, which was not seen in the school counselingstudent cohorts who only create eportfolios.

3.4. Assessment

Eportfolio assessment was both formative and summative. The for-mative assessment and deepening the sense of community of practicewere initiated at the introduction when the school counseling studentswere told that model portfolios developed by previous graduates wereavailable for review; students merely had to email the graduates toask for permission to view their eportfolio. Students were also encour-aged to share access to their eportfolio with their fellow cohort mem-bers. This created an interactive community of practice wherestudents could discuss, reflect, and evaluate individual understandingof professional practice, as described by Tang and Lam (2014). Sharingalso helped each student see how colleagues were enacting practicesgeared to answer one key data-driven and results-based question forschool counselors: How are K-12 students better off personally, aca-demically, or career-wise because of what you and your school counsel-ing program do? Work sessions were structured for the entire group tobe able to share their work at the same time and to discuss the impact oftheir work upon the school counseling program, or groups and individ-uals being served. Prior to turning their eportfolios in for the facultysummative assessment, each cohort member had their portfolioassessed formatively by a fellow cohort member using the portfolio ru-bric provided by the faculty. To avoid quid pro quo, all peer assessmentsweremade by drawing lots, ensuring cohortmembers would notmere-ly exchange eportfolios but be invited to take the responsibility for pro-viding genuine formative feedback. The purpose of such peer evaluationwas to foster dialog between and among students about their profes-sional practice and how what they did made a difference in the schoollives of the K-12 students being served. Faculty summative feedback oc-curred at the end of the process, well after the multiple formative stepsthat defined eportfolio development as an ongoing and evolvingprocesswhere students received numerous opportunities tomeet the standardsdefined in the rubric and illustrated in the eportfolio models.

3.5. Limitations

Although this study contributes to the growing literature of eportfoliosin higher education and contributes greatly to starting the discussion ofusing eportfolios by programs teaching students in helping professionsfields, there are limitations to this study. While the study provides datafrom multiple cohorts of students, the study took place at one universityand as an evolving developmental process for faculty. This contributedalso to the small sample size. These limitations could be addressed by rep-licating the eportfolio experience at other universities and through fullyvalidating the survey. A more nuanced understanding of students' valua-tion of the eportfolio process could also be investigated by using focus

groups or individual interviews to tease out more details on their experi-ences and possible places for improvement in the process.

4. Conclusion

Constructing eportfolios can be a valuable developmental experi-ence and provide a valuable product for students and their instructors.Leveraging technologies such asGoogle Sites allows students the oppor-tunity to prepare professional portfolios to share with each other forhelp and support as a community of practice, their instructors for eval-uation and assessment purposes, and potential employers as evidenceof their professional and technological competencies. Eportfolios there-fore are able to serve many functions and provide a valuable, ongoingplatform for students to record professional achievement throughouttheir careers. While the discussion around the value of eportfolios isstill nascent in the professional counseling field, there is a growingbody of research in higher education literature on the value and possi-bilities of eportfolios. Continued research is needed to both integrateeportfolios into educational psychology, counselor education, and con-tribute further to the interdisciplinary discourse on the uses and valueof eportfolios for students in higher education.

Appendix A. Eportfolio questionnaire

Data collected from this confidential survey will be used for researchon student perspectives of using Google Sites in eportfolio construction.The survey questions will be about your experiences and perspectives ofusing Google Sites to create your eportfolio. You have been invited to par-ticipate because you have created an eportfolio by using Google Sites.

Youmust be 18 years of age or older to participate. There are no risksor benefits to you in participating in this survey. Youmay choose to par-ticipate or not. You may answer only the questions that you feel com-fortable answering, and you may stop at any time. If you do not wishto participate, youmay simply return the blank survey, with no penaltyto yourself. If you do participate, completion and return of the surveyindicates your consent to the above conditions.

Please check the box that corresponds to your answer with 1 =strongly agree, 3 = neither agree nor disagree, and 5 = stronglydisagree.

58 D.K. Wakimoto, R.E. Lewis / Internet and Higher Education 21 (2014) 53–58

A. What about the eportfolio construction did you find valuable?What did you not find valuable?

B. How did/did not constructing an eportfolio help you reflect onyour learning in your program?

C. Did creating an eportfolio help you become a more reflectivepractitioner? If yes, how so?

D. What about using Google Sites as an eportfolio platform workedwell for you? What didn't work well?

E.What areas of your professional knowledge and skills are capturedbest in the eportfolio format?

F. Any other comments:

References

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