Introduction
Case studies have been used effectively in education to assist postsecondary students to connect theoretical concepts learned in the classroom with practice in real world contexts (Butler, Lee,& Tippins,2006) and to learn to use critical thinking skills in problem solving (Lee,2007). Multimedia case studies were used in this study to teach Management Information Skills (MIS) students about the role of MIS in business, thereby providing an innovative way to effectively expose MIS students to real-life cases of success and failure, an approach recommended by the National academy of Engineering (2004). The broad research question guiding this study was; How beneficial do students find the use of multimedia case studies to be in helping them learn course material? The findings from this study were used to determine how the use of multimedia case studies might be improved. The formative evaluation results of this study were used by instructors to inform their practice in the use of multimedia case studies as a pedagogical tool. Equally important, the findings provide learning opportunities to the author, who was an external evaluator, about what data collection methods yield the depth of response needed to fully answer the research questions. This paper addresses both the students’ perceptions of the use of multimedia case studies and the lessons learned about effective evaluation techniques as a result of conducting the study.