I like that idea about the kids learning online. Brilliant!
We are in the 21st century, but our education system is still in the 20th. It may had been good at the time, but it's time to update.
The best part is that the children would be at home with their family. Just think of all the money that could be saved in fuel cost (getting kids to and from school everyday) alone?
Yeah I thought it was great - it’s called the Khan Acadamy. Here is a story about it and I was wrong it is even earlier than high school.
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/ff_khan/all/1
The guy started out (he’s an MIT grad so it fits the thread!) by teaching his nephew by video, then he started putting the videos on youtube for his nephew to do practice work, and he saw that his videos were getting thousands of hits. From there he got the idea that a kid watching the video who doesn’t get it can rewind it and watch it again and again until he does get it, where in the classroom they may be too embarassed to ask, or, maybe the class has no time. Eventually he opened the Acadamy where the kids come in to meet with the teachers and show what they have learned, rather than to learn. Brilliant!
Schools need to change and we need more innovative ideas like this one to see which ones work better. The days of the giant school system have to come to an end. They are very close to doing more harm than good, by neglecting half the kids, holding maybe 10% of them back (due to the top 10% not having opportunity to go faster or learn) and the other 40% are stuck learning things that they need to learn, but at the same time not really given much of a chance to figure out what they are good at and what they may want to do with their lives.