Brick and mortar.
Posted on 10/02/2012 6:58:03 PM PDT by Kaslin
Enrollment in online schools has increased twelvefold in Ohio since the first internet-based school was created in the state in 2000, The Gazette Medina reports.
More than 30,000 students are currently enrolled, most of them concentrated in seven statewide cyber schools. Only Arizona had more students in online schools, according to the news report.
Online schools, and other forms of digital learning, are an inevitable and promising form of education for the 21st Century, unless special interest forces are able to keep technology from becoming more integrated into everyday education.
Professor Gary Miron of the National Education Policy Center is a leading voice for those special interests, which include teachers unions and the education establishment in general. He suggested that online schools in Ohio may not be properly serving their students due to a lack of state regulation.
“Miron … said Ohio has fewer requirements for online schools than most other states. He cited items like financial reporting, student-to-teacher ratios, and how long students have to stay in a school or pass state tests in order for schools to receive state money,” the newspaper reported.
And?
Miron states those facts as if they’re negatives. Toledo schools may have more “financial reporting,” but does that make them better? The Columbus teachers’ contract may mandate “student-to-teacher ratios,” but does that make the most sense? The state may dictate how long some students must stay in school, but is that always in the best interest of students?
The educational establishment prefers more regulation for alternative school choice options, presumably to make them less attractive to students and families.
The National Education Association – the teachers union that funds Miron’s opinions – wants a one-size-fits-all, government-run monopoly where kids are assigned to schools based on where they live, regardless of that school’s performance. Union leaders don’t want options for parents. They don’t want competition from for-profit operators because they know they’ll lose business.
But competition is what they’re getting. Now that Ohio has lifted the cap on the number of online schools, watch for even more students to exercise their newfound freedom, which is the American way.
Well, you’ll be happy to know that is about where fighter pilots or engineers test at. It’s a good IQ.
Long ago - right after we came over on the Mayflower and before computers and the internet - our local junior college offered basic courses via a local TV station. The classroom session was taped live and then replayed at a later time. Students had a choice to either attend actual class on campus or watch from the comfort of their living room. Of course we also had books back then, nothing digital. Only had to go to the campus to take tests and turn in papers.
It was not only very inexpensive but a great time saver and easy way to pile up the college credits on core curriculum courses.
I was pretty good at math it was English and grammar that was my hold up. It didn’t interest me at all. Math and science was bad because I would pick it up right away and then have to wait for the rest of the class. If something interested me I usually breezed right thru it. If it didn’t interest me it was pure agony. History I had mixed results on. American history was fun but European history was horrid. I think it’s just as hard to be held back as it is to not be able to keep pace. By the time I got thru high school I hated school.
“The state bureaucrats and teachers are scared to death their lock on “education” will be broken — and they will fight tooth and nail to preserve their monopoly.”
They’ll need every weapon at their disposal, as the urban permanent underclass heads out into formerly-middle class suburbs armed with gubmint rent vouchers. Those taxpayers left in those areas will do anything to keep their kids out of schools filling with “cash-for-kids” animals. In my area private schools are being driven to extinction by our property taxes (most of which go to public schools), so any public-school option that doesn’t involve ghetto kids will be vigorously pursued.
Unfortunately, traditional public school is now “be sort of requested to show up, but not forced because that might hurt your feelings or self esteem and we can’t have that, so you can study members of the opposite sex intensely for an hour while someone who has no real grasp of the ostensible subject matter blathers on and on about why Heather Has Two Mommies instead of, say, math.”
MANTRA!
BALONEY!
Are you still in school? If not, do you not have a 'social' life?
Public schools segregate students in same age groups, an unnatural setting that they won't encounter again - in time wasting classes...programming them to be good little worker bees.
Individuality is tampered down, conformity is the drum beat.
Yes, there are people who need the structure, who need someone else to plan the hours of their days, who have little ability to be self-activated.
There are others who are hampered by such settings.
One size, like 800 calorie lunches, does not fit all.
Yep... technology will tear down the brick-and-mortar school in the same way that technology is eroding away the power of the mainstream media. (Interesting how we have a term for both of these institutions to distinguish them from their Internet-based counterpart, isn’t it?)
In any case, I think my story is typical. I’m an English teacher at an Alaskan Bush school. I wanted to earn a master’s degree - which the University of Alaska Fairbanks was more than willing to provide at confiscatory rates after years of study. I found an online school sponsored by DePauw University in Chicago that gave me the education I wanted for one-third the cost in 18 months, and, most pleasantly, with none of the politically correct crap which floods the education classes at UAF. In fact, the classes were well presented and gave me lots of good information.
I can easily see most post-secondary degrees being awarded this way in the near future. Certainly there will be a need for hands-on classes in disciplines where it is appropriate, but other classes which are based on reading, research, and discussion have no need for a physical location.
I like where we’re headed. It was great living in the Alaskan Bush and still working alongside folks in New Orleans and Wisconsin, with the professor in Florida. Competition is excellent for my profession - someday we’ll have real choice - but until then, this is a great step in that direction.
Whole ball of wax.
I got excited, and predicted, that the ability to learn at home would become available way back before the Internet and DVD's. I was excited that vhs tapes could provide classes - then along came the Internet. Best thing for education ever to come down the pike.
Of course the government will hamper it anyway they can. They lose power, money and the ability to brainwash.
But it WILL prevail.
Have you checked with some ‘home school’ groups on the law that allows such students to still participate in some classes at public school?
I know students who do this.
Back in the 70’s I took a video course when that was rather new. I loved it. I could watch it at home, or go to the library and pop the tape in at my convenience. I very much prefer online classes to keep my nursing license current. My daughter did 2 semesters of online clasess and absolutely hated them, despite starting on a computer at 18 months old. She also wants a physical textbook in her hands, and it can’t be used, either. On top of that, the online classes were more expensive than on campus classes and she was watching recycled videos.
People learn differently and one size doesn’t fit all. School was torture for me, having a high IQ. A history teacher threatened to fail me if I missed another day of class. I asked him how he could justify that if I had a B+ and never cracked the book. In a small town, his personal war stories were crap compared to his neighbor who’d been in the Bhutan Death March. Maybe he was jealous I was friends with the guy’s daughter.
Back in the early 90s when online schools first became available, it was a Godsend for a colleague with a child that had ADHD and was being abused by his teacher and the school system. It made a huge difference for him and he finally started learning. Again, one size doesn’t fit all.
Thanks for that info!
Brick and mortar.
I was kind of mixed in math. I had the lowest grades in my math classes until around age 15. I’m still not sure what happened, but it was like something shifted inside my brain. Instead of being an endless list of rulas and tables, math suddenly became a language, and I could speak it, fluently. I went from being the slowest in my math class to being the one my classmates came to for help. It also stuck. Even now, I can look at something moving and “see” vector equations swirling around it. Most of my old classmates, the ones who were great at memorization and regurgitation, don’t even remember their algebra.
Math class went from being impossibly frustrating, to being boringly frustrating. I think an online school might have helped both of those stages.
I agree with your one size doesn’t fit all which is why it’s so great to have so many options. My oldest grandson tried taking one class on-line in a core subject but just didn’t have enough self-discipline to stick with it. He’s always been an “around to it” kind of kid though. Too bad because the cost of tuition was more than off set by the cost of driving too and from campus which was quite a distance.
I have to “attend” a lot of webinars on-line dealing with all the new Obamacare changes and they just drive me crazy. But it may be the subject matter and the fact that other attendees are always interrupting with questions instead of just listening. All I want is the basics and I’ll figure everything else out!
My son teaches at a private Baptist school and they are beginning to integrate some on-line classes for the 7th and 8th graders with their regular classroom work. He loves it. Says most of the kids pay more attention to it than they do to their teachers and it also opens up whole new avenues for discussion.
bflr
Despite “Public” Union Resistance
Public unions are the scourge of society, and should be illegal.
Private sector unions are a different story.
I’d have liked online skewling.
Oh wait! I’ve got FR!
JR owes me a diploma....
“JR owes me a diploma....”
Indeed. Those of us that have been here a few years deserve a political science degree. My oldest daughter currently isn’t talking to me because she didn’t understand the difference between bills, regulations and executive orders. She doesn’t know who the Speaker of the House is, and I don’t think had ever heard of Harry Reid, and she was a member of Young Democrats in college. Our conversation made her a bit touchy and it was over the Kansas student’s school lunch video, which I thought was pertinent because she’s a teacher. She shouldn’t be allowed to vote. She’s completely clueless and uninformed. She was raised by her dem father :( I’ll spare the court system tirade.
You’re kewel.
Why did you stop skydiving?
I am recovering from torn rotator cuff surgery and that is one of the things I will be doing next year after I heal and for my 50th birthday.
God hasn’t seen fit to take me home so I thought I’d hasten things along. LOL
Jeest keeding. I have helicopter snowboarded and always wanted to sky dive.
“Why did you stop skydiving?”
I had a knee injury from helicoptering my skyboard, later compounded by a bad wind gust on landing. I was pretty thrilled to survive helicoptering. I love skydiving. I gave up flying to jump. I sold my Honda 750 Shadow to learn how to fly. Now, with every limp around the house, I have really happy memories. I’m a woman, I flew a skyboard, and I lived to tell about it. If I weren’t a nurse, I’d probably let some yahoo in a disease ridden hospital fix my knee.
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