Online learning and the future of schooling, Part I

Our friends at the Alternative Education Resource Organization (AERO) recently shared this blog post by Francisco Dao on "Why online education is a fantasy."  (AERO emphasized they were just promoting discussion, not endorsing Dao's ideas).  The blog post challenges the notion that online learning, MOOCs, and the internet "will cure all of our education problems."

While Dao raises some important points, I think his blog post misfires on several levels, and suggests the need for a much broader, more thoughtful discussion about online learning and the future of schooling itself.  I'll respond to Dao's argument in two posts.

Dao's chief complaint seems to be that if students aren't motivated to learn online, then online learning won't be successful.  The library has been a source of free, self-directed, self-paced learning for decades, and yet you don't see every kid turning himself into a "self-taught entrepreneur" by biking to the local library instead of going to school. Dao goes on to note that completion rates in online courses are lower than in traditional classes, which have a "fixed structure and ... sense of belonging."

Some of Dao's concerns are certainly merited.  There is a great abundance of poorly-structured, low-rigor online learning opportunities out there, often appearing as components of a "traditional" university learning environment.  The university principal certification program where I teach has struggled against cheaper, fully-online competitors that, I believe, offer a lower-quality learning experience.  But convincing students that they should pay more for a hybrid program like ours, which allows us to have face-to-face interactions and stronger personal relationships, has been a challenge.

And motivation obviously plays a role in all learning settings, whether face-to-face or digital.  I spent four years as principal of an alternative high school for at-risk students.  This was the time when online courses were emerging as the most popular solution for credit recovery, and I quickly discovered that many of my students needed a high degree of monitoring, structure, and support to be successful with these programs.

But I do not see how Dao can draw the sweeping conclusion that online learning "will fail to be the solution to educating the masses."

First, who exactly is suggesting that online learning in general is such a solution?  The abundance of failed one-to-one laptop programs or SmartBoards as glorified overhead projectors has abundantly demonstrated that just putting technology in the hands of students or teachers doesn't really do that much to change the quality or character of schooling. 

No one should assume that just replacing a face-to-face course with something online will contribute to any kind of magical results.  Technology is a tool that may be used well, used poorly, or not used at all.  For at-risk learners, there's no doubt that online learning experiences will need to be well-structured and accompanied by a generous dose of personalized attention.  In some cases, that might require face-to-face interaction, but my own experience of teaching in online environments has taught me that the technology itself can help to facilitate personal interaction, whether through synchronous video conferencing, discussion boards, e-mail, or other media.

All things being equal, would I prefer to also meet my students face to face?  Sure.  And hybrid formats permit me to utilize the best of both online and face-to-face learning.  But increasingly I'm finding that, when carefully planned and utilized, strong interpersonal connections among students and between students and instructors is possible even in fully online environments.

When I consider my own personal and professional learning as an adult, this becomes obvious.  Almost all of the meaningful learning I've engaged in since the end of my formal schooling experience has been mediated by online environments.  I get interested in a topic, usually through some encounter on the Web (often from a social media source), Google to learn more, tweet about it and follow others on Twitter who share the same interest, establish new learning networks, and eventually share ideas and engage in new collaborations with people from around the world via e-mail, Skype, and other platforms. 

Of course, in this respect I am the motivated learner that Dao acknowledges will thrive in an online world.  What about the unmotivated?

Here, I think it's important to ask two questions.  First, why are there so many unmotivated students in our traditional schooling environments?  And second, why do we assume that there are only two options for educating "the masses:" traditional or fully online?  Why aren't we contemplating the full-scale dismantling of schooling as we know it, or pondering what might replace it?  I'll explore these questions in a future post.