Online Education Essay

College students find themselves with differing responsibilities past that of obtaining a degree. Employment and family commitments make similar demands on their time. Having the alternative of taking online classes, allows them to use online classes act as a convenient means for learners that are unable to attend classes due to restrictions such as distance. If students want to travel to another country and still need to achieve a degree, they can take online classes and transfer back to their home colleges. Moreover, some students come from regions where the colleges do not offer the courses they want, so they will be required to take online classes. In the current job market, taking courses online assists employees remain competitive, and are not mandated to take time off from work to enrol in college (Summers, Waigandt & Whittaker, 2005).

The authors analyzed statistics of online learning to determine what they mean. They looked at the growth of online options in institutions. They also compared online learning with traditional learning to determine if it was as effective.

With all the publicity over online courses, great professors alike have been determined to find out whether online courses are just as effective as face-to-face classes. There have been some controversies over the situation; therefore, several studies have been made. One study by Adam Driscoll, Karl Jicha, Andrea Hunt, Lisa Tichavsky, and Greatchen Thompson shows that given the appropriate pedagogy or instruction, online courses is just as an effective teaching format as face-to-face classes (Driscoll, Jicha, Hunt, Tichavsky, & Thompson, 2012). The study showed that when comparing online courses against face-to-face courses, the midterm scores for both teaching platforms are the same. Given that the GPA of the students is taken into consideration, the test grades do not improve or become worse when the class is taken online. The same study showed that when comparing online courses to face-to-face courses, the student satisfaction does not increase or decrease when

In “Reliance on Online Materials Hinders Learning Potential for Students” by David Smith the author argues online education has some benefits students are also able to suffer. Smith begins his article with stating students are lucky for being able to have the amount of access they have to receive education unlike past generations. He goes on by stating “this variety has begun to work its way into academia, as well; more and more, it seems, organized instruction is moving beyond the classroom and into cyberspace” (Smith, Par 3). The “traditional” educational experience is slowly being taken over by the technology world.

Characteristics: Low socio-economic status, from a single parent family, an older sibling dropped out of school, the student had changed schools two or more times, Had average grades of “C” or lower from sixth to eighth grade (National Center for Education Statistics,1992). Online learning within K-12 education is increasing access and equity by making high quality courses and highly qualified teachers available to students. Online learning programs offer courses, academic credits and support toward a diploma. They vary in structure, and may be managed by a state, district, university, charter school, not-for-profit, for-profit, or other institution. Thirty states and more than half of the school districts in the United States offer online courses and services, and online learning is growing rapidly, at 30% annually. This growth is meeting demand among students, as more than 40% of high school and middle school students have expressed interest in taking an online course. The most well-established K-12 online learning programs are more than ten years old, and many programs have between five and ten years of operating experience. The newest programs are building on the expertise of those early adopters, as well as the experience of online learning in postsecondary institutions and the corporate world.

The Internet has also changed the way students learn. Online classes are more readily available compared to several years ago. By means of online classes more adult students pursuing higher education are able to make that dream become a reality. Students attending online classes offer different viewpoints with fellow students and are able to communicate without feeling that a correct answer needs to be given.

Currently, students around the country, even the world, have the choice to either attend a class face-to-face with a teacher inside a classroom or computer-generated classes in online colleges or Universities. Even though they are similar, the differences between the two are somewhat remarkable. Obviously both types of learning require instructions and some form of assessment and they differ in terms of the learning process and communication.

Though there is growth nationally in higher education and online programs, one of the biggest challenges an academic institution faces is that student retention in online programs is lower than in traditional, campus-based programs (Nichols, 2010). Online education has grown to be very popular because it reaches rural and international areas and students can often flex their family and professional time with academic time. Online education is convenient for both the student and faculty, but the faculty must be prepared to face the challenges of online learning such as learning styles, motivation/coaching, and constraints of online learners (Stavredes, 2012). Another responsibility of online faculty is helping with student retention. Many academic

Alisa Stern’s article discusses the boom of online learning in higher education institutions and the major challenges an instructor faces with these online courses. According to Stern, the most challenging thing about an online course is replicating the same learning environment a student would get attending a regular face to face class. She discusses how technology has pushed online learning to become more collaborative and less isolated. Furthermore, Stern has experienced teaching an online courses and discusses the different tools that helped her recreate a conventional learning environment in an online course. Stern mentions that communication played an important role in the way she taught her courses and students felt as if she was interested

With the advancement of new technology, more students enroll in online courses (Spring), but this action alarms some who do not agree with online education. College Sophomore Alexander Spring’s editorial, “Online Learning: The Ruin Of Education,” argues “Online education turns a center into a diploma factory.” However, he experienced online education for only a brief period of time. Instead of providing statistics to support his proposition, he based his entire article on his own negative personal experience. Furthermore, Spring merely presents the harmful aspects of online learning, without acknowledging the benefits online education possesses. In his argument, he said this about his experience, “I had the horrific opportunity to experience online learning for a few weeks.” Contrary to Spring’s beliefs, online learning possesses many positive advantages.

It’s no wonder why millions of students from all around the world opt for online degree programs or take at least one college course through an online platform. Online learning has to be the greatest revolution in contemporary education. It made a huge change in the system and opened great opportunities for everyone who wants to learn

Online college courses are almost becoming traditional for students. Some may perceive that a student does not receive an equal education when taking an online class. People tend to think that if a teacher is not directly giving the information about the subject, the course learning experience is different or unjust. This assumption is wrong according to the perception of many online course takers. Online college courses offer students the advantage to learn on their own time. The skills that a student learns in self-discipline, scheduling to complete graded assignments, and advantages learned with technology gives online classes equal education experience compared to classes on campus.

Technology is changing every aspect in our lives, even the way we learn. Online classes are a rapidly growing trend it today’s society. Online classes are a cost-effective substitute for traditional courses and more convenient for many, so more schools and universities are offering this option. Due to the increase in online course enrollment, people are questioning if students truly learn something from online classes because it’s not a traditional learning environment. Online classes are just, if not more, effective as traditional classes because grades have increased and online discussions provide students with the chance to interact through networking while earning a degree for less than what it would cost to enroll at the same university.

Education has undergone significant changes because of the development of information and communication technology over the 21st century (Lin & Jou, 2012:2). As a convenient and inexpensive way to gain knowledge while pursuing higher education, online learning, a form of training or teaching that takes place over the Internet, has been considered as an alternative to traditional classroom learning (Zhang et al, 2004). This essay will argue that even though online learning has benefit such as flexibility which could outweigh traditional learning, traditional classroom learning might still not be entirely replaced. This essay will discuss positive and negative aspects of online and traditional learning in terms of four criteria:

In many schools, online classes are becoming more available to students. Recent studies show that the use of online classes has been rapidly increasing over the past three years. Currently, there are a total of 6,700,000 students enrolled in all different variations of courses