Using Technology to Increase Academic Success

“Can You Be Educated from a Distance,” an insightful essay by James Barszcz, brings to focus some of the benefits and disadvantages of Distance Learning education (DL). In it, Barszcz discusses the mechanics of DL courses available to students, the quality of education DL can offer, and some reasoning behind its rapidly growing popularity. “Can You Be Educated from a Distance” is an engaging article that students of all ages can benefit from.

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.

The history of distance education can be seen in mid 1940s when Sir Isaac Pittman founded a Correspondence College in England in which course material was delivered freely (Silverton, 2011). Over the years this form of education spread to other countries such as Germany, Australia and Canada until the world witnessed the establishment of the world 's first exclusively distance teaching university, the University of South Africa (UNISA) in 1946 (Tait, 2003).

A little over a decade ago a shift began taking place in the in the post-secondary education system. There was a time when a student in pursuit of a higher education had to attend a major university or college campus, and physically sit the classroom environment. However, thanks to technologies non-stop evolution, there are nearly an uncountable number of online classes available for students to take. Students are not limited to just a few courses there are entire degree programs available to them. The explosion of the online classes and programs available to students has been rapid. While this has been considered a positive shift in the education industry by many, it has also been provided some misconceptions, and is not for everyone. It is important for anyone considering an online education to know all the facts about these programs and what their benefits are.

Online education is well established as a viable means of education in both the corporate and academic environments, and it has taken a remarkable pace. A survey undertaken in 2001 of online education instructors conducted by the National Education Association (NEA) indicated that 72% of online learning instructors have a positive opinion about online learning. They believe more students can be reached, learning can be customized and flexible, and interaction can increase among students (Focus, 2001).

Online education has become a huge part in millions of student and teachers lives. It has raised tremendously in the past 10 years. More and more students are shifting from traditional classes to online. Many schools are also moving to online classes as well. It is important for students to see all the many benefits that online education has to offer. Online education is better than traditional education because it is convenient and flexible, there’s self-paced learning, and there is more interaction and a better ability to concentrate.

Distance education has the ability can be a great, as well as, a bad tool to use in the educational system. There are many pros and cons to both sides of the spectrum. In today’s world this is the constant struggle school, education faculties, along with any type of faculties that uses technology.

Self-regulated learning is a total work of the human brain; it entails attention, concentration, self-assessment, change and responsibility for one in learning. Research states that self-regulation possibly have little to do with intelligence and development. Psychologist in the year of 1960 studied how they discovered the ability to delay gratification is by forming the basic for self-control. A person character play a role in the definition of self-regulated learning. Overall research helps strengthens self-regulated learning; which helps with the student’s ability to learn and helps with their behavior.

According to Ryan Lytle of usnews.com, “more than 6.1 million students took at least one online class during fall 2010”

Students take online courses for many different reasons. Those students are usually older, have more hours at work, and need to commute long distance in order to take a class on campus (Huh, Jin, Lee, & Yoo, 2009). Also for some students it is convenient since it may be hard to handle family responsibilities and attend traditional classes at the same time. Thus online classes are a good way to work the education into their busy schedules (Brown, 2012). In other cases students perceive online courses to be easier than traditional ones due to more learning enriching environment in the traditional courses. In fact, according to Driscoll, Jicha, Hunt, Tichavsky, & Thompson (2012) this is related to a higher percentage of lower performing

Education is an important part of people’s lives; it will either make them or break them in the future depending on the careers they choose. Education is greatly diverse today in comparison to the 1950s because of advancements in teaching and other great inventions that provide easier techniques of teaching. One major issue that has been raised is distant learning courses and online education.

part of a series of reports on online learning known as the Sloan Online Survey

With the rapid growth of the Internet, numerous education/training institutes and companies have devoted great efforts and large sum of money to develop e-learning programs for users (Chiu, Sun, et al., 2007). The result of this investment is clearly showing. Online learning became the fastest-growing trend in higher education, quickly surpassing the overall growth of the population enrolled in higher education (Allen & Seaman, 2014)

Distance education has changed and grown a lot from external studies and correspondence education during the last century. Distance education has become a recognized phenomenon today, thanks to technology which has shortened the physical distances.

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