Learning Online
Is A State Mandate To Implement Virtual Education Helping Or Hurting Our Students?
Katelyn Kurzynowski says online classes saved her education; Madyson Basch says she learned more in one online German class than she did in three years of regular Spanish classes; and Emily Ross says she takes online classes when she wants some free time.
These comments from three 11th grade students well represent the wide range of opinions about online learning in general: integral, effective, a waste of time.
Then there’s the law’s opinion. According to Michigan Merit Curriculum Law, public school students in Michigan are required to complete "at least one course or learning experience that is presented online" in order to graduate.
Nearly one third of high school students in Traverse City Area Public Schools take an entire class online, says Dan Overski, the district’s online learning coordinator and an assistant principal at West Senior High. He says flexibility in scheduling is the biggest reason students sign up for an online class.
"It allows for them to do things like sports and other activities, and hold down a job or attend college, while in high school," he says.
VIRTUAL SCHOOL
Katelyn Kurzynowski has severe arthritis that can make it difficult to even get up in the morning, much less go to school. She’s enrolled in the Suttons Bay Virtual School – even though she lives in Jackson.
Suttons Bay has taken online learning to a new level with its 240-student virtual school. While many of the students are from other states, all are counted as Suttons Bay students when it comes to funding, although the funding process is complicated, says superintendent Christopher Nelson.
Nelson says money isn’t the motivator for the Virtual School. "We spend about as much as we generate in revenue," he explains.
Each online student is provided with a laptop and wireless card, if needed, and teachers are paid a $50 annual stipend for each online student they mentor. The classes and equipment are free for participating students.
Suttons Bay can enroll students from its own intermediate school district, contiguous intermediate school districts, schools of choice students and – thanks to a grandfather clause – students in and near Jackson, Michigan. This clause includes Kurzynowski, who will graduate with a diploma from Suttons Bay High School.
Kurzynowski has the option of attending a learning center in Jackson, which she says she does once or twice a week. There are teachers there and other students, which she explains is the only part of regular high school that she misses. She says she loves the education she’s receiving.
"It’s very interactive," she says. "And they definitely make sure you understand what you’re trying to learn."
THE CLASSES
In 1998, the State of Michigan developed its own online program, Michigan Virtual University. During the 2013-14 school year, the Virtual University had more than 21,000 course registrations. It also offers training for online teachers.
Michigan Virtual University is offered at TCAPS and is most popular for Advanced Placement classes, says Overski, although courses are available for kindergarten through 12th grades.
In its 2014 year-end report, Virtual University shared that 77.5 percent of students completed or passed the courses they took. To pass a course, a student must earn a grade of 60 percent.
Overski says 80 percent of TCAPS students who take online classes earn a passing grade, which is a D or above.
Madyson Basch’s German class was taught through the Virtual University and she earned As in both sections she took.
"I learned more than I did in three years of Spanish," she says. "The cultural things were good. You have to sing a German song and record it. We were always working on vocabulary with pronunciation, videos, reading stories."
Basch says she could call, email or direct message the teacher, who was somewhere in Michigan. The teacher would send corrections via typing or audio message.
More than 80 percent of Virtual University students sign up because a course they want isn’t available locally. Courses include agriculture, natural resources, engineering, technology, foreign languages and, surprisingly, physical education.
Overski says online physical education actually makes a lot of sense.
"It’s more of a health component," he says.
THE SOFTWARE
Many local districts also use software from Edgenuity, a company that serves schools in 50 states. It’s often called E2020, which is what students see when they log in to the system. TCAPS buys a district-wide Edgenuity license that costs between $40,000 and $60,000 a year, Overski says.
Emily Ross "wanted a free hour," so she took U.S. History, Introduction to Psychology and Civics through E2020.
"Honestly, you really don’t learn with the online classes," she says bluntly. "It’s stuff that gets into your short-term memory, but not really long-term." She says the classes are timeconsuming, "but they’re easier than a real class."
Nik McLane is lead teacher at Round Lake High School, an alternative school within Charlevoix Public Schools. He uses E2020 and says a lot of students are savvy enough to find workarounds and shortcuts to its online testing and coursework.
For instance, Edgenuity has journaling activities that look for keywords, not content, and students quickly learn to include the keywords to get a perfect score. Conversely, McLane explains, a student can write a wonderful essay, and receive a low score from the software simply because not enough keywords were included. McLane wishes teachers would look at "every single writing exercise" for content, instead of having the software skim for keywords.
DRAWBACKS
One major problem with online classes that is cited by students, educators and parents alike is procrastination. Overski says TCAPS checks on student progress weekly via a color-coded report that shows how much each student has accomplished. Students are also emailed weekly reports.
"You see [procrastination] in a traditional classroom too, even when there’s a teacher breathing down their neck," says Overski. "For the most part, the students figure it out, they find a comfortable pace [but] some of them gave up all of their Christmas break to get caught up."
McLane warns his students about procrastinating, as well as cramming.
"Most teenagers can’t sit still for more than 30 to 40 minutes," he says. "So they shouldn’t try to work for three to four hours straight."
The Suttons Bay Virtual School has set up an academic calendar to record student progress, and students who fall behind receive a phone call from their teacher/mentor.
"You can’t not do it on a daily basis," says Fred Wille, director of Suttons Bay Virtual Schools. "We have checks and balances."
Wille says the Virtual School drops students who fall too far behind. It also requires students to send weekly emails to their teachers.
Students and educators also agree that cheating can be a big problem. Some students say it’s easy to look up answers online. There are even websites devoted to E2020 answers.
"You can’t stop cheating. You can only discourage it," Overski says.
The Traverse City high schools have a testing center with a proctor who monitors student behavior and Wille says many tests have timers so the software can tell if a student is taking time to look elsewhere for answers.
McLane’s alternative school is configured to allow teachers to see all students’ computer screens on one monitor, so they can tell if a student opens another tab or window to possibly look for answers. There are also settings in the E2020 software that can lock a student out of a test if another tab is opened, he says.
McLane says he’d like to see continually changing tests so there can’t be websites devoted to answers. He says it’s also possible to block cheating websites when they know about them.
Kurzynowski is appalled at the very idea of dishonesty in online learning.
"I can look up words, but Googling answers? That’s cheating."
SUCCESSFUL TYPES
Kurzynowski’s attitude toward cheating brings up an opinion shared by many educators: it can take a certain type of student to succeed in an online class.
"They have to be responsible," says Wille. "If you’re involved and engaged and someone who can get to the time requirements, then you’ll be successful," says Overski.
Boyne City parent Ruth Knitter says that there can be issues with online learning because students are largely on their own. Her daughter Hannah is "a very self-motivated kid and I think they would need that. There’s nobody reminding her she has a test tomorrow or when a project is due," Knitter says. "Overall, I’m for it. It gives them more options now."
Some educators say online learning can be a great introduction to college because so much of the work is done independently.
"There’s some face time together, then you go away and work on some stuff online, then come back and meet with the teachers," says Wille.
Hannah Knitter is an honors student at Boyne City High School and she enrolled in two online classes this school year. She chose one tough course and one not-so-tough one.
"Intro to Social Media I chose because I had a blank space in my schedule," she says.
Her mom understands. "Even when you’re in college there are so-called blow off courses. My son took archery," Ruth Knitter said.
McLane teaches two hours a day in a regular classroom and two hours a day in an online classroom. He prefers the regular classroom.
"In a traditional classroom, if I see a student struggling or not understanding a question, I can rephrase the question, or approach it from a different way, or give an analogy or something like that. The online program is not going to be intuitive enough to do that."
Freelance writer Sheri McWhirter contributed to this story.
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