A recent 93-page report on online education, conducted by SRI International for the Department of Education,
has a starchy academic title, but a most intriguing conclusion: “On
average, students in online learning conditions performed better than
those receiving face-to-face instruction.”
Noah Berger for The New York Times Tyler Kennedy, 9, searches the Web at home in California.
The report examined the comparative research on online versus
traditional classroom teaching from 1996 to 2008. Some of it was in K-12
settings, but most of the comparative studies were done in colleges and
adult continuing-education programs of various kinds, from medical
training to the military.
Over the 12-year span, the report found 99 studies in which there
were quantitative comparisons of online and classroom performance for
the same courses. The analysis for the Department of Education found
that, on average, students doing some or all of the course online would
rank in the 59th percentile in tested performance, compared with the
average classroom student scoring in the 50th percentile. That is a
modest but statistically meaningful difference.
“The study’s major significance lies in demonstrating that online
learning today is not just better than nothing — it actually tends to be
better than conventional instruction,” said Barbara Means, the study’s
lead author and an educational psychologist at SRI International. This hardly means that we’ll be saying good-bye to classrooms. But
the report does suggest that online education could be set to expand
sharply over the next few years, as evidence mounts of its value. Until fairly recently, online education amounted to little more than
electronic versions of the old-line correspondence courses. That has
really changed with arrival of Web-based video, instant messaging and
collaboration tools.
The real promise of online education, experts say, is providing
learning experiences that are more tailored to individual students than
is possible in classrooms. That enables more “learning by doing,” which
many students find more engaging and useful. “We are at an inflection point in online education,” said Philip R.
Regier, the dean of Arizona State University’s Online and Extended Campus program. The biggest near-term growth, Mr. Regier predicts, will be in
continuing education programs. Today, Arizona State has 5,000 students
in its continuing education programs, both through in-person classes and
online. In three to five years, he estimates, that number could triple,
with nearly all the growth coming online. But Mr. Regier also thinks online education will continue to make
further inroads in transforming college campuses as well. Universities —
and many K-12 schools — now widely use online learning management
systems, like Blackboard or the open-source Moodle. But that is mostly for posting assignments, reading lists, and class schedules and hosting some Web discussion boards.
Mr. Regier sees things evolving fairly rapidly, accelerated by the
increasing use of social networking technology. More and more, students
will help and teach each other, he said. For example, it will be assumed
that college students know the basics of calculus, and the classroom
time will focus on applying the math to real-world problems — perhaps in
exploring the physics of climate change or modeling trends in stock
prices, he said.
“The technology will be used to create learning communities among
students in new ways,” Mr. Regier said. “People are correct when they
say online education will take things out the classroom. But they are
wrong, I think, when they assume it will make learning an independent,
personal activity. Learning has to occur in a community.”
Deepa Singh
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