Can Bonk's Perfect Storm be stopped ?

he Bonk article infers that the e learning is an education institution that will inevitably become part of mainstream American education. As an online teacher, and witness of the benefits and success of online learning, I agree with Bonk’s arguments. I have been comparing online education with the “alternative” school concept that originated in the 1980’s and was fully implemented in many Wisconsin schools in the 1990’s. Traditional schools were forced to create ‘alternative’ schools for their at-risk, credit deficient, or non-traditional students. With emerging technology, changing learning demands, pedagogy shift. and budget benefits, public schools districts (and universities) will be required to offer online learning options for all their students.

The two elements Bonk’ storm arguments that I agree the most with are pedagogy and budgets. I could not agree more with Bonk’s statement that “millions of learners are signing up for online courses. Unfortunately, many of them quickly become bored online learners who plead for more rich and engaging online experiences.” I experienced this first hand. I have had the unique opportunity to become involved in the beginning stages of an online high school. When our program began many of our classes used out dated textbooks and an education model that involved reading the book, doing a worksheet “type” activity with a Word document, take an online quiz, and complete a multiple choice assessment with a few essay questions. I feel, as a result, our course completion rates were less than 50%. Over the last few years, with new vendors, working with our course content builders, and allowing teachers to redesign and modify class content, the content, quality, and interactivity of our classes has improved tremendously. As result, we are beginning to see improved course completion rates. The emerginging technologies and changing demands of students with force teachers (and online content providers) to constantly re-evaluate and re-design online courses and assessments. In tradtional education, with my redesign a class when a new textbook is purchased. Online classes will have to be reviewed and updated on an annual basis.

The ‘financial’ reality of our countries economic situation is going to continue to impact publicly funded education, at all levels. Corporations or educational organizations cannot ignore the inherent cost savings of online classes. The ability to attract students (and tuition) from any geographic area can be practiced at both the University level and High School level. My employer, The School District of Waukesha, has never denied that one of the main reasons for starting the IQ Academy Charter High School was the potential to increase revenues for the school district of Waukesha. The geographical mixture of students from this class, outside the Menomonee, WI and traditional UW-Stout area is a strong example. The present and rapidly emerging cost effective technologies and potential additional revenue streams can be applied to all areas of education and training.