Cherie's 12 Concerns about Iowa's Virtual Schools, Part One

Post date: Jan 14, 2017 6:28:48 PM

Cherie's 12 Concerns about Iowa's Virtual Schools, Part One

http://iava.k12.com/ -- Iowa Virtual Academy

http://www.connectionsacademy.com/iowa-online-school -- K–12 Online Public School in Iowa

Maybe you’ve seen their commercials: smiling children brag about how well they have done taking online classes. Their websites promise “free tuition!” “individualized learning” and other wonderful things. However, they do NOT tell you that we have for-profit companies getting your tax dollars and that over four million dollars went out of state last year. This is money being taken out of our local schools in a time when the legislature and governor are discussing budget cuts.

The decision to offer totally online classes for Iowa children K-12 happened in 2012: I think it is time to look at the data. How have those children done? Were they prepared for the next level? How did they do in high school and college? What was the retention rate? How many students had to find another school when they discovered that they did not do well in the online environment? How many parents had to hire a tutor to sit with their child to get work done? What was the actual teaching load for these teachers: did they have the time to give to each child or did they have 75 students?

As a recently retired Community College teacher with 15 years of teaching online, I have many concerns about these online schools for students in K-12: I came up with a list of a dozen objections!

1. I object to bringing in out of state for-profit companies that have been exposed by many investigations as more focused on profits and not on students learning. When a for-profit company undertakes education, they are looking for ways to cut costs. I have read numerous articles detailing the way these companies exploit young Education graduates and then expect them to be available ten hours a day and load them down with 75 to 100 students.
2. I object to their very misleading website and advertising: they promise a free education for your child with lots of individualized attention. Instead, some of these teachers are handling 75 to 100 students and using email, a webcam and telephone to communicate with children. Parents should be told that not only is the for-profit company (from outside of Iowa) getting most of the tax dollars for their child, that money is then leaving their local school district. If many students opt to do this, they will see teachers laid off and cutbacks made in services at that school. It is NOT free: there is a cost, and it may be much higher than they realize.
3. I object to the notion that children can sit behind a computer and learn on their own. Parents enrolling elementary and middle school age children should understand that they will need to work intensively with their children, or need to hire a tutor who will sit with the child during lessons and help to guide them through the completion of their assignments. The survey results revealed that the vast majority of the “teaching” was done by the parents or another adult working with the child. This is not made clear on the website.
4. I object to the incomplete data compiled for the Annual Report. I read the annual report and then looked at the survey done with online students; however, we don’t have complete assessment results. I believe the legislature needs to work with our three state Universities to develop a comprehensive survey that EVERY online student and parent need to complete. If they are getting our tax dollars, they must complete the survey. By the way, I noted that between the two schools, they had 679 students—was this all for one year, 2014-2015? If so, and if schools get approximately $6,000 per student, that amounts to over 4 million dollars going to these companies.
5. I object to not knowing more about the students who dropped out: what happened to them? Did we get a refund? Did they go back to their local schools? Did the company keep the money? In addition, we need the names and contact information for the students who were not retained: we need to interview or survey them as well, in order to get more information about what went wrong.
6. I object to the survey instrument itself. I was baffled by the generic nature of the survey: why did it ignore the technology aspect of the school experience? I want to know the answers to the following questions:

· How do you communicate with your teacher? Webcam, instant message, telephone?

· How often do you get one on one time with your teacher?

· How do you use technology to complete your assignments?

· Do you use Google Docs to create and share essays, and get feedback?

· Do you complete worksheets and test inside of the course website?

· What kinds of assessments did you do? Did you give speeches via webcam?

· Did you do hands-on demonstrations or labs?

· Do you interact with other students, either using a discussion board or some kind of chat, email or other computer-mediated communication?

7) 7. I am concerned that some special needs children are being placed in these classes. As a college teacher, I have had some students with physical problems that prevented them from using a traditional keyboard. What accommodations are made for children too young to have good keyboarding skills or for students who have physical disabilities that make it more difficult to use a keyboard? Do they provide Dragon or another speech to text software? Many children would need an aide to keep them on track.

8. I am concerned that we ignored the resources available within Iowa to develop online classes for children with significant health problems or who had been bullied. I understand that some children may be unable to attend a local school, and that some children may do well, with a tutor or parent to guide them. However, there are 15 Community Colleges and 3 State Universities offering courses online: I am confident that we could have done a better job of putting together courses, saved taxpayers’ money, and avoided the problems being experienced now. There are other ways to use technology to connect children with the classroom: I would have recommended that we use webcams to connect children with health problems with their teacher and classmates in their classroom, for example.

9. I’m genuinely concerned for these students who are isolated from their peers, especially those in elementary school who are just developing social skills. I was not impressed with the report summarizing the extracurricular activities for children: the list of students in one of the virtual schools included 16 clubs with a total of 29 students, with 6 of those clubs enrolling only 1 student.

10. The WEAKEST argument for taking classes online is the sales pitch for the flexibility and doing it at your own pace. Does this help impressionable children developing work habits prepare for the rigors of college and the workplace? How many job descriptions have you read that stressed flexibility and the total lack of deadlines? We live and work in a fast-paced world and students who do not complete work in a timely manner are at a disadvantage for progressing with their education and looking for employment.

11. How do these children get their other classes, such as physical education, music, and art? I read a story several years ago, that one online school was mailing out jump ropes!

12. Finally, I am concerned about the very real problem of digital distraction and the impact of too much technology or too many hours on the computer/online on young children. I cannot imagine elementary school children taking a fully online school: they would become little zombies in short order. I have two grandsons, ages 3 and 6, who love my iPads. I got them a Kindle Fire for Kids for Christmas last year: it has preloaded content for children and allows parents to set controls for 30 minutes or 1 hour. I would not let them play on the iPad all day!

When I did a study of digital distraction for a presentation two years ago, I talked to a number of my college students who had been part of technology pilots with the 1 to 1 programs while in high school. A number of them had been given a laptop but their teachers were not given much time to get up to speed on things like Google Docs. Therefore, they sat in classes with teachers still trying to get documents posted for assignments, and they had a lot of time to surf around and spend time on Pinterest, YouTube, Twitter, and other websites. They now struggled to stay on task, complete work, and focus on assignments. What will the current group of online elementary and middle school students be like in high school? Will they be more tech savvy and lack social skills? Will they struggle to stay focused? Will they be ready for college or the workplace?

Only time will tell, but we are doing a very expensive experiment with our most precious commodity: Iowa's school children, and our future.

Next time: Part two, when I discuss my own experience teaching online.

Last Updated January 14, 2017