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Welcome to Our Generation USA!

Below, we cover
Education
as found in the United States and Overseas (including their majors and degrees); also including Vocational and on-the-job Training , as well as certified Online Training/Education courses, the latter of which also includes online or even video games that promote learning at any age!

For preK, Elementary, and High School Click Here.
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Education, including Education in the United StatesPictured: Diagram of education in the United States
Education in the United States



















Education is the process of facilitating learning, or the acquisition of knowledge, skills, values, beliefs, and habits.

Educational methods include teaching, training, storytelling, discussion and directed research. Education frequently takes place under the guidance of educators, however learners can also educate themselves. Education can take place in formal or informal settings and any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts may be considered educational. The methodology of teaching is called pedagogy.

Formal education is commonly divided formally into such stages as preschool or kindergarten, primary school, secondary school and then college, university, or apprenticeship.

A right to education has been recognized by some governments and the United Nations. In most regions, education is compulsory up to a certain age. There is a movement for education reform, and in particular for evidence-based education.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about Education Worldwide: ___________________________________________________________________________

Education in the United States is provided by public, private and home schools.

State governments set overall educational standards, often mandate standardized tests for K–12 public school systems and supervise, usually through a board of regents, state colleges and universities. Funding comes from the state, local, and federal government. 

Private schools are generally free to determine their own curriculum and staffing policies, with voluntary accreditation available through independent regional accreditation authorities, although some state regulation can apply.

In 2013, about 87% of school-age children (those below higher education) attended state funded public schools, about 10% attended tuition- and foundation-funded private schools and roughly 3% were home-schooled.

By state law, education is compulsory over an age range starting between five and eight and ending somewhere between ages sixteen and eighteen, depending on the state. This requirement can be satisfied in public schools, state-certified private schools, or an approved home school program.

In most schools, compulsory education is divided into three levels: elementary school, middle or junior high school, and high school.

Children are usually divided by age groups into grades, ranging from kindergarten (5–6 year olds) and first grade for the youngest children, up to twelfth grade (17–18 years olds) as the final year of high school.

There are also a large number and wide variety of publicly and privately administered institutions of higher education throughout the country. Post-secondary education, divided into college, as the first tertiary degree, and graduate school, is described in a separate section below.
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The United States spends more per student on education than any other country. In 2014, the Pearson/Economist Intelligence Unit rated US education as 14th best in the world, just behind Russia.

In 2015, the Programme for International Student Assessment rated U.S. high school students No. 40 globally in Math and No. 24 in Science and Reading. The President of the National Center on Education and the Economy said of the results "the United States cannot long operate a world-class economy if our workers are, as the OECD statistics show, among the worst-educated in the world".

Former U.S. Education Secretary John B. King, Jr. acknowledged the results in conceding U.S. students were well behind their peers. According to a report published by the U.S. News & World Report, of the top ten colleges and universities in the world, eight are American (the other two are Oxford and Cambridge, in the United Kingdom).

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Higher Education in the United States, including a List of State Universities
YouTube Video from the United States Department of Education: "Why Teachers Matter"
Pictured: LEFT: Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA; RIGHT: Princeton University, Princeton, NJ

Click here for a List of State Universities.

Higher education in the United States is an optional final stage of formal learning following secondary education. Higher education, also referred to as post-secondary education, third stage, third level, or tertiary education occurs most commonly at one of the 4,726 Title IV degree-granting institutions, either colleges or universities in the country.These may be any of the following: 
High visibility concerns include greater use of the Internet, such as massive open online courses, competency-based education, sexual assault, cutbacks in state and local spending, rapidly rising tuition and increasing student loan debt.

According to the National Student Clearinghouse, US college enrollment has declined for five consecutive years and is projected to continue declining for the next two decades. This decline, attributed to falling birth rates, amounts to a 2.5 million loss in enrollment from the peak year of 2010-2011.

Strong research and funding have helped make America's elite colleges and universities among the world's most prestigious, making them particularly attractive to international students, professors and researchers in the pursuit of academic excellence. Other countries, however, are now offering incentives to take away researchers  as funding is threatened.

The United States higher education system has also been blighted by fly-by-night schools, diploma mills, and predatory for-profit colleges.

According to Pew Research Center and Gallup poll surveys conducted in 2017, public opinion about US colleges has been declining, especially among Republicans and the white working class. The higher education industry has been criticized for being unnecessarily expensive, providing a difficult-to-measure service which is seen as vital but in which providers are paid for inputs instead of outputs, and which is besotted with federal regulations which drive up costs, and with payments not coming from users but from third parties.

Several scholarly books critical of US higher education have also been published in the last decade. Suzanne Mettler's book, Degrees of Inequality has been particularly critical of higher education policy that reinforces growing class inequality. Craig David Wilder has also written Ebony and Ivy, a scholarly analysis of early US universities and their enslavement of African Americans.

Unlike the tertiary education system of the UK and Australia, American education is unique in the world to place strong emphasis on Liberal Arts education in its higher education curriculum.

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​History of Education
YouTube Video: History of Public Education
Pictured: Countries fall into three broad categories based on their Education Index: high, medium, and low human development. The 2007/2008 edition of the Human Development Report was published on November 27, 2007; in Brasília, Brazil.  (Courtesy of Sbw01F)

The systematic provision of learning techniques to most children, such as literacy, has been a development of the last 150 or 200 years, or even last 50 years in some countries. Schools for the young have historically been supplemented with advanced training for priests, bureaucrats and specialists.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the History of Education:






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National Education Association
YouTube Video: Congressman Catches Betsy DeVos Lying About His Daughter's Public School

​The National Education Association (NEA) is the largest professional interest group in the United States.

It represents public school teachers and other support personnel, faculty and staffers at colleges and universities, retired educators, and college students preparing to become teachers. The NEA has just under 3 million members and is headquartered in Washington, D.C. The NEA had a budget of more than $341 million for the 2012–2013 fiscal year. Lily Eskelsen García is the NEA's current president.

The stated mission of the NEA is "to advocate for education professionals and to unite our members and the nation to fulfill the promise of public education to prepare every student to succeed in a diverse and interdependent world."

The NEA, originally on the conservative side of U.S. politics, by the 1970s emerged as a factor in modern liberalism. While the NEA has a stated position of "non-partisan", it typically supports the Democratic Party. Conservatives, libertarians, and parents' rights groups have criticized the NEA's liberal positions.

State affiliates of the NEA regularly lobby state legislators for funding, seek to influence education policy, and file legal actions.

At the national level, the NEA lobbies the United States Congress and federal agencies and is active in the nominating process for Democratic candidates. From 1989 through the 2014 election cycle, the NEA spent over $92 million on political campaign contributions, 97% of which went to Democrats.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the National Education Association (NEA):







Rankings of Universities in the United States
YouTube Video: Environmental Sustainability at Harvard: We are a living lab
Pictured below: ​Clockwise from upper left based on College Rankings by Forbes 2017 List: Harvard University, Stanford University, Yale University, and Princeton University

College and university rankings in the United States are rankings of US colleges and universities ordered by various combinations of various contributing factors which vary greatly depending on the organization performing the ranking.

Rankings have most often been conducted by magazines, newspapers, websites, or academics. In addition to ranking entire institutions, organizations perform rankings of specific programs, departments, and schools.

Various rankings consider combinations of measures of wealth, research excellence and/or influence, selectivity, student options, eventual success, demographics, and other criteria.

There is much debate about rankings' interpretation, accuracy, usefulness, and appropriateness. The expanding diversity in rating methodologies and accompanying criticisms of each indicate the lack of consensus in the field.

For more about College and University Rankings in the United States, click on the following blue hyperlinks:​







Colleges and Universities including a List of Both
YouTube Video: Visit University of Oxford*, England
* -- University of Oxford
Pictured below: the Campus of (L) University of Missouri, Columbia; (R) California State Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, CA

Click here for a List of Universities and Colleges (Worldwide)

A college is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, or an institution offering vocational education.

In the United States, "college" may refer to a constituent part of a university or to a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, but generally "college" and "university" are used interchangeably, whereas in the United Kingdom, Oceania, South Asia and Southern Africa, "college" may refer to a secondary or high school, a college of further education, a training institution that awards trade qualifications, a higher education provider that does not have university status (often without its own degree-awarding powers), or a constituent part of a university (See this comparison of British and American English educational terminology for further information).

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A university is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in various academic disciplines. Universities typically provide undergraduate education and postgraduate education.

The word "university" is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars." While antecedents had existed in Asia and Africa, the modern university system has roots in the European medieval university, which was created in Italy and evolved from Christian Cathedral schools for the clergy during the High Middle Ages.

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Educational Attainment in the United States
YouTube Video: President Barack Obama’s full speech at Rutgers commencement (5/5/16)

The educational attainment of the U.S. population is similar to that of many other industrialized countries with the vast majority of the population having completed secondary education and a rising number of college graduates that outnumber high school dropouts.

As a whole, the population of the United States is spending more years in formal educational programs. As with income, levels differ by race, age, household configuration and geography.

Overall, the households and demographics featuring the highest educational attainment in the United States are also among those with the highest household income and wealth. Thus, while the population as a whole is proceeding further in formal educational programs, income and educational attainment remain highly correlated.

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History of Higher Education in the United States
YouTube Video History of Women in Education

The history of higher education in the United States begins with Harvard College and continues to the present time.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the History of Higher Education in the United States:







College Admissions in the United States
YouTube Video: The College Admissions Process*
* - by the University of Notre Dame Alumni Association
College admissions in the United States refers to the process of applying for entrance to institutions of higher education for undergraduate study at one of the nation's colleges or universities. 

For people intended to go immediately into college after high school, the college search usually begins in the eleventh grade of high school with most activity taking place during the twelfth grade, although students at top high schools often begin the process during their tenth grade or earlier. In addition, there are considerable numbers of students who transfer from one college to another, as well as adults older than high school age who apply to college.

Overview:

Millions of high school students apply to college each year. While the number of graduates from high school peaked temporarily at 3.3 million in 2008, then to 3.4 million in 2014, numbers have been forecast to decline through 2015 and then rebound thereafter. 

Still, the number of students enrolled in college is expected to increase through 2020 when there will be approximately 23 million students in college. About a quarter of twelfth graders apply to seven or more schools, paying an average of $40 per application. Fewer than half of all students entering college graduate in four years and slightly over half graduate from college during their lifetimes.

The application process takes considerable time and planning since it involves multiple steps, with choices to be made and deadlines to be met. Students file separate applications to each school, although the Common Application expedites the process in many instances.

​Most undergraduate institutions admit students to the entire college and not to a particular department or major, unlike many European universities and American graduate schools, although some undergraduate programs such as architecture or engineering may require a separate application at some universities.

As a general rule, applying to two-year county and community colleges is much easier than to a four-year school, often requiring only a high school transcript or minimum test score.

New developments in college admissions include increased numbers of applications, increased interest by students in foreign countries in applying to American universities, more students applying by an early method, applications submitted by Internet-based methods including the Common Application, increased use of consultants, guidebooks, and rankings, and increased use by colleges of wait lists. 

One estimate was that 80 percent of applications were submitted online in 2009. In the spring of 2018, there is a probe by the justice department into whether colleges practicing Early Admissions violated anti-trust laws by sharing information about applicants.

Participants:

Students:

Applying to colleges can be stressful. The outcome of the admission process may affect a student's future career trajectory considerably. Entrance into top colleges is increasingly competitive, and many students feel pressure during their high school years.

"Private and affluent public primary education, test-prep courses, 'enrichment' programmes, volunteer service projects, international travel, music lessons, sports activities – all the high-cost building blocks of the perfect college application – put crushing pressure on the upper middle class and their offspring." — Yale professor William Deresiewicz, quoted in the BBC about his article in The New Republic, 2014

Parents:

The college applications process can be stressful for parents of teenagers, according to journalist Andrew Ferguson, since it exposes "our vanities, our social ambitions and class insecurities, and most profoundly our love and hopes for our children".

High School Counselors:

Some high schools have one or more teachers experienced in offering counseling to college-bound eleventh and twelfth graders. They usually work in conjunction with the guidance department who assist students in planning their high school academic path. Counselors handle many students and schools and generally do not have a role of overseeing or managing a student's college applications.

Advisors recommend that students get to know their school counselor. Counselors do not complete interviews, write essays, or arrange college visits. Parents often meet with the school counselor during the eleventh grade. Most counselors have responsibility for helping many students and, as a result, it is difficult for them to provide individual help to a particular student; one estimate was that the average ratio for all high schools of students to counselors was 460 to 1.

Only about a quarter of public high schools have a counselor devoted to college counseling issues full-time, while almost three quarters of private schools have a dedicated college counselor. A report suggested that private school counselors have substantially more contact with university admissions staff than public school counselors.

Consultants:

​Fee-based consultants, some available entirely online, can be hired to help a student gain admission to the so-called right schools, although there are some free programs to help underprivileged youth learn how to fill out applications, write essays, get ready for tests, and work on interviews. 

Consultants can help a student select schools to apply to, counsel them on test taking strategies, review scores, help with essay preparation (but not writing), review applications, conduct mock interviews, provide logistical planning, and collaborate with others such as athletic coaches. 

Consultants try to keep a low profile; however, one admissions dean explained that she can "sniff out when there has been some adult involved in the process". Assistance by consultants or other adults can go to extremes, particularly with hard-to-check variables such as the college essays; according to one view, plagiarism on admissions essays has been a "serious problem", particularly on applications to private universities and colleges.

There is the possibility that hiring a professional admissions consultant can make an application appear artificial; for example, admissions personnel may suspect adult coaching when one part of an application is polished, while other parts aren't, such as varying quality regarding writing samples.

Another risk in hiring a consultant, which can happen if parents become too involved in the process, is what Mamlet and VanDeVelde term overpackaging: the applicant appears so smooth and perfect that admissions officers suspect the person is not real but a marketing creation.

Generally, when hiring a college admissions counselor, parents and students try to understand the counselor's philosophy, learn what services are provided, and whether any help will be offered regarding advice about financial aid or scholarships. Mamlet and VanDeVelde suggest that it is improper for an admissions counselor to tamper with a student's "authentic self". 

According to their view, ideal counselors have experience with college admissions, meet regularly with college admissions officers, visit campuses regularly, and belong to professional affiliations.

College Admissions Staff:

​A typical admission staff at a college includes a dean or vice president for admission or enrollment management, middle-level managers or assistant directors, admission officers, and administrative support staff.

The chief enrollment management officer is sometimes the highest-paid position in the department, earning $121,000 on average in 2010, while admissions officers average only $35,000, according to one estimate.

Admissions officers tend to be in the 30-to-40 age demographic. They are chosen for their experience in admissions, aptitude for statistics and data analysis, experience in administration and marketing and public relations. They serve dual roles as counselors and recruiters, and do not see themselves as marketers or salespeople, according to one view.

They are evaluated on how well they "represent their college, manage their office, recruit staff members, and work with other administrators". Michele Hernandez suggested there were basically two types of officers: a first group of personable, sharp, people-oriented go-getter types who were often recent college grads; a second group was somewhat out-of-touch "lifers" who often did not graduate from a highly selective college. 

Officers are generally paid an annual salary, although there have been reports of some recruiters paid on the basis of how many students they bring to a college, such as recruiters working abroad to recruit foreign students to U.S. universities.

Many colleges and universities work hard to market themselves, trying to attract the best students and maintain a reputation for academic quality. Colleges spent an average of $585 to recruit each applicant during the 2010 year. There are efforts to make increased use of social media sites such as Facebook to promote their colleges. Marketing brochures and other promotional mailings often arrive daily in the hope of persuading high school students to apply to a college.

​According to Joanne Levy-Prewitt, colleges send "view books" not because they intend to admit them, but "because they want multitudes of students to apply" to improve the college's selectivity ranking and to make sure that they have as many well-qualified applicants as possible from whom to choose the strongest class. Colleges get access to names and addresses after students give permission to them after taking the PSAT or SAT exams.

Information Sources:

​US News compiles a directory of colleges and universities and has made a ranking of them, although the rankings are controversial, some colleges refuse to cooperate, and high school guidance counselors sometimes have major problems with the rankings. 

Other sources rank colleges according to various measures, sell guidebooks, and use their rankings as an entry into college admissions consulting services. College Board launched a website called BigFuture in 2012 with tools to help the admissions process.

There are services to help expedite the college admissions process, including a web-based service that sells copies of applications that gained the applicant admission to Ivy League colleges.

Test preparation firms:

Companies such as the College Board have offered services to help students prepare for their tests and provide other services, usually web-based, to help students compare schools. Some firms work with schools to provide test preparation advisors who teach students how to take the SAT and ACT entrance exams.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about College Admissions in the United States:
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​Tests used for Admissions into College include: YouTube Video: ACT vs SAT | Which College Admissions Exam Should You Take?
Pictured below: In Race for Test-Takers, ACT Outscores SAT—for Now (Education Week)
The SAT is a standardized test widely used for college admissions in the United States (see above topic).

​Introduced in 1926, its name and scoring have changed several times; originally called the Scholastic Aptitude Test, it was later called the Scholastic Assessment Test, then the SAT I: Reasoning Test, then the SAT Reasoning Test, and now, simply the SAT.

The SAT is owned, developed, and published by the College Board, a private, non-profit organization in the United States. It is administered on behalf of the College Board by the Educational Testing Service, which until recently developed the SAT as well. The test is intended to assess students' readiness for college.

The SAT was originally designed not to be aligned with high school curricula, but several adjustments were made for the version of the SAT introduced in 2016, and College Board president, David Coleman, has said that he also wanted to make the test reflect more closely what students learned in high school.

On March 5, 2014, the College Board announced that a redesigned version of the SAT would be administered for the first time in 2016. The current SAT, introduced in 2016, takes three hours to finish, plus 50 minutes for the SAT with essay, and as of 2017 costs US$45 (US$57 with the optional essay), excluding late fees, with additional processing fees if the SAT is taken outside the United States.

Scores on the SAT range from 400 to 1600, combining test results from two 800-point sections: mathematics, and critical reading and writing. Taking the SAT, or its competitor, the ACT (see below) , is required for freshman entry to many, but not all, colleges and universities in the United States.

Starting with the 2015–16 school year, the College Board also announced it would team up with Khan Academy, a free, online education site to provide SAT prep free of charge.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about SAT: ___________________________________________________________________________

​The ACT (originally an abbreviation of American College Testing) is a standardized test used for college admissions in the United States (see above). It was first introduced in November 1959 by University of Iowa professor Everett Franklin Lindquist as a competitor to the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) (See above)

ACT It is currently administered by ACT, a nonprofit organization of the same name.

The ACT originally consisted of four tests: English, Mathematics, Social Studies, and Natural Sciences. In 1989 however, the Social Studies test was changed into a Reading section (which included a social sciences subsection) and the Natural Sciences test was renamed the Science Reasoning test, with more emphasis on problem-solving skills as opposed to memorizing scientific facts. 

In February 2005, an optional Writing test was added to the ACT, mirroring changes to the SAT that took place in March of the same year. In 2013, ACT announced that students would be able to take the ACT by computer starting in the spring of 2015; however, by the fall of 2017, computer-based ACT tests were available only for school-day testing at limited school districts in the US, with greater availability not expected until at least the fall of 2018.

The ACT has seen a gradual increase in the number of test takers since its inception, and in 2011 the ACT surpassed the SAT for the first time in total test takers; that year, 1,666,017 students took the ACT and 1,664,479 students took the SAT.

All four-year colleges and universities in the U.S. accept the ACT, but different institutions place different emphases on standardized tests such as the ACT, compared to other factors including class rank, GPA, and extracurricular activities.

The main four sections are individually scored on a scale of 1–36, and a composite score (the rounded whole number average of the four sections) is provided.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about ACT:






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Online Academic Degrees including a List of Online Colleges in the United States
Click on arrow: YouTube Video: Can online courses replace a campus education? by PBS News Hour
YouTube Video: Picking the best Accredited Online Colleges with the best Online College Courses
Picture courtesy of The Best Schools Organization 

Click here for an alphabetical List of Online Colleges in the United States.

An online degree is an academic degree (usually a college degree, but sometimes the term includes high school diplomas and non-degree certificate programs) that can be earned primarily or entirely through the use of an Internet-connected computer, rather than attending college in a traditional campus setting.

Improvements in technology, the increasing use of the Internet worldwide, and the need for people to have flexible school schedules while they are working have led to a proliferation of online colleges that award associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees.

Accreditation:

The goal of educational accreditation, according to the United States Department of Education, is to ensure that programs provided by institutions of higher education meet acceptable levels of quality.

ENQA, the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education, describes the role of external quality assurance in education as one that "combines both accountability for the reassurance of the public and an objective and developmental role for enhancing quality in institutions". 

In the area of online education, it is important to avoid unaccredited diploma mills that offer fake degrees, as these are unfortunately common. Students seeking valid online degrees should obtain proof of accreditation from an appropriate national or regional accrediting body.

In the United States, online colleges that are fully accredited have earned a widely recognized form of university accreditation from one of six regional accreditation boards. Each of six geographic regions of the United States has one of these boards, a non-governmental agency that oversees and accredits degree-granting institutions headquartered in their areas.

The U.S. Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) also recognize the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) as the accrediting organization for distance learning institutions and education programs that offer online degrees.

Quality of Online Degrees:

Online education enables individuals living with physical disabilities, full-time employees, soldiers, those living abroad, and stay-at-home parents, among others to have access to accredited higher education.

The perception of the quality of online degrees compared to on-campus degrees varies, but has been increasing in recent years. While most major online colleges are regionally accredited, the public estimation of their quality is in dispute. A national survey of hiring representatives showed that a preference toward on-campus degrees exists. In some instances, hiring executives were unwilling to consider applicants with an online degree. 

Some experts argue that degrees in certain fields are more accepted online than in others, while some programs are less suited for online-only schools. A major issue for accredited and reputable online programs is the proliferation of proprietary online-only programs that have come under fire in recent years.

A survey by the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) found that 100% of employers who responded felt that distance education program graduates performed better on the job as a result of their degree (as compared to their previous performance). Additionally, employers felt that an employee receiving a distance education degree compared favorably, in terms of knowledge learned, to someone with a resident degree. 

On the other hand, The Chronicle of Higher Education reported in January 2007 on a Vault Inc. survey that found 55 percent of employers preferred traditional degrees over online ones. Forty-one percent, however, said they would give "equal consideration to both types of degrees".

The Sloan Consortium, an organization funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to maintain and improve the quality of distance education, publishes regular reports on the state of United States distance education. In its 2006 report "Making the Grade: Online Education in the United States, 2006," it stated that "in 2003, 57 percent of academic leaders rated the learning outcomes in online education as the same or superior to those in face-to-face. That number is now 62 percent, a small but noteworthy increase".

According to Steve Lohr's article in the New York Times, a major study was done in 2009 that was funded by the Education Department. The collected research was from a 12-year period and concluded that online learning on average beat face-to-face teaching by a small but statistical margin. <rev>Lohr, Steve. “Second Thoughts On Web Classes.” New York Times 13 Sept. 2010: 3 Academic Search Complete. Web. 12 Apr. 2015.</rev>

In many cases, an online degree earned through an accredited public or private university may be effectively indistinguishable from a degree earned in a campus-based program, sometimes referred to as "brick-and-mortar" programs. The instruction is often exactly the same, with the online degree containing no special designation. As such the same financial aid packages are often available to online students, which has helped make them more accessible to traditional applicants.

An example of an indistinguishable degree program is that offered by Columbia University. Student who earn a degree through the Columbia Video Network (CVN) earn exactly the same type of degree as the campus-based program. The professors, courses, homework, tests, and eventual transcripts and diploma are identical to that of on-campus students. Another example is NYU Tandon Online which offers master's degrees completely online through New York University Tandon School of Engineering.

In recent years many top universities have been actively expanding their extension and online learning programs in an effort to legitimize the online education arena. While admissions to online programs at prestigious universities hasn't seen a dramatic spike, there has been a large expansion in course offerings in recent years. Almost all Ivy League and top 20 universities now offer at least one online graduate degree program or certification.

Prevalence of Online Education:

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) conducted a distance education study based on the 2001-2002 academic year at United States 2-year and 4-year degree-granting institutions that were eligible for U.S. federal student aid. The study reported that 56 percent of institutions surveyed offered distance education courses. The study also found that public institutions were more likely to offer distance education than private institutions were.

The Sloan Consortium, based on data collected from over 2,200 U.S. colleges and universities, reports that nearly 3.2 million students took at least one online course during 2005 (a significant increase over the 2.3 million reported in 2004). According to the same report, about two-thirds of the largest institutions have fully online programs.

In 2010, more than 6 million students were taking at least one course online. As of 2013, the number of students enrolled in online courses had risen to over 6.7 million.

According to Steve Lohr's article in the New York Times, a major study was done in 2009 that was funded by the Education Department. The collected research was from a 12-year period and concluded that online learning on average beat face-to-face teaching by a small but statistical margin.

Financial Aid:

Until 2006, United States students enrolled in online degree programs were not eligible for federal student aid unless at least half of their programs were campus-based (a law established in 1992 and known as the 50-percent rule). In February 2006, that law was repealed, making federal student aid in the form of federal loans, grants, and work-study available in the U.S. for students enrolled in an eligible online degree program at an accredited Title IV-eligible institution.

See Also:









Technological Evolution of the Classroom, including:  ​YouTube Video of the Top 10 Educational Video Games by WatchMojo
Pictured below: ​Examples of how Technology is Changing the Classroom (Clockwise from Upper Left): Pre-school; Elementary School; High School; University ​
[Your Web Host:​ Recently, I observed first-hand how advanced educational technology can play a positive role for children, and decided to add this topic.]

Educational technology is "the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using, and managing appropriate technological processes and resources".

Educational technology is the use of both physical hardware and educational theoretics. It encompasses several domains, including learning theory, computer-based training, online learning, and, where mobile technologies are used, m-learning. Accordingly, there are several discrete aspects to describing the intellectual and technical development of educational technology:
Definition:

Educational technology is "the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using and managing appropriate technological processes and resources".

The Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) denoted instructional technology as "the theory and practice of design, development, utilization, management, and evaluation of processes and resources for learning". 

As such, educational technology refers to all valid and reliable applied education sciences, such as equipment, as well as processes and procedures that are derived from scientific research, and in a given context may refer to theoretical, algorithmic or heuristic processes: it does not necessarily imply physical technology.

Educational technology is the process of integrating technology into education in a positive manner that promotes a more diverse learning environment and a way for students to learn how to use technology as well as their common assignments.

Related Terms:

Early 20th century abacus used in a Danish elementary school. Given this definition, educational technology is an inclusive term for both the material tools and the theoretical foundations for supporting learning and teaching. Educational technology is not restricted to high technology. Education technology is anything that enhances classroom learning in the utilization of blended, face to face, or online learning.

However, modern electronic educational technology is an important part of society today.

Educational technology encompasses the following:
  • e-learning,
  • instructional technology, 
  • information and communication technology (ICT) in education,
  • EdTech,
  • learning technology, 
  • multimedia learning,
  • technology-enhanced learning (TEL),
  • computer-based instruction (CBI),
  • computer managed instruction,
  • computer-based training (CBT),
  • computer-assisted instruction or computer-aided instruction (CAI),
  • internet-based training (IBT), flexible learning, web-based training (WBT),
  • online education,
  • digital educational collaboration,
  • distributed learning, 
  • computer-mediated communication,
  • cyber-learning,
  • and multi-modal instruction,
  • virtual education,
  • personal learning environments, 
  • networked learning, 
  • virtual learning environments (VLE) (which are also called learning platforms), 
  • m-learning,
  • ubiquitous learning
  • and digital education.

Each of these numerous terms has had its advocates, who point up potential distinctive features. However, many terms and concepts in educational technology have been defined nebulously; for example, Fiedler's review of the literature found a complete lack agreement of the components of a personal learning environment.

Moreover, Moore saw these terminologies as emphasizing particular features such as digitization approaches, components or delivery methods rather than being fundamentally dissimilar in concept or principle. For example, m-learning emphasizes mobility, which allows for altered timing, location, accessibility and context of learning; nevertheless, its purpose and conceptual principles are those of educational technology.

In practice, as technology has advanced, the particular "narrowly defined" terminological aspect that was initially emphasized by name has blended into the general field of educational technology. 

Initially, "virtual learning" as narrowly defined in a semantic sense implied entering an environmental simulation within a virtual world, for example in treating posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). 

In practice, a "virtual education course" refers to any instructional course in which all, or at least a significant portion, is delivered by the Internet.

"Virtual" is used in that broader way to describe a course that is not taught in a classroom face-to-face but through a substitute mode that can conceptually be associated "virtually" with classroom teaching, which means that people do not have to go to the physical classroom to learn. Accordingly, virtual education refers to a form of distance learning in which course content is delivered by various methods such as course management applications, multimedia resources, and videoconferencing.

Educational content, pervasively embedded in objects, is all around the learner, who may not even be conscious of the learning process: students may not have to do anything in order to learn, they just have to be there. 

The combination of adaptive learning, using an individualized interface and materials, which accommodate to an individual, who thus receives personally differentiated instruction, with ubiquitous access to digital resources and learning opportunities in a range of places and at various times, has been termed smart learning. Smart learning is a component of the smart city concept


History:
Main article: Educational software

Helping people and children learn in ways that are easier, faster, surer, or less expensive can be traced back to the emergence of very early tools, such as paintings on cave walls. Various types of abacus have been used. Writing slates and blackboards have been used for at least a millennium. From their introduction, books and pamphlets have held a prominent role in education.

From the early twentieth century, duplicating machines such as the mimeograph and Gestetner stencil devices were used to produce short copy runs (typically 10–50 copies) for classroom or home use. The use of media for instructional purposes is generally traced back to the first decade of the 20th century with the introduction of educational films (1900s) and Sidney Pressey's mechanical teaching machines (1920s).

The first all multiple choice, large-scale assessment was the Army Alpha, used to assess the intelligence and more specifically the aptitudes of World War I military recruits. Further large-scale use of technologies was employed in training soldiers during and after WWII using films and other mediated materials, such as overhead projectors. The concept of hypertext is traced to the description of memex by Vannevar Bush in 1945.

Slide projectors were widely used during the 1950s in educational institutional settings. Cuisenaire rods were devised in the 1920s and saw widespread use from the late 1950s.
​
In the mid 1960s Stanford University psychology professors Patrick Suppes and Richard C. Atkinson experimented with using computers to teach arithmetic and spelling via Teletypes to elementary school students in the Palo Alto Unified School District in California. Stanford's Education Program for Gifted Youth is descended from those early experiments.

Online education originated from the University of Illinois in 1960. Although internet would not be created for another nine years, students were able to access class information with linked computer terminals. The first online course was offered in 1986 by the Electronic University Network for DOS and Commodore 64 computers.

Computer Assisted Learning eventually offered the first online courses with real interaction. In 2002, MIT began providing online classes free of charge. As of 2009, approximately 5.5 millions students were taking at least one class online. Currently, one out of three college students takes at least one online course while in college (Promises and pitfalls).

At DeVry University, out of all students that are earning a bachelor's degree, 80% earn two-thirds of their requirements online (Promises and Pitfalls). Also in 2014, 2.85 million students out of 5.8 million that took courses online, took all of their courses online (Promises and Pitfalls). From this information, it can be concluded that the number of students taking classes online is on the steady increase. 

In 1971, Ivan Illich published a hugely influential book called, Deschooling Society, in which he envisioned "learning webs" as a model for people to network the learning they needed. The 1970s and 1980s saw notable contributions in computer-based learning by Murray Turoff and Starr Roxanne Hiltz at the New Jersey Institute of Technology as well as developments at the University of Guelph in Canada. 

In the UK, the Council for Educational Technology supported the use of educational technology, in particular administering the government's National Development Programme in Computer Aided Learning (1973–77) and the Microelectronics Education Programme (1980–86).

By the mid-1980s, accessing course content became possible at many college libraries. In computer-based training (CBT) or computer-based learning (CBL), the learning interaction was between the student and computer drills or micro-world simulations.

Digitized communication and networking in education started in the mid-1980s. Educational institutions began to take advantage of the new medium by offering distance learning courses using computer networking for information.

Early e-learning systems, based on computer-based learning/training often replicated autocratic teaching styles whereby the role of the e-learning system was assumed to be for transferring knowledge, as opposed to systems developed later based on computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL), which encouraged the shared development of knowledge.

Videoconferencing was an important forerunner to the educational technologies known today. This work was especially popular with museum education. Even in recent years, videoconferencing has risen in popularity to reach over 20,000 students across the United States and Canada in 2008–2009.

Disadvantages of this form of educational technology are readily apparent: image and sound quality is often grainy or pixelated; videoconferencing requires setting up a type of mini-television studio within the museum for broadcast, space becomes an issue; and specialized equipment is required for both the provider and the participant.

​The Open University in Britain and the University of British Columbia (where Web CT, now incorporated into Blackboard Inc., was first developed) began a revolution of using the Internet to deliver learning, making heavy use of web-based training, online distance learning and online discussion between students. Practitioners such as Harasim (1995) put heavy emphasis on the use of learning networks.

With the advent of World Wide Web in the 1990s, teachers embarked on the method using emerging technologies to employ multi-object oriented sites, which are text-based online virtual reality systems, to create course websites along with simple sets of instructions for its students.

By 1994, the first online high school had been founded. In 1997, Graziadei described criteria for evaluating products and developing technology-based courses that include being portable, replicable, scalable, affordable, and having a high probability of long-term cost-effectiveness.

Improved Internet functionality enabled new schemes of communication with multimedia or webcams. The National Center for Education Statistics estimate the number of K-12 students enrolled in online distance learning programs increased by 65 percent from 2002 to 2005, with greater flexibility, ease of communication between teacher and student, and quick lecture and assignment feedback.

According to a 2008 study conducted by the U.S Department of Education, during the 2006–2007 academic year about 66% of postsecondary public and private schools participating in student financial aid programs offered some distance learning courses; records show 77% of enrollment in for-credit courses with an online component. In 2008, the Council of Europe passed a statement endorsing e-learning's potential to drive equality and education improvements across the EU.

Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is between learners and instructors, mediated by the computer. In contrast, CBT/CBL usually means individualized (self-study) learning, while CMC involves educator/tutor facilitation and requires itemization of flexible learning activities. In addition, modern ICT provides education with tools for sustaining learning communities and associated knowledge management tasks.

Students growing up in this digital age have extensive exposure to a variety of media. Major high-tech companies such as Google, Verizon and Microsoft have funded schools to provide them the ability to teach their students through technology, in the hope that this would lead to improved student performance.

2015 was the first year that private nonprofit organizations enrolled more online students than for-profits, although public universities still enrolled the highest number of online students. In the fall of 2015, more than 6 million students enrolled in at least one online course.

Theory:
Main articles: 
Various pedagogical perspectives or learning theories may be considered in designing and interacting with educational technology. E-learning theory examines these approaches. These theoretical perspectives are grouped into three main theoretical schools or philosophical frameworks: behaviorism, cognitivism and constructivism.

Behaviorism:

This theoretical framework was developed in the early 20th century based on animal learning experiments by Ivan Pavlov, Edward Thorndike, Edward C. Tolman, Clark L. Hull, and B.F. Skinner. Many psychologists used these results to develop theories of human learning, but modern educators generally see behaviorism as one aspect of a holistic synthesis.

Teaching in behaviorism has been linked to training, emphasizing the animal learning experiments. Since behaviorism consists of the view of teaching people how to do something with rewards and punishments, it is related to training people.

B.F. Skinner wrote extensively on improvements of teaching based on his functional analysis of verbal behavior and wrote "The Technology of Teaching", an attempt to dispel the myths underlying contemporary education as well as promote his system he called programmed instruction. Ogden Lindsley developed a learning system, named Celeration, that was based on behavior analysis but that substantially differed from Keller's and Skinner's models.

Cognitivism:

Cognitive science underwent significant change in the 1960s and 1970s. While retaining the empirical framework of behaviorism, cognitive psychology theories look beyond behavior to explain brain-based learning by considering how human memory works to promote learning.

The Atkinson-Shiffrin memory model and Baddeley's working memory model were established as theoretical frameworks. Computer Science and Information Technology have had a major influence on Cognitive Science theory. The Cognitive concepts of working memory (formerly known as short term memory) and long term memory have been facilitated by research and technology from the field of Computer Science.

Another major influence on the field of Cognitive Science is Noam Chomsky. Today researchers are concentrating on topics like cognitive load, information processing and media psychology. These theoretical perspectives influence instructional design.

Constructivism:

Educational psychologists distinguish between several types of constructivism: individual (or psychological) constructivism, such as Piaget's theory of cognitive development, and social constructivism. This form of constructivism has a primary focus on how learners construct their own meaning from new information, as they interact with reality and with other learners who bring different perspectives.

Constructivist learning environments require students to use their prior knowledge and experiences to formulate new, related, and/or adaptive concepts in learning (Termos, 2012). Under this framework the role of the teacher becomes that of a facilitator, providing guidance so that learners can construct their own knowledge.

Constructivist educators must make sure that the prior learning experiences are appropriate and related to the concepts being taught. Jonassen (1997) suggests "well-structured" learning environments are useful for novice learners and that "ill-structured" environments are only useful for more advanced learners.

Educators utilizing a constructivist perspective may emphasize an active learning environment that may incorporate learner centered problem-based learning, project-based learning, and inquiry-based learning, ideally involving real-world scenarios, in which students are actively engaged in critical thinking activities.

An illustrative discussion and example can be found in the 1980s deployment of constructivist cognitive learning in computer literacy, which involved programming as an instrument of learning.

LOGO, a programming language, embodied an attempt to integrate Piagetan ideas with computers and technology. Initially there were broad, hopeful claims, including "perhaps the most controversial claim" that it would "improve general problem-solving skills" across disciplines.

However, LOGO programming skills did not consistently yield cognitive benefits. It was "not as concrete" as advocates claimed, it privileged "one form of reasoning over all others," and it was difficult to apply the thinking activity to non-LOGO-based activities. By the late 1980s, LOGO and other similar programming languages had lost their novelty and dominance and were gradually de-emphasized amid criticisms.

Practice:
​See also: Instructional design

​The extent to which e-learning assists or replaces other learning and teaching approaches is variable, ranging on a continuum from none to fully online distance learning. A variety of descriptive terms have been employed (somewhat inconsistently) to categorize the extent to which technology is used.

For example, 'hybrid learning' or 'blended learning' may refer to classroom aids and laptops, or may refer to approaches in which traditional classroom time is reduced but not eliminated, and is replaced with some online learning. 'Distributed learning' may describe either the e-learning component of a hybrid approach, or fully online distance learning environments.

Synchronous and asynchronous:

E-learning may either be synchronous or asynchronous. Synchronous learning occurs in real-time, with all participants interacting at the same time, while asynchronous learning is self-paced and allows participants to engage in the exchange of ideas or information without the dependency of other participants′ involvement at the same time.

Synchronous learning refers to the exchange of ideas and information with one or more participants during the same period. Examples are face-to-face discussion, online real-time live teacher instruction and feedback, Skype conversations, and chat rooms or virtual classrooms where everyone is online and working collaboratively at the same time.

Since students are working collaboratively, synchronized learning helps students create an open mind because they have to listen and learn from their peers. Synchronized learning fosters online awareness and improves many students' writing skills.

Asynchronous learning may use technologies such as email, blogs, wikis, and discussion boards, as well as web-supported textbooks, hypertext documents, audio video courses, and social networking using web 2.0. At the professional educational level, training may include virtual operating rooms.

Asynchronous learning is beneficial for students who have health problems or who have child care responsibilities. They have the opportunity to complete their work in a low stress environment and within a more flexible time frame. In asynchronous online courses, students proceed at their own pace. If they need to listen to a lecture a second time, or think about a question for a while, they may do so without fearing that they will hold back the rest of the class.

Through online courses, students can earn their diplomas more quickly, or repeat failed courses without the embarrassment of being in a class with younger students. Students have access to an incredible variety of enrichment courses in online learning, and can participate in college courses, internships, sports, or work and still graduate with their class.

Linear learning:

Computer-based training (CBT) refers to self-paced learning activities delivered on a computer or handheld device such as a tablet or smartphone. CBT initially delivered content via CD-ROM, and typically presented content linearly, much like reading an online book or manual.

For this reason, CBT is often used to teach static processes, such as using software or completing mathematical equations. Computer-based training is conceptually similar to web-based training (WBT) which are delivered via Internet using a web browser.

Assessing learning in a CBT is often by assessments that can be easily scored by a computer such as multiple choice questions, drag-and-drop, radio button, simulation or other interactive means. Assessments are easily scored and recorded via online software, providing immediate end-user feedback and completion status. Users are often able to print completion records in the form of certificates.

CBTs provide learning stimulus beyond traditional learning methodology from textbook, manual, or classroom-based instruction. CBTs can be a good alternative to printed learning materials since rich media, including videos or animations, can be embedded to enhance the learning.

CBTs pose some learning challenges. Typically, the creation of effective CBTs requires enormous resources. The software for developing CBTs (such as Flash or Adobe Director) is often more complex than a subject matter expert or teacher is able to use. The lack of human interaction can limit both the type of content that can be presented and the type of assessment that can be performed, and may need supplementation with online discussion or other interactive elements.

Collaborative learning:
Main article: Computer-supported collaborative learning

Computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) uses instructional methods designed to encourage or require students to work together on learning tasks, allowing social learning. CSCL is similar in concept to the terminology, "e-learning 2.0" and "networked collaborative learning" (NCL).

With Web 2.0 advances, sharing information between multiple people in a network has become much easier and use has increased. One of the main reasons for its usage states that it is "a breeding ground for creative and engaging educational endeavors."

Learning takes place through conversations about content and grounded interaction about problems and actions. This collaborative learning differs from instruction in which the instructor is the principal source of knowledge and skills. The neologism "e-learning 1.0" refers to direct instruction used in early computer-based learning and training systems (CBL).

In contrast to that linear delivery of content, often directly from the instructor's material, CSCL uses social software such as blogs, social media, wikis, podcasts, cloud-based document portals (such as Google Docs and Dropbox), and discussion groups and virtual worlds such as Second Life. This phenomenon has been referred to as Long Tail Learning. 

Advocates of social learning claim that one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it to others. Social networks have been used to foster online learning communities around subjects as diverse as test preparation and language education. Mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) is the use of handheld computers or cell phones to assist in language learning.

Collaborative apps allow students and teachers to interact while studying. Apps are designed after games, which provide a fun way to revise. When the experience is enjoyable the students become more engaged.

Games also usually come with a sense of progression, which can help keep students motivated and consistent while trying to improve. Examples of educational games are Dragon Box, Mind Snacks, Code Spells and many more.

Classroom 2.0 refers to online multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) that connect schools across geographical frontiers. Known as "eTwinning", computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) allows learners in one school to communicate with learners in another that they would not get to know otherwise, enhancing educational outcomes and cultural integration.

Further, many researchers distinguish between collaborative and cooperative approaches to group learning. For example, Roschelle and Teasley (1995) argue that "cooperation is accomplished by the division of labor among participants, as an activity where each person is responsible for a portion of the problem solving", in contrast with collaboration that involves the "mutual engagement of participants in a coordinated effort to solve the problem together."

Flipped classroom:
Main article: Flipped classroom

​This is an instructional strategy in which computer-assisted teaching is integrated with classroom instruction. Students are given basic essential instruction, such as lectures, before class instead of during class. This frees up classroom time for teachers to more actively engage with learners.

Media:

Educational media and tools can be used for:
  • task structuring support: help with how to do a task (procedures and processes),
  • access to knowledge bases (help user find information needed)
  • alternate forms of knowledge representation (multiple representations of knowledge, e.g. video, audio, text, image, data)

​Numerous types of physical technology are currently used: 
  • digital cameras,
  • video cameras,
  • interactive whiteboard tools,
  • document cameras, 
  • electronic media,
  • and LCD projectors.

Combinations of these techniques include blogs, collaborative software, ePortfolios, and virtual classrooms.

The current design of this type of applications includes the evaluation through tools of cognitive analysis that allow to identify which elements optimize the use of these platforms.

Audio and video:

Radio offers a synchronous educational vehicle, while streaming audio over the internet with webcasts and podcasts can be asynchronous. Classroom microphones, often wireless, can enable learners and educators to interact more clearly.

Video technology has included VHS tapes and DVDs, as well as on-demand and synchronous methods with digital video via server or web-based options such as streamed video from YouTube, Teacher Tube, Skype, Adobe Connect, and webcams. Telecommuting can connect with speakers and other experts. Interactive digital video games are being used at K-12 and higher education institutions.

Computers, tablets and mobile devices:

Collaborative learning is a group-based learning approach in which learners are mutually engaged in a coordinated fashion to achieve a learning goal or complete a learning task. With recent developments in smartphone technology, the processing powers and storage capabilities of modern mobiles allow for advanced development and use of apps. Many app developers and education experts have been exploring smartphone and tablet apps as a medium for collaborative learning.

Computers and tablets enable learners and educators to access websites as well as programs such as Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, PDF files, and images. Many mobile devices support m-learning.

Mobile devices such as clickers and smartphones can be used for interactive audience response feedback. Mobile learning can provide performance support for checking the time, setting reminders, retrieving worksheets, and instruction manuals.

OpenCourseWare (OCW) gives free public access to information used in undergraduate and graduate programs. Participating institutions are
  • MIT, 
  • Harvard,
  • Yale,
  • Princeton,
  • Stanford,
  • University of Pennsylvania,
  • and University of Michigan.

Google Classroom allows instructors to create, administer, and grade assignments. While Google Classroom ultimately strives to create a paperless learning environment, there are many different types of learner; a learning environment like the one that Google Classroom projects does not work for everyone.

Social networks:
Further information: Social media in education

Group web pages, blogs, wikis, and Twitter allow learners and educators to post thoughts, ideas, and comments on a website in an interactive learning environment. Social networking sites are virtual communities for people interested in a particular subject to communicate by voice, chat, instant message, video conference, or blogs.

The National School Boards Association found that 96% of students with online access have used social networking technologies, and more than 50% talk online about schoolwork. Social networking encourages collaboration and engagement and can be a motivational tool for self-efficacy among students.

Webcams:

Webcams and webcasting have enabled creation of virtual classrooms and virtual learning environment. Webcams are also being used to counter plagiarism and other forms of academic dishonesty that might occur in an e-learning environment.

Whiteboards:
Main articles: Whiteboard and Interactive whiteboard

There are three types of whiteboards. The initial whiteboards, analogous to blackboards, date from the late 1950s. The term whiteboard is also used metaphorically to refer to virtual whiteboards in which computer software applications simulate whiteboards by allowing writing or drawing.

This is a common feature of groupware for virtual meeting, collaboration, and instant messaging. Interactive whiteboards allow learners and instructors to write on the touch screen.

The screen markup can be on either a blank whiteboard or any computer screen content. Depending on permission settings, this visual learning can be interactive and participatory, including writing and manipulating images on the interactive whiteboard.

Screencasting:

Screencasting allows users to share their screens directly from their browser and make the video available online so that other viewers can stream the video directly. The presenter thus has the ability to show their ideas and flow of thoughts rather than simply explain them as simple text content.

In combination with audio and video, the educator can mimic the one-on-one experience of the classroom. Learners have an ability to pause and rewind, to review at their own pace, something a classroom cannot always offer.

Virtual classroom:
Main articles: Virtual Learning Environment and MUVE

A virtual learning environment (VLE), also known as a learning platform, simulates a virtual classroom or meetings by simultaneously mixing several communication technologies. Web conferencing software enables students and instructors to communicate with each other via webcam, microphone, and real-time chatting in a group setting.

Participants can raise hands, answer polls or take tests. Students are able to whiteboard and screencast when given rights by the instructor, who sets permission levels for text notes, microphone rights and mouse control.

A virtual classroom provides the opportunity for students to receive direct instruction from a qualified teacher in an interactive environment. Learners can have direct and immediate access to their instructor for instant feedback and direction. The virtual classroom provides a structured schedule of classes, which can be helpful for students who may find the freedom of asynchronous learning to be overwhelming.

In addition, the virtual classroom provides a social learning environment that replicates the traditional "brick and mortar" classroom. Most virtual classroom applications provide a recording feature. Each class is recorded and stored on a server, which allows for instant playback of any class over the course of the school year. This can be extremely useful for students to retrieve missed material or review concepts for an upcoming exam.

Parents and auditors have the conceptual ability to monitor any classroom to ensure that they are satisfied with the education the learner is receiving.

In higher education especially, a virtual learning environment (VLE) is sometimes combined with a management information system (MIS) to create a managed learning environment, in which all aspects of a course are handled through a consistent user interface throughout the institution. Physical universities and newer online-only colleges offer select academic degrees and certificate programs via the Internet.

Some programs require students to attend some campus classes or orientations, but many are delivered completely online. Several universities offer online student support services, such as online advising and registration, e-counseling, online textbook purchases, student governments and student newspapers.

Augmented reality (AR) provides students and teachers the opportunity to create layers of digital information, that includes both virtual world and real world elements, to interact with in real time. There are already a variety of apps which offer a lot of variations and possibilities.

​Media psychology involves the application of theories in psychology to media and is a growing specialty in learning and educational technology.

Learning management system:
Main article: Learning management system

A learning management system (LMS) is software used for delivering, tracking and managing training and education. It tracks data about attendance, time on task, and student progress. Educators can post announcements, grade assignments, check on course activity, and participate in class discussions.

Students can submit their work, read and respond to discussion questions, and take quizzes. An LMS may allow teachers, administrators, students, and permitted additional parties (such as parents if appropriate) to track various metrics. LMSs range from systems for managing training/educational records to software for distributing courses over the Internet and offering features for online collaboration.

The creation and maintenance of comprehensive learning content requires substantial initial and ongoing investments of human labor. Effective translation into other languages and cultural contexts requires even more investment by knowledgeable personnel.

Internet-based learning management systems include the following:
These types of LMS allow educators to run a learning system partially or fully online, asynchronously or synchronously.

Blackboard can be used for K-12 education, Higher Education, Business, and Government collaboration.

Moodle is a free-to-download Open Source Course Management System that provides blended learning opportunities as well as platforms for distance learning courses.

Eliademy is a free cloud-based Course Management System that provides blended learning opportunities as well as platforms for distance learning courses.

Learning content management system:

A learning content management system (LCMS) is software for author content (courses, reusable content objects). An LCMS may be solely dedicated to producing and publishing content that is hosted on an LMS, or it can host the content itself.

The Aviation Industry Computer-Based Training Committee (AICC) specification provides support for content that is hosted separately from the LMS.

A recent trend in LCMSs is to address this issue through crowdsourcing (cf.SlideWiki).

Computer-aided assessment:

Computer-aided assessment (e-assessment) ranges from automated multiple-choice tests to more sophisticated systems. With some systems, feedback can be geared towards a student's specific mistakes or the computer can navigate the student through a series of questions adapting to what the student appears to have learned or not learned. Formative assessment sifts out the incorrect answers, and these questions are then explained by the teacher.

The learner then practices with slight variations of the sifted out questions. The process is completed by summative assessment using a new set of questions that only cover the topics previously taught.

Electronic performance support system:

An electronic performance support system (EPSS) is, according to Barry Raybould, "a computer-based system that improves worker productivity by providing on-the-job access to integrated information, advice, and learning experiences".

Training management system:

A training management system or training resource management system is a software designed to optimize instructor-led training management.

Similar to an enterprise resource planning (ERP), it is a back office tool which aims at streamlining every aspect of the training process:
  • planning (training plan and budget forecasting),
  • logistics (scheduling and resource management),
  • financials (cost tracking, profitability),
  • reporting,
  • and sales for-profit training providers.

A training management system can be used to schedule instructors, venues and equipment through graphical agendas, optimize resource utilization, create a training plan and track remaining budgets, generate reports and share data between different teams.

While training management systems focus on managing instructor-led training, they can complete an LMS. In this situation, an LMS will manage e-learning delivery and assessment, while a training management system will manage ILT and back-office budget planning, logistic and reporting.

Learning objects:
Main article: Learning object

Content: Content and design architecture issues include pedagogy and learning object re-use. One approach looks at five aspects:
  • Fact – unique data (e.g. symbols for Excel formula, or the parts that make up a learning objective)
  • Concept – a category that includes multiple examples (e.g. Excel formulas, or the various types/theories of instructional design)
  • Process – a flow of events or activities (e.g. how a spreadsheet works, or the five phases in ADDIE)
  • Procedure – step-by-step task (e.g. entering a formula into a spreadsheet, or the steps that should be followed within a phase in ADDIE)
  • Strategic principle – task performed by adapting guidelines (e.g. doing a financial projection in a spreadsheet, or using a framework for designing learning environments)

Pedagogical elements  are defined as structures or units of educational material. They are the educational content that is to be delivered. These units are independent of format, meaning that although the unit may be delivered in various ways, the pedagogical structures themselves are not the textbook, web page, video conference, Podcast, lesson, assignment, multiple choice question, quiz, discussion group or a case study, all of which are possible methods of delivery.

Learning objects standards: Much effort has been put into the technical reuse of electronically based teaching materials and in particular creating or re-using learning objects.

These are self-contained units that are properly tagged with keywords, or other metadata, and often stored in an XML file format. Creating a course requires putting together a sequence of learning objects.

There are both proprietary and open, non-commercial and commercial, peer-reviewed repositories of learning objects such as the Merlot repository. Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) is a collection of standards and specifications that applies to certain web-based e-learning.

Other specifications such as Schools Framework allow for the transporting of learning objects, or for categorizing metadata (LOM).

Settings:

Preschool:
Various forms of electronic media are a feature of preschool life. Although parents report a positive experience, the impact of such use has not been systematically assessed.

The age when a given child might start using a particular technology such as a cellphone or computer might depend on matching a technological resource to the recipient's developmental capabilities, such as the age-anticipated stages labeled by Swiss psychologist, Jean Piaget. Parameters, such as age-appropriateness, coherence with sought-after values, and concurrent entertainment and educational aspects, have been suggested for choosing media.

K–12:​

E-learning is utilized by public K–12 schools in the United States as well as private schools. Some e-learning environments take place in a traditional classroom, others allow students to attend classes from home or other locations. There are several states that are utilizing virtual school platforms for e-learning across the country that continue to increase. Virtual school enables students to log into synchronous learning or asynchronous learning courses anywhere there is an internet connection.

E-learning is increasingly being utilized by students who may not want to go to traditional brick and mortar schools due to severe allergies or other medical issues, fear of school violence and school bullying and students whose parents would like to homeschool but do not feel qualified.

Online schools create a haven for students to receive a quality education while almost completely avoiding these common problems. Online charter schools also often are not limited by location, income level or class size in the way brick and mortar charter schools are.

E-learning also has been rising as a supplement to the traditional classroom. Students with special talents or interests outside of the available curricula use e-learning to advance their skills or exceed grade restrictions. Some online institutions connect students with instructors via web conference technology to form a digital classroom.

National private schools are also available online. These provide the benefits of e-learning to students in states where charter online schools are not available. They also may allow students greater flexibility and exemption from state testing.

Virtual education in K-12 schooling often refers to virtual schools, and in higher education to virtual universities. Virtual schools are "cyber charter schools" with innovative administrative models and course delivery technology.

​Higher education:
Main article: Online learning in higher education

Online college course enrollment has seen a 29% increase in enrollment with nearly one third of all college students, or an estimated 6.7 million students are currently enrolled in online classes. In 2009, 44 percent of post-secondary students in the USA were taking some or all of their courses online, which was projected to rise to 81 percent by 2014.

Although a large proportion of for-profit higher education institutions now offer online classes, only about half of private, non-profit schools do so.

Private institutions may become more involved with on-line presentations as the costs decrease. Properly trained staff must also be hired to work with students online. These staff members need to understand the content area, and also be highly trained in the use of the computer and Internet.

Online education is rapidly increasing, and online doctoral programs have even developed at leading research universities.

Although massive open online courses (MOOCs) may have limitations that preclude them from fully replacing college education, such programs have significantly expanded. MIT, Stanford and Princeton University offer classes to a global audience, but not for college credit.

University-level programs, like edX founded by Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, offer wide range of disciplines at no charge, while others permit students to audit a course at no charge but require a small fee for accreditation. MOOCs have not had a significant impact on higher education and declined after the initial expansion, but are expected to remain in some form.

Private organizations also offer classes, such as Udacity, with free computer science classes, and Khan Academy, with over 3,900 free micro-lectures available via YouTube. Distributed open collaborative course (DOCC) sees itself as a counter-movement to MOOC, emphasizing decentralized teaching.

University of the People is a non-profit accredited online university. Coursera offers online courses. According to Fortune magazine, over a million people worldwide have enrolled in free online courses.

Corporate and professional:

Companies with spread out distribution chains use e-learning for staff training and development and to bring customers information about the latest product developments. Continuing professional development (CPD) can deliver regulatory compliance updates and staff development of valuable workplace skills. For effectiveness and competitive learning performance, scoring systems are designed to give live feedback on decision-making in complex (mobile) learning scenarios.

Public health:

There is an important need for recent, reliable, and high-quality health information to be made available to the public as well as in summarized form for public health providers. Health providers have indicated the need for automatic notification of the latest research, a single searchable portal of information, and access to grey literature.

The Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Library is funded by the U.S. Maternal and Child Health Bureau to screen the latest research and develop automatic notifications to providers through the MCH Alert.

Another application in public health is the development of mHealth (use of mobile telecommunication and multimedia into global public health). MHealth has been used to promote prenatal and newborn services, with positive outcomes.

In addition, "Health systems have implemented mHealth programs to facilitate emergency medical responses, point-of-care support, health promotion and data collection." In low and middle income countries, mHealth is most frequently used as one-way text messages or phone reminders to promote treatment adherence and gather data.

ADHD:

There has also been a growing interest in e-learning as a beneficial educational method for students with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). With the growing popularity in e-learning among K-12 and higher education, the opportunity to take online classes is becoming increasingly important for students of all ages.

However, students with ADHD and special needs face different learning demands compared to the typical developing learner. This is especially significant considering the dramatic rise in ADHD diagnoses in the last decade among both children and adults. Compared to the traditional face-to-face classroom, e-learning and virtual classrooms require a higher level of executive functions, which is the primary deficit associated with ADHD.

Although ADHD is not specifically named in the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, students with ADHD who have symptoms that interfere with their learning or ability may be eligible for assistive technology. Some examples of the resources that may help interest students and adults with ADHD consist of, computer software, brain games, timers, calendars, voice recognition devices, screen magnifiers, and talking books.

Wolf lists 12 executive function skills necessary for students to succeed in post-secondary education: plan, set goals, organize, initiate, sustain attention/effort, flexibility, monitor, use feedback, structure, manage time, manage materials, and follow through. 

These skills, along with strong independent and self-regulated learning, are especially pronounced in the online environment and as many ADHD students suffer from a deficit in one or more of these executive functions, this presents a significant challenge and accessibility barrier to the current e-learning approach.

Some have noted that current e-learning models are moving towards applying a constructivism learning theory that emphasizes a learner-centered environment and postulates that everyone has the ability to construct their own knowledge and meaning through a process of problem solving and discovery. However, some principles of constructivism may not be appropriate for ADHD learners; these principles include active learning, self-monitoring, motivation, and strong focus.

Despite the limitations, students with special needs, including ADHD, have expressed an overall enthusiasm for e-learning and have identified a number e-learning benefits, including:
  • availability of online course notes, materials and additional resources;
  • the ability to work at an independent pace and spend extra time formulating thoughtful responses in class discussions;
  • help in understanding course lecture/content;
  • ability to review lectures multiple times; and enhanced access to and communication with the course instructor.

​Disabilities:

The design of e-learning platforms in ways that enable universal access has received attention from several directions, including the World Wide Web Consortium's Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). WAI provides universal formatting standards for websites so they can remain accessible to people with disabilities.

For example, developing or adopting e-learning material can enable accessibility for people with visual impairment. The Perkins School for the Blind offers learning resources tailored for the visually impaired, including webcasts, webinars, downloadable science activities, and an online library that has access to over 40,000 resource materials on blindness and deaf blindness.

Online education may appear to be a promising alternative for students with physical and sensory disabilities because they get to work at their own pace and in their own home.

However, not all online programs are equal when it comes to their resources for students with disabilities. Students with disabilities who wish to enroll in online education must either be able to advocate for themselves and their own rights or have a person who is willing to advocate for them.

The American with Disabilities Act states that online programs must provide appropriate accommodations for students with disabilities, but has not specifically defined what that means. "Once students with disabilities are accepted into an online program, they should prepare to be direct and open about what they need to succeed, experts say" (Haynie).

Identity options:

Educational technology, particularly in online learning environments, can allow students to use real identity, pseudonym, or anonymous identity during classroom communication. Advantages in anonymizing race, age, and gender are increased student participation and increased cross-cultural communication. Risks include increased cyber-bullying, and aggressive or hostile language.

Benefits:
​
Effective technology use deploys multiple evidence-based strategies concurrently (e.g. adaptive content, frequent testing, immediate feedback, etc.), as do effective teachers. 

Using computers or other forms of technology can give students practice on core content and skills while the teacher can work with others, conduct assessments, or perform other tasks. 

Through the use of educational technology, education is able to be individualized for each student allowing for better differentiation and allowing students to work for mastery at their own pace.

Modern educational technology can improve access to education, including full degree programs. It enables better integration for non-full-time students, particularly in continuing education, and improved interactions between students and instructors. Learning material can be used for long distance learning and are accessible to a wider audience.

Course materials are easy to access. In 2010, 70.3% of American family households had access to the internet. In 2013, according to Canadian Radio Television and Telecommunications Commission Canada, 79% of homes have access to the internet. 

Students can access and engage with numerous online resources at home. Using online resources such as Khan Academy or TED Talks can help students spend more time on specific aspects of what they may be learning in school, but at home.

Schools like MIT have made certain course materials free online. Although some aspects of a classroom setting are missed by using these resources, they are helpful tools to add additional support to the educational system. The necessity to pay for transport to the educational facility is removed.

Students appreciate the convenience of e-learning, but report greater engagement in face-to-face learning environments.

According to James Kulik, who studies the effectiveness of computers used for instruction, students usually learn more in less time when receiving computer-based instruction and they like classes more and develop more positive attitudes toward computers in computer-based classes. Students can independently solve problems.

There are no intrinsic age-based restrictions on difficulty level, i.e. students can go at their own pace. Students editing their written work on word processors improve the quality of their writing. According to some studies, the students are better at critiquing and editing written work that is exchanged over a computer network with students they know.

Studies completed in "computer intensive" settings found increases in student-centric, cooperative and higher order learning, writing skills, problem solving, and using technology. In addition, attitudes toward technology as a learning tool by parents, students and teachers are also improved.

Employers' acceptance of online education has risen over time. More than 50% of human resource managers SHRM surveyed for an August 2010 report said that if two candidates with the same level of experience were applying for a job, it would not have any kind of effect whether the candidate's obtained degree was acquired through an online or a traditional school.

Seventy-nine percent said they had employed a candidate with an online degree in the past 12 months. However 66% said candidates who get degrees online were not seen as positively as a job applicant with traditional degrees.

The use of educational apps generally has positive effect on learning. Pre- and post- tests reveal that the use of apps on mobile devices reduces the achievement gap between struggling and average students.

Some educational apps improve group work by allowing students to receive feedback on answers and promoting collaboration in solving problems, examples of these apps can be found in the third paragraph. The benefits of app-assisted learning have been exhibited in all age groups.

​Kindergarten students that use iPads show much higher rates of literacy than non-users. Medical students at University of California Irvine that utilized iPad academically have been reported to score 23% higher on national exams than previous classes that did not.

Disadvantages:
​
Many US states spend large sums of money on technology. However, as of 2013, none were looking at technology return on investment (ROI) to connect expenditures on technology with improved student outcomes.

New technologies are frequently accompanied by unrealistic hype and promise regarding their transformative power to change education for the better or in allowing better educational opportunities to reach the masses. Examples include silent film, broadcast radio, and television, none of which have maintained much of a foothold in the daily practices of mainstream, formal education.

Technology, in and of itself, does not necessarily result in fundamental improvements to educational practice. The focus needs to be on the learner's interaction with technology—not the technology itself. It needs to be recognized as "ecological" rather than "additive" or "subtractive". In this ecological change, one significant change will create total change.

According to Branford et al., "technology does not guarantee effective learning" and inappropriate use of technology can even hinder it. A University of Washington study of infant vocabulary shows that it is slipping due to educational baby DVDs.

Published in the Journal of Pediatrics, a 2007 University of Washington study on the vocabulary of babies surveyed over 1,000 parents in Washington and Minnesota. The study found that for every one hour that babies 8–16 months of age watched DVDs and Videos they knew 6-8 fewer of 90 common baby words than the babies that did not watch them.

Andrew Meltzoff, a surveyor in this study states that the result makes sense, that if the baby's 'alert time' is spent in front of DVDs and TV, instead of with people speaking, the babies are not going to get the same linguistic experience. Dr. Dimitri Chistakis, another surveyor reported that the evidence is mounting that baby DVDs are of no value and may be harmful.

Adaptive instructional materials tailor questions to each student's ability and calculate their scores, but this encourages students to work individually rather than socially or collaboratively (Kruse, 2013). Social relationships are important but high-tech environments may compromise the balance of trust, care and respect between teacher and student.

Massively open online courses (MOOCs), although quite popular in discussions of technology and education in developed countries (more so in US), are not a major concern in most developing or low-income countries. One of the stated goals of MOOCs is to provide less fortunate populations (i.e., in developing countries) an opportunity to experience courses with US-style content and structure.

However, research shows only 3% of the registrants are from low-income countries and although many courses have thousands of registered students only 5-10% of them complete the course. MOOCs also implies that certain curriculum and teaching methods are superior and this could eventually wash over (or possibly washing out) local educational institutions, cultural norms and educational traditions.

With the Internet and social media, using educational apps makes the students highly susceptible to distraction and sidetracking. Even though proper use has shown to increase student performances, being distracted would be detrimental. Another disadvantage is increased potential for cheating. Smartphones can be very easy to hide and use inconspicuously, especially if their use is normalized in the classroom. These disadvantages can be managed with strict rules and regulations on mobile phone use.

Over-stimulation:

Electronic devices such as cellphones and computers facilitate rapid access to a stream of sources, each of which may receive cursory attention. Michel Rich, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and executive director of the center on Media and Child Health in Boston, said of the digital generation,

"Their brains are rewarded not for staying on task, but for jumping to the next thing. The worry is we're raising a generation of kids in front of screens whose brains are going to be wired differently."

Students have always faced distractions; computers and cellphones are a particular challenge because the stream of data can interfere with focusing and learning. Although these technologies affect adults too, young people may be more influenced by it as their developing brains can easily become habituated to switching tasks and become unaccustomed to sustaining attention. Too much information, coming too rapidly, can overwhelm thinking.

Technology is "rapidly and profoundly altering our brains." High exposure levels stimulate brain cell alteration and release neurotransmitters, which causes the strengthening of some neural pathways and weakening of others. This leads to heightened stress levels on the brain that, at first, boost energy levels, but, over time, actually augment memory, impair cognition, lead to depression, alter the neural circuitry of the hippocampus, amygdala and prefrontal cortex.

These are the brain regions that control mood and thought. If unchecked, the underlying structure of the brain could be altered. Over-stimulation due to technology may begin too young. When children are exposed before the age of seven, important developmental tasks may be delayed, and bad learning habits might develop, which "deprives children of the exploration and play that they need to develop." Media psychology is an emerging specialty field that embraces electronic devices and the sensory behaviors occurring from the use of educational technology in learning.

Sociocultural criticism:

According to Lai, "the learning environment is a complex system where the interplay and interactions of many things impact the outcome of learning." When technology is brought into an educational setting, the pedagogical setting changes in that technology-driven teaching can change the entire meaning of an activity without adequate research validation. If technology monopolizes an activity, students can begin to develop the sense that "life would scarcely be thinkable without technology."

Leo Marx considered the word "technology" itself as problematic, susceptible to reification and "phantom objectivity", which conceals its fundamental nature as something that is only valuable insofar as it benefits the human condition. Technology ultimately comes down to affecting the relations between people, but this notion is obfuscated when technology is treated as an abstract notion devoid of good and evil.

Langdon Winner makes a similar point by arguing that the underdevelopment of the philosophy of technology leaves us with an overly simplistic reduction in our discourse to the supposedly dichotomous notions of the "making" versus the "uses" of new technologies, and that a narrow focus on "use" leads us to believe that all technologies are neutral in moral standing. These critiques would have us ask not, "How do we maximize the role or advancement of technology in education?", but, rather, "What are the social and human consequences of adopting any particular technology?"

Winner viewed technology as a "form of life" that not only aids human activity, but that also represents a powerful force in reshaping that activity and its meaning. For example, the use of robots in the industrial workplace may increase productivity, but they also radically change the process of production itself, thereby redefining what is meant by "work" in such a setting.

In education, standardized testing has arguably redefined the notions of learning and assessment. We rarely explicitly reflect on how strange a notion it is that a number between, say, 0 and 100 could accurately reflect a person's knowledge about the world. According to Winner, the recurring patterns in everyday life tend to become an unconscious process that we learn to take for granted. Winner writes,

By far the greatest latitude of choice exists the very first time a particular instrument, system, or technique is introduced. Because choices tend to become strongly fixed in material equipment, economic investment, and social habit, the original flexibility vanishes for all practical purposes once the initial commitments are made. In that sense technological innovations are similar to legislative acts or political findings that establish a framework for public order that will endure over many generations.

When adopting new technologies, there may be one best chance to "get it right." Seymour Papert (p. 32) points out a good example of a (bad) choice that has become strongly fixed in social habit and material equipment: our "choice" to use the QWERTY keyboard.

The QWERTY arrangement of letters on the keyboard was originally chosen, not because it was the most efficient for typing, but because early typewriters were prone to jam when adjacent keys were struck in quick succession. Now that typing has become a digital process, this is no longer an issue, but the QWERTY arrangement lives on as a social habit, one that is very difficult to change.

Neil Postman endorsed the notion that technology impacts human cultures, including the culture of classrooms, and that this is a consideration even more important than considering the efficiency of a new technology as a tool for teaching. 

Regarding the computer's impact on education, Postman writes "What we need to consider about the computer has nothing to do with its efficiency as a teaching tool. We need to know in what ways it is altering our conception of learning, and how in conjunction with television, it undermines the old idea of school."

There is an assumption that technology is inherently interesting so it must be helpful in education; based on research by Daniel Willingham, that is not always the case. He argues that it does not necessarily matter what the technological medium is, but whether or not the content is engaging and utilizes the medium in a beneficial way.

Digital divide:
Main article: Digital divide

The concept of the digital divide is a gap between those who have access to digital technologies and those who do not. Access may be associated with age, gender, socio-economic status, education, income, ethnicity, and geography.

Data protection:

According to a report by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, large amounts of personal data on children is collected by electronic devices that are distributed in schools in the United States. Often far more information than necessary is collected, uploaded and stored indefinitely.

​Aside name and date of birth, this information can include the child's browsing history, search terms, location data, contact lists, as well as behavioral information. Parents are not informed or, if informed, have little choice. According to the report, this constant surveillance resulting from educational technology can "warp children's privacy expectations, lead them to self-censor, and limit their creativity".

Teacher Training:

Since technology is not the end goal of education, but rather a means by which it can be accomplished, educators must have a good grasp of the technology and its advantages and disadvantages. Teacher training aims for effective integration of classroom technology.

The evolving nature of technology may unsettle teachers, who may experience themselves as perpetual novices. Finding quality materials to support classroom objectives is often difficult. Random professional development days are inadequate.

According to Jenkins, "Rather than dealing with each technology in isolation, we would do better to take an ecological approach, thinking about the interrelationship among different communication technologies, the cultural communities that grow up around them, and the activities they support."

Jenkins also suggested that the traditional school curriculum guided teachers to train students to be autonomous problem solvers. However, today's workers are increasingly asked to work in teams, drawing on different sets of expertise, and collaborating to solve problem.

Learning styles and the methods of collecting information have evolved, and "students often feel locked out of the worlds described in their textbooks through the depersonalized and abstract prose used to describe them". 

These twenty-first century skills can be attained through the incorporation and engagement with technology. Changes in instruction and use of technology can also promote a higher level of learning among students with different types of intelligence

Assessment:
​Main articles: Educational assessment and Electronic assessment

There are two distinct issues of assessment: the assessment of educational technology and assessment with technology.

Assessments of educational technology have included the Follow Through project.
Educational assessment with technology may be either formative assessment or summative assessment.

Instructors use both types of assessment to understand student progress and learning in the classroom. Technology has helped teachers create better assessments to help understand where students who are having trouble with the material are having issues.

Formative assessment is more difficult, as the perfect form is ongoing and allows the students to show their learning in different ways depending on their learning styles.

Technology has helped some teachers make their formative assessments better, particularly through the use of classroom response systems (CRS). 

A CRS is a tool in which the students each have a handheld device that partners up with the teacher's computer. The instructor then asks multiple choice or true or false questions and the students answer on their device. 

Depending on the software used, the answers may then be shown on a graph so students and teacher can see the percentage of students who gave each answer and the teacher can focus on what went wrong.

Summative assessments are more common in classrooms and are usually set up to be more easily graded, as they take the form of tests or projects with specific grading schemes.

One huge benefit to tech-based testing is the option to give students immediate feedback on their answers. When students get these responses, they are able to know how they are doing in the class which can help push them to improve or give them confidence that they are doing well.

Technology also allows for different kinds of summative assessment, such as digital presentations, videos, or anything else the teacher/students may come up with, which allows different learners to show what they learned more effectively. Teachers can also use technology to post graded assessments online for students to have a better idea of what a good project is.

Electronic assessment uses information technology. It encompasses several potential applications, which may be teacher or student oriented, including educational assessment throughout the continuum of learning, such as: 
E-Marking is an examiner led activity closely related to other e-assessment activities such as e-testing, or e-learning which are student led. E-marking allows markers to mark a scanned script or online response on a computer screen rather than on paper.

There are no restrictions to the types of tests that can use e-marking, with e-marking applications designed to accommodate multiple choice, written, and even video submissions for performance examinations.

E-marking software is used by individual educational institutions and can also be rolled out to the participating schools of awarding exam organisations. e-marking has been used to mark many well known high stakes examinations, which in the US includes the SAT test for college admissions. 

Analytics:

The importance of self-assessment through tools made available on Educational Technology platforms has been growing. Self-assessment in education technology relies on students analyzing their strengths, weaknesses and areas where improvement is possible to set realistic goals in learning, improve their educational performances and track their progress. One of the unique tools for self-assessment made possible by education technology is Analytics. Analytics is data gathered on the student's activities on the learning platform, drawn into meaningful patterns that leads to a valid conclusion, usually through the medium of data visualization such as graphs.

Expenditure:

The five key sectors of the e-learning industry are consulting, content, technologies, services and support. Worldwide, e-learning was estimated in 2000 to be over $48 billion according to conservative estimates.

Commercial growth has been brisk. In 2014, the worldwide commercial market activity was estimated at $6 billion venture capital over the past five years, with self-paced learning generating $35.6 billion in 2011. North American e-learning generated $23.3 billion in revenue in 2013, with a 9% growth rate in cloud-based authoring tools and learning platforms.

Careers:
Main articles: Educational technologist and Educational psychologist

Educational technologists and psychologists apply basic educational and psychological research into an evidence-based applied science (or a technology) of learning or instruction.

In research, these professions typically require a graduate degree (Master's, Doctorate, Ph.D., or D.Phil.) in a field related to educational psychology, educational media, experimental psychology, cognitive psychology or, more purely, in the fields of educational, instructional or human performance technology or instructional design.

In industry, educational technology is utilized to train students and employees by a wide range of learning and communication practitioners, including: 
See Also: ___________________________________________________________________________
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Use of Technology in Teaching and Learning 
(U.S. Department of Education) 

"Technology ushers in fundamental structural changes that can be integral to achieving significant improvements in productivity.

Used to ​support both teaching and learning, technology infuses classrooms with digital learning tools, such as computers and hand held devices; expands course offerings, experiences, and learning materials; supports learning 24 hours a day, 7 days a week; builds 21st century skills; increases student engagement and motivation; and accelerates learning.

Technology also has the power to transform teaching by ushering in a new model of connected teaching. This model links teachers to their students and to professional content, resources, and systems to help them improve their own instruction and personalize learning.

Online learning opportunities and the use of open educational resources and other technologies can increase educational productivity by accelerating the rate of learning; reducing costs associated with instructional materials or program delivery; and better utilizing teacher time.

The links on this page are provided for users convenience and are not an endorsement. See full disclaimer. 

Virtual or online learning: 48 states and the District of Columbia currently support online learning opportunities that range from supplementing classroom instruction on an occasional basis to enrolling students in full-time programs. These opportunities include dual enrollment, credit recovery, and summer school programs, and can make courses such as Advanced Placement and honors, or remediation classes available to students.

Both core subjects and electives can be taken online, many supported by online learning materials. While some online schools or programs are homegrown, many others contract with private providers or other states to provide online learning opportunities.

Full-time online schools: The following online or virtual schools enroll students on a full-time basis. Students enrolled in these schools are not attending a bricks and mortar school; instead they receive all of their instruction and earn all of their credits through the online school.

State operated:
  • The Florida Virtual School – An online school that provides full-time learning opportunities to students in grades K-12. Districts can also work with Florida Virtual School to provide blended learning opportunities to students by enabling them to access online courses from school sites. Additional link here.
  • ​North Carolina Virtual Public School – An online high school offering 120 courses to students both during and after the school day. The courses offered include Advanced Placement and honors courses, world languages, electives, credit recovery, and online college courses. The school also provides test preparation and career planning services to students.

District operated:
  • Karval Online Education – A public K-12 online school for Colorado residents that provides a free computer for the family to use while the student is enrolled and provides reimbursement opportunities to offset Internet and other educational expenses. Dual credit courses are available to juniors and seniors.
  • ​Salem-Keizer Online – This online Oregon high school is an accredited program of Roberts High School in the Salem-Keizer Public School District in Oregon. The school provides 24/7 learning opportunities to students living within the boundaries of the school district and who are not enrolled in their neighborhood public school. Tuition is only required for students enrolled in summer school courses. 

Charter operated:
  • Guided Online Academic Learning Academy – An online public charter high school in Colorado for students ages 14-21. The Academy offers more than 200 courses to students as well as a variety of support services, activities to support student-to-student interactions, and drop-in centers to facilitate enrollment, counseling, assessments, and other services.

​Blended learning:

Blended learning opportunities incorporate both face-to-face and online learning opportunities. The degree to which online learning takes place, and the way it is integrated into the curriculum, can vary across schools.

The strategy of blending online learning with school-based instruction is often utilized to accommodate students’ diverse learning styles and to enable them to work before or after school in ways that are not possible with full-time conventional classroom instruction.

Online learning has the potential to improve educational productivity by accelerating the rate of learning, taking advantage of learning time outside of school hours, reducing the cost of instructional materials, and better utilizing teacher time. These strategies can be particularly useful in rural areas where blended or online learning can help teachers and students in remote areas overcome distance.

State operated:
​
  • Michigan Virtual School – Michigan’s students are able to take online classes and access online learning tools from their middle and high schools via this virtual school. Michigan Virtual also provides full-time learning opportunities to middle and high school students. Districts in the state work with the virtual school to grant course credit and diplomas to students.

District operated:

  • Walled Lake Consolidated School District – This Michigan district’s online summer school credit recovery program was expanded to include online learning opportunities during the school year. Students can now enroll in up to two online courses each semester while continuing to attend school for at least four hours a day. Eleventh and twelfth graders may also choose to enroll concurrently in postsecondary courses via a partnership with a local community college. The credit recovery program reduced per-student costs by 57 percent and the district estimates that by offering two online courses during the school year it has been able to save $517 per student on instructional costs.
​

School operated:

  • San Francisco Flex Academy – This high school is a five-days-a-week hybrid school that provides an online curriculum that personalizes learning and enables students to move through courses at their own pace. These online courses are taken at the school site and are supported by credentialed teachers.
  • Rocketship – This elementary charter school network in California is a hybrid school model. Each day, students attend the Learning Lab where they use computers to support their individual learning needs. These Labs do not require certified teachers, enabling Rocketship to reinvest the savings in training, Response to Intervention, higher teacher salaries, facilities, and academic deans. While students are in the Lab, teachers are engaging in planning.
  • Carpe Diem Collegiate High School – Carpe Diem is a hybrid school in Arizona that offers computer-assisted instruction and onsite teacher facilitators. This model enables students to progress as they demonstrate mastery.
 ​
Open educational resources are teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain and are freely available to anyone over the Web. They are an important element of an infrastructure for learning and range from podcasts to digital libraries to textbooks and games.

It is critical to ensure that open educational resources meet standards of quality, integrity, and accuracy—as with any other educational resource—and that they are accessible to students with disabilities. 
  • Open High School of Utah – This school uses open educational resources to create an open source curriculum. To create this curriculum, teachers gather and sort through open source materials, align them with state standards, and modify the materials to meet student needs.  
  • CK-12 – CK-12 FlexBooks are customizable, standards-aligned, digital textbooks for grades K-12. They are intended to provide high-quality educational content that will serve both as core text and provide an adaptive environment for learning. 
  • Leadership Public Schools (LPS) – In each of the four LPS schools, teachers work together to utilize open-source materials to meet the specific learning needs of their students. Through a partnership with CK-12, LPS has developed College Access Readers, a series of online books with literacy supports embedded in them to meet the individual needs of students, from advanced to under-performing students. 
  • Khan Academy – The Khan Academy is a not-for-profit organization providing digital learning resources, including an extensive video library, practice exercises, and assessments. These resources focus on K-12 math and science topics such as biology, chemistry, and physics, and include resources on the humanities, finance, and history.

Use digital resources well: Schools can use digital resources in a variety of ways to support teaching and learning. Electronic grade books, digital portfolios, learning games, and real-time feedback on teacher and student performance, are a few ways that technology can be utilized to power learning.
  • High Tech High – High Tech High (HTH) is a network of eleven California charter schools offering project-based learning opportunities to students in grades K-12. HTH links technical and academic studies and focuses on personalization and the connection of learning to the real word. To support student learning and share the results of project-based learning, HTH makes a wealth of resources available online, including teacher and student portfolios, videos, lessons, and other resources.
  • New Technology High School – At this California school, student work is assessed across classes and grades, and feedback is made available to students via online grade books. These grade books are continually updated so that students can see how they are doing not only in each course, but also on each of their learning outcomes, averaged across all their courses. Electronic learning portfolios contain examples of students’ work and associated evaluations across all classes and grades. New Tech High is part of the national New Tech Network.
  • Quest to Learn – This school, located in New York, utilizes games and other forms of digital media to provide students with a curriculum that is design-led and inquiry-based. The goal of this model is to use education technologies to support students in becoming active problem solvers and critical thinkers, and to provide students with constant feedback on their achievement.

Click here for the full article by the U.S. Department of Education.
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Do Digital Games Improve Children’s Math Skills?
(by Education Week May 16, 2017)

In Gregory Smith's 5th grade class in Tampa, Fla., two girls are beating the majority of their class in an online math-strategy game named TiViTz

That is remarkable given the original disparity between the two students: The girl who is No. 1 on the class leader-board scored a level five—indicating mastery—on Florida's state test in math last year. The other girl, who is No. 3 on the leader board, had scored a level one on the state test.

"When they played each other at first, the student at level five [on the state test] won almost every time," Smith said. "Over the last month, it has been a very close split between the two young ladies."

The students have been playing the online game since January. Sometimes, the girls play against each other and sometimes they play against the computer, Smith said.

"The student who scored a level one is doing math that's harder because she's playing with a friend," he said.

That sort of increase in student achievement is what educators in the Hillsborough County school system are hoping to see with the adoption of TiViTz, a math-strategy game that covers concepts from single-digit addition to multiplying and dividing by percentages.

Smith, who teaches at Witter Elementary, which is part of Hillsborough, conducted an informal study that found that after ur months of playing TiViTz games online, his students' math-skills scores went up significantly, from an average of 49 percent to 83 percent. The students enjoyment of math also nearly doubled, by their own ratings.

​"I've seen enthusiasm in some of the children who normally didn't do as well, paper-to-pencil, but when they're doing it because of the game, they're doing better at it," he said.

"If you don't like something, you're definitely not going to do well in it. And if you don't think you're going to do well, you're definitely not going to do well," Smith continued.

That's the philosophy behind digital math games, whether they're played online or through an app. Many educators and researchers say the games can help students both improve their math skills and enjoy math more. Nearly three-quarters of K-8 teachers report using digital games for instruction, according to a 2014 study by the Games and Learning Publishing Council, a project of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center.

As long as these digital games are meaningful and motivating to children, they can have a real impact on learning, said Douglas Clements, a professor of early-childhood learning at the University of Denver, who has studied the effectiveness of digital math games.

Digital games allow students to take an active role in their learning and see the visual connection between the game play and the math. The games also provide constant positive or corrective feedback that is "really hard for teachers to provide to individual kids," Clements said.

And while there has been some pushback, especially in the early years, against students having too much screen time, Clements said the research shows that children don't need to play the games for hours to see results.

"We have found that a focused five-to-15 minutes, just a couple times a week, can make a big difference for kids," he said.

Gathering Research:

The 206,800-student Hillsborough district is now expanding on Smith's informal study by looking at all 148 elementary schools and matching classrooms that are playing the digital game with those who aren't. The paired groups will have similar student demographics, so the district can get a better sense of how the game is improving student outcomes, said Larry Plank, the district's director of K-12 science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, or STEM, education.

The district is also looking at whether the improved math performance shows up on state assessments as well as the district's formative assessments, he said.

And this summer, the district will conduct a study across approximately 50 K-8 after-school programs to gather data on digital games' use in that context, Plank said.

SAS Games, which makes TiViTz, is not paying for the study or otherwise involved, said Siobhan Mullen, the company's CEO. That's key to producing trustworthy results, she and other game company executives said.

"I know from personal experience that games play a role in engagement. ... [But] the only way I know they work is by running a large, controlled study in the field," said Vadim Polikov, the CEO and founder of Legends of Learning, which creates digital games for middle school science and other subjects.

Legends of Learning recently partnered with researchers from Vanderbilt University to test the effectiveness of an 8th grade U.S. history digital game. Over 1,000 students participated across seven states. Thirteen teachers each taught two sections of 8th grade U.S. history: One section would receive the teacher's regular instruction, and the other used curriculum-aligned games for at least half of class time.

After three weeks, both sections were tested, and students who had played the games outperformed their peers at a statistically significant level.

In addition to learning that student outcomes increased, the researchers found that both students and teachers enjoyed the games. Teachers reported that their students were more engaged while using the game, and that the games were easy to incorporate into the existing curriculum.

The digital-math-game company Motion Math was born out of a research project by Stanford University graduate students. The company, which develops games for students in kindergarten through 6th grades, has since worked with a researcher to study the efficacy of the games.

That peer-reviewed study, published in 2013 in the journal Games and Culture, tracked 122 Los Angeles 5th graders who played Motion Math's fraction game for five days for 20 minutes each day. The students improved by 15 percent on their fractions estimation, and 10 percent in their attitudes toward fractions, based on standardized-test items.

A Bright Spot for Girls:

One of the early findings in the Hillsborough County district's adoption of TiViTz is that 55 percent of the players and many of the top winners are girls like two of the top scorers in Smith's class.

As research shows that girls are typically more anxious about math than boys, "thatdid raise an eyebrow or two," Plank said. "I think it's an engaging, fun way [to learn math] that is nonthreatening, because it's utilized in a very social manner—students play each other one-on-one."

Motion Math CEO Jacob Klein said his company consciously chooses female characters for the games, and stays away from the "violent tropes of video games." Students can choose avatars in their play that reflect their gender and skin color.

Since the math gender gap widens as students progress through school, Klein said, "early grades are a great time to build up almost a reserve in interest and skill."

That's critical for both genders, SAS Games' Mullen said, since there are not enough people in the pipeline to meet the demand in the STEM fields.

"If we focus on elementary math, we could catch them before they drift away and decide they don't like it," she said. "Show why [math] is relevant to their future world and make it part of their current world."

"We shouldn't look to old media such as a paper-and-pencil quiz as the arbiter of knowledge," Klein said. "If a student can do something smartly in a digital environment, that matters, that counts. Even if they can't yet introduce that in paper and pencil, that doesn't lessen the skill. ... It's just a different place for knowledge."

Coverage of early-math education is supported in part by a grant from the CME Group Foundation. Education Week retains sole editorial control over the content of this coverage.

[End of Article]
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​
Best Student-Collaboration Tools by Common Sense Education

These 29 tools mix productivity and creativity, getting students to share and collaborate on projects, give and take feedback, annotate, brainstorm, make media, or just hang out.

No matter the use, there's tech here that'll show students how collaboration leads to better knowledge building as well as the development of social and emotional skills like teamwork. 

Interested in how you might use some of these tools in the classroom? Check out our page "Give Every Student a Stake in Group Work".

Note also buttons for reading the full review along with accessing the web page. You can even purchase and download any tool that you might wish!

Click here for full list.







​
Impact of 2019-2020 Coronavirus Pandemic on Education Pictured (with Video) below: With students sent home to take classes online, will they decide the experience of being on campus isn't worth the price and hurt small colleges? 
The 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic has affected educational systems worldwide, leading to the widespread closures of schools and universities.

As of 3 April 2020, over 421 million learners were out of school due to school closures in response to COVID-19. According to UNESCO monitoring, over 200 countries have implemented nationwide closures, impacting about 98% of the world's student population.

On 23 March 2020, Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) released a statement announcing the cancellation of Cambridge IGCSE, Cambridge O Level, Cambridge International AS & A Level, Cambridge AICE Diploma, and Cambridge Pre-U examinations for the May/June 2020 series across all countries. International Baccalaureate exams have also been cancelled.

School closures impact not only students, teachers, and families, but have far-reaching economic and societal consequences.

School closures in response to COVID-19 have shed light on various social and economic issues, including: 
The impact was more severe for disadvantaged children and their families, causing interrupted learning, compromised nutrition, childcare problems, and consequent economic cost to families who could not work.

In response to school closures, UNESCO recommended the use of distance learning programs and open educational applications and platforms that schools and teachers can use to reach learners remotely and limit the disruption of education.

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about the Impact of the Coronavirus on Education:







Virtual School (K12) including the Impact of the 2019-2020 Coronavirus on Education
An online school (virtual school or e-school or cyber-school) teaches students entirely or primarily online or through the Internet. It has been defined as "education that uses one or more technologies to deliver instruction to students who are separated from the instructor and to support regular and substantive interaction between the students.

Online education exists all around the world and is used for all levels of education (K-12, college, or graduate school). This type of learning enables the individuals to earn transferable credits, take recognized examinations, or advance to the next level of education over the Internet.

Virtual education is most commonly used at the high school or college level. Students who are of the age 30 or older, tend to study on online programs at higher rates. This group represents 41% of the online education population, while 35.5% of students ages 24–29 and 24.5% of students ages 15–23 participate in virtual education.

Virtual education is becoming increasing used worldwide. There are currently more than 4,700 colleges and universities that provide online courses to their students. In 2015, more than 6 million students were taking at least one course online, this number grew by 3.9% from the previous year. 29.7% of all higher education students are taking at least one distance course.

The total number of students studying on a campus exclusively dropped by 931,317 people between the years 2012 and 2015. Experts say that because the number of students studying at the college level is growing, there will also be an increase in the number of students enrolled in distance learning

Instructional models:

Instructional models vary, ranging from distance learning types which provide study materials for independent self-paced study, to live, interactive classes where students communicate with a teacher in a class group lesson. Class sizes range widely from a small group of 6 pupils or students to hundreds in a virtual school.

The courses that are independent and self paced are called asynchronous courses. Typically for this type of learning, the students are given the assignments and information, and are expected to complete the assignments by the due date. This is done on their own time. There is no scheduled time when the class meets. Usually the only interactions that takes place are through discussion boards, blogs, and wikis.

On the other hand, synchronous online courses happen in real time. The instructor and students all interact online at the same time. This is done either through text, video, or audio chat. Therefore these lessons are socially constructed. In addition to the scheduled class time, there is usually additional assignments to complete.

Hybrid, sometimes also called blended, courses are when students learn and interact both in person and online. Theses classes meet in person during the semester in addition to computer based communication.

In 2008 an assessment found high dropout rates. As in other computerized environments, once the glamour of the new methods wore off it became clear that human skills were paramount to success, in this case teaching and welfare expertise.

Where this is recognized retention is good, i.e. in the synchronous, socially structured models; in the huge MOOC style courses the same isolation problems as correspondence learning are found.

Sometimes referred to as "distance learning", correspondence schools offered students an alternative to the traditional brick and mortar meetings within a schoolhouse. These schools utilized the postal service for student-teacher interaction, or used two-way radio transmissions, sometimes with pre-recorded television broadcasts. Students were expected to study their learning material independently and, in some cases, meet with a proctor to be tested.

Virtual schools now exist all around the world. Over the past decade, K-12 online instruction has dramatically increased in both Canada and the United States. Some of these virtual schools have been integrated into public schools (particularly in the United States), where students sit in computer labs and do their work online. Students can also be completely home-schooled, or they can take any combination of public/private/home-schooling and online classes.

The International Association for K-12:

Online Learning (iNACOL) developed a set of standards released in September 2007 and updated on October 12, 2011. These standards will help monitor online programs and ensure that every provider of education is accredited.

Pricing and location:

Where online methods are integrated with State provision, costs follow state school standards. Otherwise fees must be met by the student, or parents. Many US school districts are now creating their own online services to avoid paying external providers. Such students can graduate from their home district without ever leaving home. In most of these cases, students are given computers, books, and even Internet service to complete coursework from home.

With the resources of the Internet as a library, and the ease of making online study materials, there is usually a comparatively small requirement for textbooks. Most courses will provide electronic materials free of cost, or included in the course fee. Textbooks are most often required for an exam syllabus course.

Advantages and disadvantages:

Advocates of online schools and online learning point to a number of advantages:

  • There is a lack of costly and tiring travel involved, with a much greater dependability of lessons. Weather disrupting transport is almost irrelevant (though an area subject to frequent power cuts will suffer consequent disruptions). Similarly common health disruptions through minor illness or injury will not halt learning, because the physical demands are so much less. Transcripts of lessons can plug short absences.
  • Many students who have personal or health conditions that make physical school difficult or impossible can instead learn using virtual educational programs.
  • Ideal for individuals and families who need flexible arrangements. However, synchronous learning does impose limits due to time zones, which tends to divide online schools in Europe and Asia from North America.
  • The integration of Internet resources provides a huge library of content, and students quickly become adept at online research.
  • There is a greater flexibility for self-learners or gifted students to explore learning beyond the standard curriculum. Independent minded students, those with specialist skills and ambitions, can develop at their own preferred pacing using net resources.
  • Online schools can be equalizers, as age, appearance, and background are far less obvious. Groups can be categorized by personal ability.
  • Students and pupils benefit from exposure to others in different cultures of the world, which enriches understanding of history, geography, religions and politics, and develops social skills.
  • Part-time students with jobs or family commitments may benefit from the flexibility of online schedules, as claimed by supporters of virtual education.
  • For asynchronous education, a student may study, learn, or do their homework when they have free time. Therefore, this gives the students flexibility with their education.
  • It is argued that online learning is more effective and efficient at providing education to a large number of people no matter the physical distance between the students and professors than traditional education.
  • There are claims that online education "develops higher order skills such as collaborating across time and place and solving complex real-world problems" better than in-class learning.
  • Students have the ability to avoid the requirement of traveling to a physical school.
  • As pointed out by advocates of online schooling, this type of education could be beneficial in rural areas, where the distance between students and educators is vast.
  • A student may have the ability to take a course that is not offered at a location near them.
  • Some affirm that virtual education is very cost effective for schools or districts because it allows a teacher to instruct more students than in a face-to-face classroom setting.
  • It has been claimed that courses online are less expensive for the students than course taken in traditional school, college, or university.

Some disadvantages of virtual school includes:

  • Critics argue that students do not interact with their instructors or peers face-to-face, which lends itself to a "lack of socialization" unless supplemented using online groups such as Elluminate or Wimba, or by attending other social activities outside of school.
  • A challenge pointed out by critics is that there is an added challenge of staying focused while in the home environment. It has been reported that many students have a difficult time staying on task when participating in learning online.
  • Some argue that the cost of starting up an online school is expensive.
  • As pointed out by opposers of online school, not everyone has access to digital technologies which would prohibited them to attend virtual schools, unless their local libraries or community programs may offer access to computers and research materials.
  • An argument identified by critics is that virtual schools are relatively new and because of that there are no seldom methods of evaluating their effectiveness in educating their students.
  • As claimed in a study done by Eric Bettinger and Susanna Loeb, on average, online students "do substantially worse than students in the same face-to-face course".
  • Critics have pointed out that it is common for technology to be unpredictable, glitch, or not function correctly.
  • Some people who oppose virtual education have argued that obtaining a job with an online degree may be harder because potential employers may be skeptical of the credibility of these virtual programs.
  • The assignments due for online schooling may not be assessing the ability of the students because many answers can be found on the Internet, as claimed by critics of online schooling.

History:

The mid-1990s saw the advent of completely virtual schools. Many of today's virtual schools are descendants of correspondence schools. The earlier online schools began in Australia, New Zealand, North America and the UK, generally in areas where low density population made schooling by conventional means difficult and expensive to provide.

In 2008 an assessment found high dropout rates. As in other computerized environments, once the glamour of the new methods wore off it became clear that human skills were paramount to success, in this case teaching and welfare expertise. Where this is recognized retention is good, i.e. in the synchronous, socially structured models; in the huge MOOC style courses the same isolation problems as correspondence learning are found.

Sometimes referred to as "distance learning", correspondence schools offered students an alternative to the traditional brick and mortar meetings within a schoolhouse. These schools utilized the postal service for student-teacher interaction, or used two-way radio transmissions, sometimes with pre-recorded television broadcasts. Students were expected to study their learning material independently and, in some cases, meet with a proctor to be tested.

Virtual schools now exist all around the world. Over the past decade, K-12 online instruction has dramatically increased in both Canada and the United States. Some of these virtual schools have been integrated into public schools (particularly in the United States), where students sit in computer labs and do their work online. Students can also be completely home-schooled, or they can take any combination of public/private/home-schooling and online classes.

The International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL) developed a set of standards released in September 2007 and updated on October 12, 2011. These standards will help monitor online programs and ensure that every provider of education is accredited.

Some disadvantages of virtual school includes:
  • Critics argue that students do not interact with their instructors or peers face-to-face, which lends itself to a "lack of socialization" unless supplemented using online groups such as Elluminate or Wimba, or by attending other social activities outside of school.
  • A challenge pointed out by critics is that there is an added challenge of staying focused while in the home environment. It has been reported that many students have a difficult time staying on task when participating in learning online.
  • Some argue that the cost of starting up an online school is expensive.
  • As pointed out by opposers of online school, not everyone has access to digital technologies which would prohibited them to attend virtual schools, unless their local libraries or community programs may offer access to computers and research materials.
  • An argument identified by critics is that virtual schools are relatively new and because of that there are no seldom methods of evaluating their effectiveness in educating their students.
  • As claimed in a study done by Eric Bettinger and Susanna Loeb, on average, online students "do substantially worse than students in the same face-to-face course".
  • Critics have pointed out that it is common for technology to be unpredictable, glitch, or not function correctly.
  • Some people who oppose virtual education have argued that obtaining a job with an online degree may be harder because potential employers may be skeptical of the credibility of these virtual programs.
  • The assignments due for online schooling may not be assessing the ability of the students because many answers can be found on the Internet, as claimed by critics of online schooling.

See also:







THE National Standards for Quality Online Learning (NSQOL) ​[A word from your Webhost: due to Covid 19, most schools have switched to online teaching. However, there is a huge concern that online may not include the best of one-on-one interaction between the teacher and student, that physical schools offer. Particularly important is that there be standards that any e-learning schools follows, like NSQOL offers!]
​COVID-19

In response to COVID-19 and its impact on the field of education and online learning, the NSQ Project team would like to remind educators of the updated National Standards for Quality (NSQ) Online Learning.  The (NSQ) standard sets include Online Courses, Online Teaching, and Online Programs. These are essential frameworks for K-12 districts developing quality online learning plans to deal with long-term school closure possibilities.  These standard sets, updated in 2019, have been the benchmark for online programs since 2007. We invite you to explore the resources on this site.

Contact us for further information.
​The National Standards for Quality Online Courses, Online Teaching and Online Programs
have been the benchmark for online programs, districts and state agencies since their creation in 2007.
​
Quality Online Learning
The Virtual Learning Leadership Alliance (VLLA) and Quality Matters (QM) are leading a broad-based effort to revise the National Standards for Quality Online Learning, building upon the work started by The International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL).
The ​NEW Standards
Click here to view or download the most current versions of each of the standards sets. National Standards for Quality Online Courses is currently being revised.
Designed to complement one another, the National Standards for Quality have been the benchmark for online programs, districts and state agencies since their creation in 2007.
Click on any of the following for Additional Resources
About the National Standards for Quality Online Learning:

​The National Standards for Quality Online Learning is an ongoing project to continuously revise the National Standards for Quality Online Courses, Programs and Teaching led by a partnership between Quality Matters and the Virtual Learning Leadership Alliance with widespread community support.

History and Purpose:

The National Standards for Quality Online Courses, Programs, and Teaching have been the most used and respected benchmark for states, districts, and schools aspiring to provide quality online courses, programs and teaching, since first being introduced by the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB).

The Virtual Learning Leadership Alliance (VLLA) and Quality Matters (QM) organized a committee of experts with various backgrounds in the field of K-12 online learning to take the lead in refreshing the National Standards for Quality Online Courses, Programs, and Teaching previously updated and maintained by the International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL).
​
The purpose of the National Standards for Quality (NSQ) revision initiative is to provide the K-12 online and blended learning community with an updated set of openly licensed standards to help evaluate and improve online courses, online teaching and online programs.

Both the VLLA and QM, as well as the project contributors, are committed to a continuous improvement cycle for all three sets of standards for online learning, and to a common philosophy that standards in such a dynamic area as digital learning must be updated regularly to provide a useful benchmark for schools, districts, statewide programs and commercial suppliers of online and blended learning.

Revision Process:

The National Standards for Quality Online Learning are a family and meant to complement one another in their implementation and use. Each set of standards is revised by a team selected for their expertise in either K-12 online learning research or practice.

The revision of each set starts with a comprehensive Literature Review so as to ensure the standards are supported by research. Next, a widespread survey is deployed to the community — consisting mainly of users of the standards.

Respondents are encouraged to give comprehensive feedback on the standards, including what areas they would like to see revised, topics they would like to see included, and any standards they would like to see removed, along with a rationale. The results from these surveys are compiled and distributed to the standards workgroup teams, who use the feedback, along with the literature review and other correlation documents, to inform the proposed revisions.

Once a draft of the new edition is complete, it is sent out to an additional set of reviewers, who provide additional feedback. This additional feedback provides a final bird’s eye view of the standards, and is incorporated into a final draft.

The new editions of the National Standards for Quality Online Courses, Programs, and Teaching will be continuously revised to keep abreast with the most current research and best practices in the field. Members of the online learning community will continue to play an important role in contributing to the revisions of each standard set.







​
Online Education, including an Online Degree and a List of Online Colleges in the United StatesPictured below: The best accredited online Colleges in 2020, according to U.S. News & World Report
​[Your WebHost: Keep in mind that,  while this Wikipedia article goes back to a time when there was no  Internet, we are primarily focused on online learning]

Click here for an alphabetical List of Online Collages in the United States.

Distance education or distance learning is the education of students who may not always be physically present at a school. Traditionally, this usually involved correspondence courses wherein the student corresponded with the school via post.

Today, it involves online education. A distance learning program can be completely distance learning, or a combination of distance learning and traditional classroom instruction (called hybrid or blended).

Massive open online courses (MOOCs), offering large-scale interactive participation and open access through the World Wide Web or other network technologies, are recent educational modes in distance education.

A number of other terms (distributed learning, e-learning, m-learning, online learning, virtual classroom etc.) are used roughly synonymously with distance education.

Technologies:

Internet technology has enabled many forms of distance learning through open educational resources and facilities such as e-learning and MOOCs. Although the expansion of the Internet blurs the boundaries, distance education technologies are divided into two modes of delivery: synchronous learning and asynchronous learning.

In synchronous learning, all participants are "present" at the same time. In this regard, it resembles traditional classroom teaching methods despite the participants being located remotely.

It requires a timetable to be organized. Examples of Synchronous Technology include: 
Web conferencing software helps to facilitate meetings in distance learning courses and usually contain additional interaction tools such as text chat, polls, hand raising, emoticons etc. These tools also support asynchronous participation by students being able to listen to recordings of synchronous sessions.

Immersive environments (notably SecondLife) have also been used to enhance participant presence in distance education courses. Another form of synchronous learning that has been entering the classroom over the last couple of years is the use of robot proxies[ including those that allow sick students to attend classes.

Some universities have been starting to use robot proxies to enable more engaging synchronous hybrid classes where both remote and in person students can be present and interact using telerobotics devices such as the Kubi Telepresence robot stand that looks around and the Double Robot that roams around. With these telepresence robots, the remote students have a seat at the table or desk instead of being on a screen on the wall.

In asynchronous learning, participants access course materials flexibly on their own schedules. Students are not required to be together at the same time. Mail correspondence, which is the oldest form of distance education, is an asynchronous delivery technology, as are message board forums, e-mail, video and audio recordings, print materials, voicemail, and fax.

The two methods can be combined. Many courses offered by both open universities and an increasing number of campus based institutions use periodic sessions of residential or day teaching to supplement the sessions delivered at a distance. This type of mixed distance and campus based education has recently come to be called "blended learning" or less often "hybrid learning". Many open universities uses a blend of technologies and a blend of learning modalities (face-to-face, distance, and hybrid) all under the rubric of "distance learning".

Distance learning can also use interactive radio instruction (IRI), interactive audio instruction (IAI), online virtual worlds, digital games, webinars, and webcasts, all of which are referred to as e-Learning.

Radio and television​

The rapid spread of film in the 1920s and radio in the 1930s led to proposals to use it for distance education. By 1938, at least 200 city school systems, 25 state boards of education, and many colleges and universities broadcast educational programs for the public schools. One line of thought was to use radio as a master teacher.

Experts in given fields broadcast lessons for pupils within the many schoolrooms of the public school system, asking questions, suggesting readings, making assignments, and conducting tests. This mechanizes education and leaves the local teacher only the tasks of preparing for the broadcast and keeping order in the classroom.

A typical setup came in Kentucky in 1948 when John Wilkinson Taylor, president of the University of Louisville, teamed up with NBC to use radio as a medium for distance education, The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission endorsed the project and predicted that the "college-by-radio" would put "American education 25 years ahead".

The University was owned by the city, and local residents would pay the low tuition rates, receive their study materials in the mail, and listen by radio to live classroom discussions that were held on campus.

Physicist Daniel Q. Posin also was a pioneer in the field of distance education when he hosted a televised course through DePaul University.

Charles Wedemeyer of the University of Wisconsin–Madison also promoted new methods. From 1964 to 1968, the Carnegie Foundation funded Wedemeyer's Articulated Instructional Media Project (AIM) which brought in a variety of communications technologies aimed at providing learning to an off-campus population. The radio courses faded away in the 1950s. Many efforts to use television along the same lines proved unsuccessful, despite heavy funding by the Ford Foundation.

From 1970 to 1972 the Coordinating Commission for Higher Education in California funded Project Outreach to study the potential of telecourses. The study included the University of California, California State University and the community colleges.

This study led to coordinated instructional systems legislation allowing the use of public funds for non-classroom instruction and paved the way for the emergence of telecourses as the precursor to the online courses and programs of today.

The Coastline Community Colleges, The Dallas County Community College District, and Miami Dade Community College led the way. The Adult Learning Service of the US Public Broadcasting Service came into being and the "wrapped" series, and individually produced telecourse for credit became a significant part of the history of distance education and online learning.

Internet:
Main article: Virtual education

The widespread use of computers and the internet have made distance learning easier and faster, and today virtual schools and virtual universities deliver full curricula online. The capacity of Internet to support voice, video, text and immersion teaching methods made earlier distinct forms of telephone, videoconferencing, radio, television, and text based education somewhat redundant. However, many of the techniques developed and lessons learned with earlier media are used in Internet delivery.

The first completely online course for credit was offered by the University of Toronto in 1984 through the Graduate School of Education (then called OISE: the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education). The topic was "Women and Computers in Education", dealing with gender issues and educational computing.

The first new and fully online university was founded in 1994 as the Open University of Catalonia, headquartered in Barcelona, Spain. In 1999 Jones International University was launched as the first fully online university accredited by a regional accrediting association in the US.

Between 2000 and 2008, enrollment in distance education courses increased rapidly in almost every country in both developed and developing countries. Many private, public, non-profit and for-profit institutions worldwide now offer distance education courses from the most basic instruction through to the highest levels of degree and doctoral programs. 

New York University, for example, offers online degrees in engineering and management-related fields through NYU Tandon Online. Levels of accreditation vary: widely respected universities such as Stanford University and Harvard now deliver online courses—but other online schools receive little outside oversight, and some are actually fraudulent, i.e., diploma mills. In the US, the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) specializes in the accreditation of distance education institutions.

In the United States in 2011, it was found that a third of all the students enrolled in post-secondary education had taken an accredited online course in a postsecondary institution.

Even though growth rates are slowing, enrollment for online courses has been seen to increase with the advance in technology. The majority of public and private colleges now offer full academic programs online. These include, but are not limited to training programs in: 
Distance education has a long history, its use growning as more advanced technology has become available. By 2008, online learning programs were available in the United States in 44 states at the K-12 level.

Internet forums, online discussion group and online learning community can contribute to an efficacious distance education experience. Research shows that socialization plays an important role in some forms of distance education.

E-courses are also available. Some websites such as Khan Academy and MasterClass offer ones on many topics.

Paced and self-paced models:

Distance education can be delivered in a paced format similar to traditional campus-based models in which learners commence and complete a course at the same time. Paced delivery is currently the most common mode of distance education delivery.

Alternatively, some institutions offer self-paced programs that allow for continuous enrollment and the length of time to complete the course is set by the learner's time, skill and commitment levels.

Paced courses may be offered in either synchronous mode, but self-paced courses are almost always offered asynchronously. Each delivery model offers both advantages and disadvantages for students, teachers, and institutions.

Kaplan and Haenlein classify distance education into four groups along the dimensions Time dependency and Number of participants:
  1. MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses): Open-access online course (i.e., without specific participation restrictions) that allows for unlimited (massive) participation;
  2. SPOCs (Small Private Online Courses): Online course that only offers a limited number of places and therefore requires some form of formal enrollment;
  3. SMOCs (Synchronous Massive Online Courses): Open-access online course that allows for unlimited participation but requires students to be "present" at the same time (synchronously);
  4. SSOCs (Synchronous Private Online Courses): Online course that only offers a limited number of places and requires students to be "present" at the same time (synchronously).

Paced models are a familiar mode since they are used almost exclusively in campus-based schools. Institutes that offer both distance and campus programs usually use paced models so that teacher workload, student semester planning, tuition deadlines, exam schedules, and other administrative details can be synchronized with campus delivery.

Student familiarity and the pressure of deadlines encourages students to readily adapt to and usually succeed in paced models. However, student freedom is sacrificed as a common pace is often too fast for some students and too slow for others. In addition life events, professional or family responsibilities can interfere with a students capability to complete tasks to an external schedule. Finally, paced models allows students to readily form communities of inquiry and to engage in collaborative work.

Self-paced courses maximize student freedom, as not only can students commence studies on any date, but they can complete a course in as little time as a few weeks or up to a year or longer. Students often enroll in self-paced study when they are under pressure to complete programs, have not been able to complete a scheduled course, need additional courses or have pressure which precludes regular study for any length of time.

The self-paced nature of the programming, though, is an unfamiliar model for many students and can lead to excessive procrastination, resulting in course incompletion. Assessment of learning can also be challenging as exams can be written on any day, making it possible for students to share examination questions with resulting loss of academic integrity. Finally, it is extremely challenging to organize collaborative work activities, though some schools are developing cooperative models based upon networked and connectivist pedagogies for use in self-paced programs.

Benefits:

Distance learning can expand access to education and training for both general populace and businesses since its flexible scheduling structure lessens the effects of the many time-constraints imposed by personal responsibilities and commitments. Devolving some activities off-site alleviates institutional capacity constraints arising from the traditional demand on institutional buildings and infrastructure.

Furthermore, there is the potential for increased access to more experts in the field and to other students from diverse geographical, social, cultural, economic, and experiential backgrounds.

As the population at large becomes more involved in lifelong learning beyond the normal schooling age, institutions can benefit financially, and adult learning business courses may be particularly lucrative. Distance education programs can act as a catalyst for institutional innovation and are at least as effective as face-to-face learning programs, especially if the instructor is knowledgeable and skilled.

Distance education can also provide a broader method of communication within the realm of education. With the many tools and programs that technological advancements have to offer, communication appears to increase in distance education among students and their professors, as well as students and their classmates.

The distance educational increase in communication, particularly communication amongst students and their classmates, is an improvement that has been made to provide distance education students with as many of the opportunities as possible as they would receive in in-person education. The improvement being made in distance education is growing in tandem with the constant technological advancements.

Present-day online communication allows students to associate with accredited schools and programs throughout the world that are out of reach for in-person learning. By having the opportunity to be involved in global institutions via distance education, a diverse array of thought is presented to students through communication with their classmates.

This is beneficial because students have the opportunity to "combine new opinions with their own, and develop a solid foundation for learning". It has been shown through research that "as learners become aware of the variations in interpretation and construction of meaning among a range of people [they] construct an individual meaning", which can help students become knowledgeable of a wide array of viewpoints in education.

To increase the likelihood that students will build effective ties with one another during the course, instructors should use similar assignments for students across different locations to overcome the influence of co-location on relationship building.

The high cost of education affects students in higher education, to which distance education may be an alternative in order to provide some relief. Distance education has been a more cost-effective form of learning, and can sometimes save students a significant amount of money as opposed to traditional education. Distance education may be able to help to save students a considerable amount financially by removing the cost of transportation.

 In addition, distance education may be able to save students from the economic burden of high-priced course textbooks. Many textbooks are now available as electronic textbooks, known as e-textbooks, which can offer digital textbooks for a reduced price in comparison to traditional textbooks. Also, the increasing improvements in technology have resulted in many school libraries having a partnership with digital publishers that offer course materials for free, which can help students significantly with educational costs.

Within the class, students are able to learn in ways that traditional classrooms would not be able to provide. It is able to promote good learning experiences and therefore, allow students to obtain higher satisfaction with their online learning. For example, students can review their lessons more than once according to their need.

Students can then manipulate the coursework to fit their learning by focusing more on their weaker topics while breezing through concepts that they already have or can easily grasp. When course design and the learning environment are at their optimal conditions, distance education can lead students to higher satisfaction with their learning experiences.

Studies have shown that high satisfaction correlates to increased learning. For those in a healthcare or mental health distance learning program, online-based interactions have the potential to foster deeper reflections and discussions of client issues, as well as a quicker response to client issues, since supervision happens on a regular basis and is not limited to a weekly supervision meeting. This also may contribute to the students feeling a greater sense of support, since they have ongoing and regular access to their instructors and other students.

Distance learning may enable students who are unable to attend a traditional school setting, due to disability or illness such as decreased mobility and immune system suppression, to get a good education. Children who are sick or are unable to attend classes are able to attend them in "person" through the use of robot proxies.

This helps the students have experiences of the classroom and social interaction that they are unable to receive at home or the hospital, while still keeping them in a safe learning environment. Over the last few years more students are entering safely back into the classroom thanks to the help of robots.

An article from the New York Times, "A Swiveling Proxy Will Even Wear a Tutu", explains the positive impact of virtual learning in the classroom, and another that explains how even a simple, stationary telepresence robot can help. 

Distance education may provide equal access regardless of socioeconomic status or income, area of residence, gender, race, age, or cost per student. Applying universal design strategies to distance learning courses as they are being developed (rather than instituting accommodations for specific students on an as-needed basis) can increase the accessibility of such courses to students with a range of abilities, disabilities, learning styles, and native languages.

Distance education graduates, who would never have been associated with the school under a traditional system, may even donate money to the school!

Distance learning may also offer a final opportunity for adolescents that are no longer permitted in the general education population due to behavior disorders. Instead of these students having no other academic opportunities, they may continue their education from their homes and earn their diplomas, offering them another chance to be an integral part of society.

Distance learning offers individuals a unique opportunity to benefit from the expertise and resources of the best universities currently available. Students have the ability to collaborate, share, question, infer, and suggest new methods and techniques for continuous improvement of the content.

The ability to complete a course at a pace that is appropriate for each individual is the most effective manner to learn given the personal demands on time and schedule. Self-paced distance learning on a mobile device, such is a smartphone, provides maximum flexibility and capability.

Criticism:

Barriers to effective distance education include obstacles such as domestic distractions and unreliable technology, as well as students' program costs, adequate contact with teachers and support services, and a need for more experience.

Some students attempt to participate in distance education without proper training with the tools needed to be successful in the program. Students must be provided with training opportunities (if needed) on each tool that is used throughout the program.

The lack of advanced technology skills can lead to an unsuccessful experience. Schools have a responsibility to adopt a proactive policy for managing technology barriers. Time management skills and self-discipline in distance education is just as important as complete knowledge of the software and tools being used for learning.

The results of a study of Washington state community college students showed that distance learning students tended to drop out more often than their traditional counterparts due to difficulties in language, time management, and study skills.

According to Dr. Pankaj Singhm, director of Nims University, "distance learning benefits may outweigh the disadvantages for students in such a technology-driven society; however before indulging into use of educational technology a few more disadvantages should be considered." He describes that over multiple years, "all of the obstacles have been overcome and the world environment for distance education continues to improve."

Dr. Pankaj Singhm also claims there is a debate to distance education stating, "due to a lack of direct face-to-face social interaction. However, as more people become used to personal and social interaction online (for example dating, chat rooms, shopping, or blogging), it is becoming easier for learners to both project themselves and socialize with others. This is an obstacle that has dissipated."

Not all courses required to complete a degree may be offered online. Health care profession programs in particular, require some sort of patient interaction through field work before a student may graduate.

Studies have also shown that students pursuing a medical professional graduate degree who are participating in distance education courses, favor face to face communication over professor-mediated chat rooms and/or independent studies.

However, this is little correlation between student performance when comparing the previous different distance learning strategies.

There is a theoretical problem about the application of traditional teaching methods to online courses because online courses may have no upper size limit. Daniel Barwick noted that there is no evidence that large class size is always worse or that small class size is always better, although a negative link has been established between certain types of instruction in large classes and learning outcomes; he argued that higher education has not made a sufficient effort to experiment with a variety of instructional methods to determine whether large class size is always negatively correlated with a reduction in learning outcomes.

Early proponents of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC)s saw them as just the type of experiment that Barwick had pointed out was lacking in higher education, although Barwick himself has never advocated for MOOCs.

There may also be institutional challenges. Distance learning is new enough that it may be a challenge to gain support for these programs in a traditional brick-and-mortar academic learning environment. Furthermore, it may be more difficult for the instructor to organize and plan a distance learning program, especially since many are new programs and their organizational needs are different from a traditional learning program.

Additionally, though distance education offers industrial countries the opportunity to become globally informed, there are still negative sides to it. Hellman states that "These include its cost and capital intensiveness, time constraints and other pressures on instructors, the isolation of students from instructors and their peers, instructors' enormous difficulty in adequately evaluating students they never meet face-to-face, and drop-out rates far higher than in classroom-based courses."

A more complex challenge of distance education relates to cultural differences between student and teachers and among students. Distance programmes tend to be more diverse as they could go beyond the geographical borders of regions, countries, and continents, and cross the cultural borders that may exist with respect to race, gender, and religion. That requires a proper understanding and awareness of the norms, differences, preconceptions and potential conflicting issues.

Educational technology:

The modern use of electronic educational technology (also called e-learning) facilitates distance learning and independent learning by the extensive use of information and communications technology (ICT), replacing traditional content delivery by postal correspondence.

Instruction can be synchronous and asynchronous online communication in an interactive learning environment or virtual communities, in lieu of a physical classroom. "The focus is shifted to the education transaction in the form of virtual community of learners sustainable across time."

One of the most significant issues encountered in the mainstream correspondence model of distance education is transactional distance, which results from the lack of appropriate communication between learner and teacher. This gap has been observed to become wider if there is no communication between the learner and teacher and has direct implications over the learning process and future endeavors in distance education.

Distance education providers began to introduce various strategies, techniques, and procedures to increase the amount of interaction between learner and teacher. These measures e.g. more frequent face-to-face tutorials, increased use of information and communication technologies including teleconferencing and the Internet, were designed to close the gap in transactional distance.

Credentials:
Main article: Online credentials for learning

Online credentials for learning are digital credentials that are offered in place of traditional paper credentials for a skill or educational achievement. Directly linked to the accelerated development of internet communication technologies, the development of digital badges, electronic passports and massive open online courses (MOOCs) have a very direct bearing on our understanding of learning, recognition and levels as they pose a direct challenge to the status quo. It is useful to distinguish between three forms of online credentials: Test-based credentials, online badges, and online certificates.

See also: ___________________________________________________________________________
Online Degree:

An online degree is an academic degree (usually a college degree, but sometimes the term includes high school diplomas and non-degree certificate programs) that can be earned primarily or entirely through the use of an Internet-connected computer, rather than attending college in a traditional campus setting.

Improvements in technology, the increasing use of the Internet worldwide, and the need for people to have flexible school schedules while they are working have led to a proliferation of online colleges that award associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees.

​Accreditation:

The goal of educational accreditation, according to the United States Department of Education, is to ensure that programs provided by institutions of higher education meet acceptable levels of quality.

ENQA, the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education, describes the role of external quality assurance in education as one that "combines both accountability for the reassurance of the public and an objective and developmental role for enhancing quality in institutions".

In the area of online education, it is important to avoid unaccredited diploma mills that offer fake degrees, as these are unfortunately common. Students seeking valid online degrees should obtain proof of accreditation from an appropriate national or regional accrediting body.

In the United States, online colleges that are fully accredited have earned a widely recognized form of university accreditation from either one of the six regional accreditation boards, one of the six national accreditation boards, or one of the four national faith-based accreditation boards. Each of six geographic regions of the United States has one regional accreditation board, a non-governmental agency that oversees and accredits degree-granting institutions headquartered in their areas.

Outside of the United States, other national and regional standards of accreditation hold, and may be highly supportive of, distance education. For example, the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, or Open University of Catalonia, has been accredited by AQU, the Agency for Quality Assurance in the Catalan University System (a full member of ENQA), since its inception in 1995, and has been called a "significant success story" as "the world's first continuous, and sustainable, virtual university".

Similarly, in Ireland, the Higher Education and Training Awards Council (HETAC) has accredited a number of online colleges and degrees, e.g. Setanta College.

Quality:

Online education enables individuals living with physical disabilities, full-time employees, military personnel, those living abroad, and stay-at-home parents, among others to have access to accredited higher education.

The perception of the quality of online degrees compared to on-campus degrees varies, but has been increasing in recent years. While most major online colleges are regionally accredited, the public estimation of their quality is in dispute. A national survey of hiring representatives showed that a preference toward on-campus degrees exists. In some instances, hiring executives were unwilling to consider applicants with an online degree. 

Some experts argue that degrees in certain fields are more accepted online than in others, while some programs are less suited for online-only schools. A major issue for accredited and reputable online programs is the proliferation of proprietary online-only programs that have come under fire in recent years.

A survey by the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) found that 100% of employers who responded felt that distance education program graduates performed better on the job as a result of their degree (as compared to their previous performance).

Additionally, employers felt that an employee receiving a distance education degree compared favorably, in terms of knowledge learned, to someone with a resident degree.

On the other hand, The Chronicle of Higher Education reported in January 2007 on a Vault Inc. survey that found 55 percent of employers preferred traditional degrees over online ones. Forty-one percent, however, said they would give "equal consideration to both types of degrees".

The Sloan Consortium, an organization funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to maintain and improve the quality of distance education, publishes regular reports on the state of United States distance education. In its 2006 report "Making the Grade: Online Education in the United States, 2006", it stated that "in 2003, 57 percent of academic leaders rated the learning outcomes in online education as the same or superior to those in face-to-face. That number is now 62 percent, a small but noteworthy increase".

According to Steve Lohr's article in the New York Times, a major study was done in 2009 that was funded by the Education Department. The collected research was from a 12-year period and concluded that online learning on average beat face-to-face teaching by a small but statistical margin.

In many cases, an online degree earned through an accredited public or private university may be effectively indistinguishable from a degree earned in a campus-based program, sometimes referred to as "brick-and-mortar" programs. The instruction is often exactly the same, with the online degree containing no special designation. As such the same financial aid packages are often available to online students, which has helped make them more accessible to traditional applicants.

An example of an indistinguishable degree program is that offered by Columbia University. Student who earn a degree through the Columbia Video Network (CVN) earn exactly the same type of degree as the campus-based program. The professors, courses, homework, tests, and eventual transcripts and diploma are identical to that of on-campus students.

Another example is NYU Tandon Online which offers master's degrees completely online through New York University Tandon School of Engineering.

In recent years many top universities have been actively expanding their extension and online learning programs in an effort to legitimize the online education arena. While admissions to online programs at prestigious universities hasn't seen a dramatic spike, there has been a large expansion in course offerings in recent years.

Almost all Ivy League and top 20 universities now offer at least one online graduate degree program or certification.

Prevalence of online education:

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) conducted a distance education study based on the 2001-2002 academic year at United States 2-year and 4-year degree-granting institutions that were eligible for U.S. federal student aid. The study reported that 56 percent of institutions surveyed offered distance education courses. The study also found that public institutions were more likely to offer distance education than private institutions were.

The Sloan Consortium, based on data collected from over 2,200 U.S. colleges and universities, reports that nearly 3.2 million students took at least one online course during 2005 (a significant increase over the 2.3 million reported in 2004).

According to the same report, about two-thirds of the largest institutions have fully online programs. In 2010, more than 6 million students were taking at least one course online. As of 2013, the number of students enrolled in online courses had risen to over 6.7 million.

According to Steve Lohr's article in the New York Times, a major study was done in 2009 that was funded by the Education Department. The collected research was from a 12-year period and concluded that online learning on average beat face-to-face teaching by a small but statistical margin.

Financial aid:

Until 2006, United States students enrolled in online degree programs were not eligible for federal student aid unless at least half of their programs were campus-based (a law established in 1992 and known as the 50-percent rule). In February 2006, that law was repealed, making federal student aid in the form of federal loans, grants, and work-study available in the U.S. for students enrolled in an eligible online degree program at an accredited Title IV-eligible institution.

See also:






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Degree Completion ProgramPictured below: Top 20 Fastest Online Degree Completion Programs
A degree completion program is an undergraduate academic program, most frequently found in the United States and Canada, that is offered within an established university but designed for non-traditional students.

Degree completion programs are typically structured to allow persons who previously completed a substantial portion of the requirements for an undergraduate degree, but who have been separated from the university setting for a period of time, to complete the credit requirements needed to earn a bachelor's degree (B.A.), either at an accelerated pace, or a flexible schedule.

The difference between credits previously earned, and those required for the award of a B.A., are made-up through a variety of methods depending on the sponsoring institution, but typically include a combination of traditional university courses and CLEP examinations.

Examples follow:
  • Georgetown University bills its degree completion program as designed for students who were "meaning to complete" their bachelor's degree, but for whom "life, work and other obligations got in the way". Applications are accepted from working adults who have completed one or two years of university courses which can be transferred onto the potential student's Georgetown transcript. A series of evening and weekend classes fills the gap between credits earned and those required for a bachelor's degree.
  • The degree completion program at the University of the Pacific is open to applicants who have completed 70-credits of university level course work. Once enrolled, students take a twice-weekly, evening class over the course of four semesters; those who successfully complete the 15-month instructional sequence are awarded a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies.
  • Colorado State University offers a degree completion program in psychology. Students can transfer up to 90 credits of coursework taken at another university before completing the final 30 credits required for a B.A. degree through distance learning psychology courses at Colorado State.
  • University of San Francisco offers a Bachelor of Science in Management to working professionals who are interested in completing their degree. Students who have completed at least 60 semester credits may apply to the program and can earn their degree in as little as 23 months. Students take two courses each semester, and studies include accounting, finance, marketing, organizational behavior and theory, analytics, technology, logistics, and other core competencies.
  • University of Nebraska–Lincoln offers an online Bachelor of Science degree completion program in applied science. Students select from a broad range of courses across the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, in addition to the credits they've already earned, to tailor a degree to their career goals. This program provides a convenient and flexible career path for those in the military, currently employed, returning to college or transferring from a two-year college.
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World-wide Rankings of Colleges and Universities Pictured below: Top 6 Universities and their Rankings, by Row (L-R)
(TOP): (1) Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); (2) University Of Cambridge;
(CENTER): (3) Harvard University; (4) University College London (UCL);
(BOTTOM): (5) University of Oxford; (6) Imperial College London
College and university rankings are global rankings of institutions in higher education which have been ranked on the basis of various combinations of various factors. None of the rankings give a comprehensive overview of the strengths of the institutions ranked because all select a range of easily quantifiable characteristics to base their results on.

Rankings have most often been conducted by magazines, newspapers, websites, governments, or academics. In addition to ranking entire institutions, organizations perform rankings of specific programs, departments, and schools.

Various rankings consider combinations of measures of funding and endowment, research excellence and/or influence, specialization expertise, admissions, student options, award numbers, internationalization, graduate employment, industrial linkage, historical reputation and other criteria. Various rankings mostly evaluating on institutional output by research.

Some rankings evaluate institutions within a single country, while others assess institutions worldwide. The subject has produced much debate about rankings' usefulness and accuracy. The expanding diversity in rating methodologies and accompanying criticisms of each indicate the lack of consensus in the field.

Further, it seems possible to game the ranking systems through excessive self-citations or by researchers supporting each other in surveys. UNESCO has questioned whether rankings "do more harm than good", while acknowledging that "Rightly or wrongly, they are perceived as a measure of quality and so create intense competition between universities all over the world"

Click on any of the following blue hyperlinks for more about World-wide Rankings of Colleges and Universities:







Scholarship Programs in the United States, including a List of North American Scholarship ProgramsPictured below: Fulbright Foreign Student Scholarships Program In USA*
* - Click here for more about the Fullbright Program

Click here for a List of North American scholarships

Scholarships in the United States:

​A scholarship is defined as a grant or payment made to support a student's education, awarded on the basis of academic or other distinction. "Scholarship" has a different meaning in the United States than it does in other countries, with the partial exception of Canada.

Outside the U.S., scholarship is any type of monetary award to fund education.

In the United States, the only country with a national system that determines a student's financial need (see Expected Family Contribution), and where universities are far more expensive than in other countries, a scholarship is money for which the student must qualify in some way, and the term "grant" - an award the student receives because of financial need - is used for what in other countries are called scholarships.

Scholarships in the U.S. are awarded based upon various criteria, which usually reflect the values and purposes of the donor or founder of the award. Some scholarships for college are merit-based. Merit scholarships might be awarded based on academic achievement or on a combination of academics and a special talent, trait, or interest. Other scholarships are based on financial need.

Scholarship money is not required to be repaid. Scholarships are not a large component of college financial aid in the United States; they are far surpassed by grants, for which the only qualification is financial need, interest-free loans (while the student is in college), and subsidized campus employment. (See next topic below:"Student financial aid in the United States".)

A student who receives a scholarship may find other (need-based) financial aid reduced by the amount of the scholarship, so the net benefit of the scholarship to the student — especially the poor student — may be zero.

​Scholarships versus grants:

In the U.S., a grant is given on the basis of economic need, determined by the amount to which the college's Cost of Attendance (COA) exceeds the Expected Family Contribution (EFC), calculated by the U.S. Department of Education from information submitted on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) following formulas set by the United States Congress.

(The federal EFC is sometimes modified, usually upwards, in awarding non-federal grants.) The federal Pell grant program is an entitlement: if the applicant meets the requirements - has economic Need (COA exceeds EFC), is studying at least half time towards a first undergraduate degree, is a U.S. citizen or eligible alien - the award of the money is automatic. The student has a right to it (is entitled).

In some cases obtaining scholarships does not help the student or her/his family. Scholarships reduce financial need, and the amount of the scholarship can cause need-based aid, which the student would have received anyway, to be reduced by the amount of the scholarship.

The English Access Microscholarship Program:

The English Access Microscholarship Program is an international project that was created by the U.S Department of State aimed at helping teens (13–20 years-old) from economically disadvantaged backgrounds to have better opportunities in employment, education, and life in general.

Access promotes skills and knowledge in the English language, as well as giving students the ability to compete and participate in future exchanges and study in the United States.

Each student receives 128 hours of instructions per year. It consists of 4 hours per week, for a total of 32 weeks, plus 72 hours of intensive two-week summer program each year. Approximately 95,000 students in more than 85 countries have participated in the Access Program since its founding in 2004.

The English Access Micro-Scholarship Program has reached out to other countries. The U.S. Embassy in Chisinau, Moldova has made available grants proposals from possible implementing partners for the 2017 – 2019 Access Program.

The purpose is to provide underprivileged young students opportunities to learn English and promote leadership skills by educating them regarding American culture. This program provides two years of English lessons or minimum of 180 hours of instruction annually.

In Algeria, the US Department of State launched the Program on February 2015 up to September 2018. The target is students from 13 to 20 years old from deprived sectors worldwide. World Learning will collaborate with eight schools in this country with 200 students participating in various programs for two years and receive 360 hours of instruction.
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Student Loan, including Student Loans in the United States Pictured below: The map below shows where people are having the hardest time paying off student loans
A student loan is a type of loan designed to help students pay for post-secondary education and the associated fees, such as tuition, books and supplies, and living expenses. It may differ from other types of loans in the fact that the interest rate may be substantially lower and the repayment schedule may be deferred while the student is still in school.

It also differs in many countries in the strict laws regulating renegotiating and bankruptcy. This article highlights the differences of the student loan system in several major countries.

Click here for a Listing of Student Loans by Country.

Student loans in the United States:

​Student loans are a form of financial aid used to help students access higher education. Student loan debt in the United States has grown rapidly since 2006. The debt was ~$1.6 trillion in 2019 which was ~7.5% of 2019 GDP.

Loans usually must be repaid, in contrast to other forms of financial aid such as scholarships, which never have to be repaid, and grants, which rarely have to be repaid. Research indicates the increased usage of student loans has been a significant factor in college cost increases.

US leaders have acknowledged the rise in student loan debt as a crisis. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has noted that Federal Student Aid's portfolio "is nearly 10 percent of our nation's debt." Approximately 45 million people have student loan debt. 

In 2018, the average borrower owed $37,172 at the time of graduation, an increase of $20,000 from 2005. Student loan debt is unevenly distributed, and race and social class are significant factors in the distribution of student loans. Approximately 30 percent of all college students do not incur debt.

The schools with the highest amount of student loan debt are University of Phoenix, Walden University, Nova Southeastern University, Capella University, and Strayer University. Except for Nova Southeastern, they are all proprietary (profit-making) universities.

The default rate for borrowers who didn't complete their degree is three times as high as the rate for those who did. Student loan defaults are disproportionately concentrated in the for-profit college sector. 

In 2018, the National Center for Education Statistics reported that the 12-year student loan default rate for for-profit colleges was 52 percent. The 12-year student loan default rate for African Americans going to for-profit colleges was reported to be 65.7 percent.

A 2018 Brookings Institution study projected that "nearly 40 percent of students who took out loans in 2004 may default by 2023."

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Online Higher Education, including a
List of Online Colleges in the United StatesPictured: Logos for (L) University of Phoenix; (R) Southern New Hampshire University
Click here for a List of Online Colleges within the United States.

Click here for a List of online colleges who are accredited by the U.S.Department of Education*
​* -- U. S. Department of Education

Online Education involves courses offered by postsecondary institutions that are 100% virtual, excluding massively open online courses (MOOCs).

In the domain of higher education there are two distinct methods in which a learner can engage with an academic institution; the traditional method of brick-and-mortar facilities and the virtual method through online learning.

This article will focus on the virtual platform of online learning. Today's online learning is the newest development in distance education that began in the mid-1990s with the spread of the internet.

Learner experience is typically asynchronous, but may also incorporate synchronous elements. The vast majority of institutions utilize a Learning Management System for the administration of online courses. As theories of distance education evolve, digital technologies to support learning and pedagogy continue to transform as well.

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United States Department of EducationPictured below: Today, @BetsyDeVosED joined @VP and the @WhiteHouse
Coronavirus Task Force at ED to further discuss how American educators and community health leaders can work together to safely reopen schools this fall.
The United States Department of Education (ED or DoED), also referred to as the ED for (the) Education Department, is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government.

It began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services by the Department of Education Organization Act, which President Jimmy Carter signed into law on October 17, 1979.

The Department of Education is administered by the United States secretary of education. It has under 4,000 employees (2018) and an annual budget of $68 billion (2016). The 2019 Budget also supports $129.8 billion in new postsecondary grants, loans, and work-study assistance to help an estimated 11.5 million students and their families pay for college. Its official abbreviation is "ED" ("DOE" refers to the United States Department of Energy) and is also often abbreviated informally as "DoEd".

Functions:

The primary functions of the Department of Education are to "establish policy for, administer and coordinate most federal assistance to education, collect data on US schools, and to enforce federal educational laws regarding privacy and civil rights. The Department of Education does not establish schools or colleges.

Unlike the systems of most other countries, education in the United States is highly decentralized, and the federal government and Department of Education are not heavily involved in determining curricula or educational standards (with the exception of the No Child Left Behind Act). This has been left to state and local school districts. The quality of educational institutions and their degrees is maintained through an informal private process known as accreditation, over which the Department of Education has no direct public jurisdictional control.

The Department of Education is a member of the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, and works with federal partners to ensure proper education for homeless and runaway youth in the United States.

Opposition to the Department of Education mainly stems from conservatives, who see the department as an undermining of states rights, and libertarians who believe it results in a state-imposed leveling towards the bottom and low value for taxpayers' money.

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