Would you want to miss the equivalent of 180 days of teacher instruction in Math? In America, where many students attend online schools full-time instead of a physical school (229,000 as of the 2015-16 school year) you can see the good and bad of online schooling. Perhaps we can learn something about the effectiveness of online schooling from them in a time when the majority of students throughout the world are partaking in online education.

Opponents of online learning argue that online learning is significantly worse for students than conventional schooling in brick-and-mortar buildings as it has a negative impact on test scores and academic performance. Proponents of online learning argue that it is more flexible, affordable and that you can take online classes and courses from the comfort of your home. But is that too big of a price to pay or not? Let us look at what each side says, shall we?

Proponents of online schooling argue that online schooling is flexible, affordable and personalised, and gives students more autonomy. Online schooling providers in the USA, such as K12 and Connections Academy, say that their curriculum is research-based and that parents should have options beyond the neighbourhood state school: a notion known as school choice.

The gist of the arguments in favour of this is that more competition between schools produces a better product for students. They (US online schooling providers) also argue that student can learn at their own pace; a theme that is very prominent in many of their commercials.

Opponents of online schooling believe that online learning through online schools and other such mediums can be detrimental to children’s academic progress. I get this impression due to several sources and reasons.

For example, 30 percent of the student population in Washington D.C. does not have access to technology. Imagine that if this is the rate in the capital of the USA (which is a cosmopolitan area) what will that same figure look like in the urban and rural environments of Pakistan?

Researchers at Stanford University measured 101 online charter schools in 16 states for academic growth against their peers in regular school. The results were scathing. The study found that attending an online charter school had the equivalent effect of missing 180 days of teacher instruction in math per year. In the US and many other countries, that’s an entire academic year. They also found that it was equivalent to missing 72 days of teacher instruction in reading per year.

The study also found that, in reading, out of the 101 schools tested, only two had higher achievement scores than the state average. Most were found to be significantly weaker (67 schools).

In math, the results were even worse. Not one of the schools performed better than the state’s average in math and 88 schools’ achievement scores were found to be significantly weaker.

Gary Miron, a professor of education at Western Michigan University, said during an interview with Vox about this topic, “In reality, they’re not teaching those children.”

This suggests that children attending online schools, and online learning as a whole is detrimental to students’ academic success without the absence of a brick-and-mortar substitute. Therefore, we can deduce that online learning should not go on long-term and once the pandemic is over, on campus schooling should continue as earlier.

Do you want to be stripped of academic success? Think about that carefully. After all, it is your future.

Published in Dawn, Young World, April 10th, 2021