![]() The US has led the way with virtual schools, with a recent report claiming that, “In 2017, the United States held a market share of 93.2%, followed by Canada with 3.8%. Propelled by improvements in Internet access speed and coverage, virtual schools (sometimes referred to as ‘online’ or ‘blended’ schools) are growing and can now be found on every continent. Virtual education has been around for several decades, evolving from correspondence schools that sought to serve remote or rural populations to today’s fully online schools. A recent European report on virtual schools observes that, ”Increasingly, daily life provides numerous examples including banking, travel, higher education, shopping, services and commerce, where people can choose a virtual environment if they wish.” Can ‘virtualizing’ the school improve education service delivery? Can virtual schools contribute to solving some of the intractable challenges facing education in the developed and developing world today? Virtual schools are in some ways a natural extension of many longstanding ‘distance learning’ initiatives around the world that have utilized (aided by technologies such as radio and television ), updated for the Internet Age. What do you do when there are no schools or not enough teachers? Or even when you don’t have enough money to build all the schools and hire all the teachers that you need? Could so-called 'virtual schools' play a role, and if so: how?Ī number of countries have sought answers to such questions through the development of ‘virtual schools’, where students learn all (or most) of the time online, outside of a physical school building. ![]() ![]() ![]() There are many challenges, including a lack of schools, inability to go to school due to conflict or disaster and not having enough trained teachers (and in some cases, having no teachers at all). And of those who are in school, too many are not learning, according to the World Bank Global Development Report of 2018. According to UNESCO, there are 262 Million children out of school, mostly in low and middle income countries. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |