It’s without question that due to lockdowns happening across the globe to mitigate the spread of COVID-19, education has had to move online. But this migration from traditional classroom environment to digital workspaces is not a new trend. In fact, it started pre-pandemic and it will stick around for much longer than the virus outbreak itself.
As technology advances every day, it is obvious that it will eventually become a key part of any industry. The field of education is no different as the integration of technology with it has opened the door for new options that are transforming the way people learn for the better. Here are a few reasons online learning is here to stay.
1. It’s Flexible To Individual Needs:
Online education allows teachers the opportunity to meet student’s individual needs and style. Different schedules can be set that benefits every student per their individual learning page. Technology and data can help teachers better place students in groups based on their grasping capabilities and focus on learning methods that are effective based on the types of students they are working with. Students who struggle in traditional learning environments can use tons of online resources to help them get past roadblocks. For example, Studypool, a platform that offers affordable on-demand online tutoring and access to millions of student documents for download, can help students optimize their learning beyond the classroom.
2. You Get to Choose from a Wide Selection of Courses:
There are many limitations to in-person education and an obvious one is physical limitation. The need to travel, whether a short or long distance, to be in-person on a school campus can be a huge roadblock for students. And even if students have the ability to attend an academic institution in person, that institution may be lacking teachers for certain subjects they want to learn. Person Online education breaks this barrier of physical boundaries. Students can access teachers who are on the other side of the globe, hence the choice of course and subjects one can learn is limitless.
3. You Save Time:
Another benefit of online learning is the time efficiency. Students need not travel to their classes and can learn according to the schedule that works for them. This can be especially helpful for those who might be balancing a job or family life while enrolled in their course. Also, unexpected conditions that can affect one’s ability to commute to school get eliminated. The latest pandemic has affected many students enrolled in in-person schooling, but online education needs no physical contact which makes it the most viable option now.
4. Lower Total Costs:
Online courses are cheaper for students and for schools. Without the need to pay for campus rent to run the classes, schools can charge lower fees for online courses. The commuting costs of the staff and students become nil, also the course material can be supplied online, hence there are no printing charges.
5. You Get to Meet Global Students:
As there are students from all over the world who enroll in online courses, there’s an opportunity to virtually meet and collaborate with a diverse group of people. This can expose students to other cultures they would not have an opportunity to engage with otherwise. It’s particularly beneficial for students who don’t live in cosmopolitan cities and would otherwise not interact with international students at their local colleges.
6. Better Participation:
Students can be shy to ask questions in a classroom environment, but online classes can be less intimidating simply due to the buffer of a keyboard. Students can type questions in a chat to their peers and professors, sometimes anonymously. This encourages typically quieter students to participate in class discussions. Online chats can also serve as useful study material students can refer back to if they need to clarify any doubts and reduce the need to take notes so the students can be focused on absorbing and participating in the lesson.
7. Easy Access to Lectures and Class Material:
As online classes are conducted through learning management systems (LMS), many institutes send you the class recordings so you can repeat it and understand the subject better. Especially in more advanced courses, the curriculum can be very fast paced so having access to all class materials to re-listen or watch allows students who need more time to absorb the content a better chance of learning and succeeding in the course. This also means that if a student is out sick or has to miss a class for some reason, they can always access it later and catch up.
