All over the world, the number of people in school at different levels forms a pyramidal shape. There is a large number at the primary level, but as they progress, the number decreases, leaving only a few in higher education. In the United States, some 65 million students K to K12 were expected to enroll in the fall of 2015. Over the same period, it was expected that 20.2 million would attend colleges and universities. It has been estimated that 25% of fresh high school students in the U.S. are not able to graduate. For students entering colleges or universities, 1 in 3 is unlikely to make it to the second year. This dropout rate is a stumbling block to national development, as many do not receive the full training required to function in society. If more people get an education, national development will get a huge boost, so that they can become functional in the society.
I am not saying that all the people who were not fully educated are not playing an important role in society. There are very prominent persons in society who have dropped out of school at some stage or the other. For example, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Oprah Winfrey all dropped out of school at some point. While this list is not exhaustive, the number of people who dropped out or chose not to pursue higher education and still succeeded is relatively small.
For the majority of people who dropped out or dropped out, and could not succeed in their careers, it was because they lacked the necessary knowledge to develop their potential. If you examine the history of people who have become successful despite dropping out or closing school, you will find that they found their life purpose and therefore pursued those goals, and more importantly, they later received some kind of education.
As we all know that education is a lifelong activity. At some point, whether you’ve dropped out of school or earned honors upon graduation, you’ll need an education. School dropouts who have found themselves a vocation or found employment need the education to be more productive, dropouts who feel the need for school but are ‘beyond school going age’ and the desire to go to school obviously needs education, managers, as well as employees, need further education to keep pace with today’s fast changing world and achieve increased wages and status respectively.
Somehow, a society dependent on traditional education that we have built for ourselves and considered ‘the best’ limits our search for continuing education. For many people, formal education ends the day they drop out or graduate from high school, college, or university, even though technology makes it possible for us to sit in our homes and still get quality education.
When technology – computers and Internet connectivity – replaced physical classes and made it possible to study from a distance in real-time, it appeared that the issue of continuing education for all, including dropouts and the working class, was resolved. It appears and still does, that teachers are no longer required to drop their students, apply for leave of study, or apply for leave of absence to pursue further education. It appears that a fifty-year-old woman who dropped out of school several years ago can now go to school from home and it appears that a father can learn what his daughter is learning in college, using the same device Then he calls her.
That’s what appeared. Those who have dropped out of school due to financial issues and haven’t had any success since then will not benefit, and those who have money may not want to put their money in a certificate, employers, and academics alike. will be disappointed. Little seems to have changed for these two groups of people, although online colleges and universities abound.
Two major issues are to blame. First, online education is too expensive for the target group of learners, and second, there is a perception that online colleges and universities do not provide holistic education like traditional colleges and universities. As indicated by Ed Vosganian, founder and CEO of College Funding 123, the cost of an on-campus university to graduate is estimated at $42,000, compared to about $21,000 for online universities for the same group. By comparison, we would say that it costs very little to study online. But we should not lose sight of those who mostly enroll in online universities.
It is the middle and lower-class people who opt for online universities. they include; The employee who has sacrificed pleasure for a higher qualification in exchange for a better salary, the unemployed who wants to acquire employable skills, the one who has dropped out who wants to go back to school in the hope that there will be a brighter future, and People living in remote parts of the world, especially in the developing world, who do not even have money to pay fees and therefore have to learn and work together.
The money for these $21,000 is so huge, it’s very difficult to raise. There are people from higher income groups who enroll in online universities, but online education is not popular among these due to the low reputation and myths associated with online education. Online institutions will tell you that they will not put anything on your certificate to show that you have received a non-traditional education.
This type of advertisement shows how society values online education. Online education is considered an inexpensive way to get ‘underwater’ education. Online colleges and universities were until recently considered diploma mills. This assumption still exists, although empirical evidence tells us that there is no disparity in the quality of students from traditional colleges and universities on the one hand and students from online colleges and universities on the other. Online universities and colleges are trying their best to make online learning prestigious and reduce study costs, but they cannot do it alone. With government intervention, online education can become prestigious and lower and middle-class-friendly.
The government should provide a national framework for online education, subsidize accreditation, and provide scholarships and student loans for students in online colleges and universities. A national framework should be established to guide the operation of all online colleges and universities by the state through the Department of Education or the relevant government agency. This framework, which shall be descriptive and not prescriptive in nature, describes, for example, the minimum courses to be taken at a given level, and the general mode of operation of online universities and colleges without prescribing specific courses or mode of operation Will do Accreditation for online colleges and universities isn’t just painstaking; It is expensive too.
This cost is passed on to the students, which increases the fees for the program. If the government decides to bear half the cost of accreditation, although there is no guarantee that the program fee will be halved, the program fee will be reduced in any way. Lastly, most students who choose online colleges and universities do not get scholarships and student loans from the state. Those who do get some don’t get huge scholarships and student loans like their counterparts at traditional colleges and universities. The government should make available scholarships and student loans for students of colleges and universities online, as it is for students of traditional colleges and universities.
The effects of these interventions would certainly be dire. Providing a national framework for online education will remove the false negative perception of people about online education. Many people think that online learning is easy and takes little credit compared to the credit taken in traditional learning settings. This thinking exists because there are some poorly designed online courses in which certificates are awarded only after submitting a couple of assignments. Such practices can be stopped when a national framework is developed and governed.
A national framework will give credibility to online learning, as online learning has to follow a national standard and hence no online college or university can just sell certificates. Subsidizing Accreditation will yield three outcomes. The most obvious thing is that this will reduce the program fee as the amount of passing students will be less. The subsidy in accreditation fee will encourage online colleges and universities to seek accreditation from accrediting bodies accredited by the Department of Education or an appropriate state agency.
Even though accreditation is not mandatory in some parts of the world such as the United States, some businesses that require state licensure will not accept degrees from unaccredited colleges and universities. Potential online learners are usually concerned about whether they can easily work with their certificates. Government intervention will address this concern and also remove the negative perception of people about online education. Government intervention in the form of scholarships and loans will reduce the financial burden and make it possible for those who have not been able to do so till now. In short, government intervention will go a long way in building an enlightened society by allowing many people to get higher education.
Many people wish to pursue higher education through online colleges and universities to gain knowledge and skills, or to enhance their knowledge and skills, but cannot do so due to the cost or uncertainty of the acceptability of the certificate. Government intervention in the form of a national framework for online universities and colleges, subsidizing accreditation costs, and providing scholarships and student loans will open doors for those who wish to study from home. Government intervention can assure that online education is as good as traditional college or university education and that their certifications will be accepted jobs that require state licensure. This would reduce the pressure on facilities in traditional colleges and universities, produce the well-educated citizens needed for national development and convert the current pyramid shape into a ‘near’ cylinder.