The time has come for online classes

The Internet is the center of a boom in education. Students around the nation, and about 10,000 here in Washington took one or more classes online last year. Now, it's time for my own school to enter this new era and offer online classes to its students.

The Seattle Times reports in its Aug. 14 edition that Internet schools are rapidly entering education's mainstream. That comes as no surprise to me, as I have taken online courses for my master's degree for over a year now.

Most Internet schools were begun as a way to offer highly motivated students a chance to take courses they might otherwise not have acces to, especially in smaller communities. That's a philosophy shared by a real-time counterpart: Running Start. They're also helpful for homeschool students and those students who are also competitive athletes. Today, though, the Internet classes are also a chance to take courses to get ahead and open up some room in a schedule or to take courses a student failed or missed.

The online academies are a model of success, and a replica should be formed in Wenatchee. We face a schedule crunch where students are forced from certain electives, we face a shortage of staff in some areas, we face students who need alternatives to traditional classroom education. The Internet is a solution. By creating our own online school, we control the curriculum and can closely match the online classes to our traditional classes.

Not all learning can be done online, and a student should not be able to earn a high school diploma solely with online classes. The socialization necessary for a developing youngster happens through live interaction with peers, and that cannot be replicated online.

There is a pilot program slated for this fall at Wenatchee High School. A teacher has been assigned two sections of U.S. History to be taught using an online classroom software. Whether it works depends on student interest. The half-hearted effort by the guidance office and school administration would seem to indicate that enrollment would be limited. I think we should start small, but we need to fill a class, too.

So the time has come for us to move in this direction. It's good for our students, our staff and our community. I am ready to sign up to teach at least one class, too. We'll see who's ready to learn.

-- Seattle