informal proposal

Dear ASU,

Over the past five semesters, there has been an increasing number of online classes offered at ASU. Each semester, many of the in-person lectures are replaced by condensed online versions taught by faculty or graduate students. According to ASU’s website, there are “more than 30,000 students enrolled in more than 150 undergraduate and graduate degree programs.” There are myriad problems with pushing more classes online, and in this proposal, I will outline many of the issues and later introduce a solution.

First of all, physically going to class builds accountability and teaches time management and self-direction, all of which are essential life skills. When a student takes the time to go to class, he or she has deemed it worthy of his or her time and are, in turn, more invested in the class. A study done in 2010 about the relationship between class attendance and overall performance showed that “the proportion of students getting a D or an F in an experimental psychology class was 12.6% when attendance was not mandatory and that this dropped to 3.9% when class attendance was mandatory” (Credé et.al, 2010). This study does not directly compare online students to traditional students, however, it does show that going to class and absorbing the material increases performance.

Another frustration I have with this new phenomenon is that certain online classes truly demand in-person discussion and interaction. One of the most enriching parts of education is the conversation that happens between professors and classmates outside schoolwork. I have thoroughly enjoyed my conversations with my English 302 professor about life, music, and politics, none of which are directly related to business writing but have been valuable nonetheless. In addition to this, a discussion I had with two individuals in my Barrett Human Event course led me to start a club with them over our shared interest in the arts. These conversations are a great way to forge relationships which can later lead to letters of recommendation or extracurricular opportunities.

Online classes prohibit these discussions and opportunities and perpetuate academic isolation. I took History of American Feminist Thought as an online Session A course this semester and had to do 4 or 5 discussion board posts. I would have to write about 500 words of my own and then respond to somebody else’s discussion board post. I never once looked at somebody’s response to my post, and most other people I talked to also did not look at responses to their posts. This class was very interesting to me, but since I never saw my professor or classmates, I never really got to talk about or challenge myself with the content. There is no online way to emulate a true, in-person discussion.

There are also issues with the faculty who teach online classes. I have heard that some tenured professors teaching online classes have been prohibited from teaching in person versions due to misconduct. I cannot understand why an individual who is on probation should be allowed to teach, even if it is online. In addition to this, professors are not given the freedom to create their own curriculum and incorporate their personal experiences into lectures because they are simply posting pre-recorded lectures. There is a huge discrepancy in the faculty who teach online versus those who teach in-person.

In addition to this, ASU transcripts do not designate whether a class was online or in-person. I had a friend who took Empirical Political Inquiry online and another who took it as a Session A online class. This is supposed to be we “weed-out” class for political science students, however, my friend who took it online said all the answers were available on websites like Quizlet or Course Hero, so he never studied for a single exam and received an A+ in the class. This is not learning and I think this undermines the entire concept of education. Individuals are ill-prepared for the real world, both with their skill set and with their ability to communicate.

The important caveat to this is that online classes are designed for non-traditional students, many of whom already have degrees and are looking for supplemental education. That being said, online classes are not conducive to first-time college students, most of whom only have experience with in-person instruction. An article published by the University of North Carolina stated that “the profile of the online learner suggested a student with more life and academic experiences” (Diaz, 2002). This article also showed how online students are “generally older, have completed more college credit hours and more degree programs, and have a higher all-college prior GPA than their traditional counterparts.” This reaffirms my original statement that online classes are meant to be supplemental, not foundational.

Michael Crow, President of ASU, has stated on multiple occasions that ASU prides itself on who they let in and not who leave out. Though the sentiment of this means well, it means that President Crow is focused much more on quantity rather than quality. In order to yield as many students as he wants, the quality has to inevitably decrease. It is the economic concept of diminishing returns: If everyone gets a degree, whether or not they deserve it, it devalues what that degree symbolizes.

The original idea was to create flexible schedules for students who either have full-time jobs or other obligations to obtain a degree at their own pace. A perfect example of this is the ASU Starbucks program, for “75% of undergraduate students currently enrolled in ASU Online, the Starbucks College Achievement Plan encompasses 21% of that enrollment.” This is a great idea in theory but the online student is missing out on the plethora of extracurricular or co-curricular activities that complement the course.

That being said, my proposed solution is to either cut down on the number of online classes being offered or to invest enough capital to provide enough in-person classes for all traditional students and enough online classes for the non-traditional students.

In order to do this, ASU may have to shift their thinking to look more at quality over quantity and invest more resources in fewer students. This will increase the quality of students at ASU and will reflect favorably because individuals will be better prepared to enter the working world, thus enhancing ASU’s overall reputation.

References