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There has been a big move in recent years as more and more people use online schools instead of traditional classrooms. Most major Universities have their full program available to online students, including life lectures and exams in real time. Because the online programs have a fraction of the overhead and maintenance costs that a traditional classroom environment, tuition’s are significantly lower. These classes are also much easier to fit into a work schedule and involve no expensive travel to and from the campus.
But online education has taken a large step forward with firm steps into the fields of primary and secondary education in both private and public school systems across the nation. There are nearly one million American youngsters using online public schooling and parent proctored classes today which numbers increasing annually. The Florida Virtual School, which is the largest of its kind in the world, maintains an enrollment of approximately 50,000 students for all three semesters. In Michigan City Councils are exploring online classes to attack both budget and classroom sizes.
The moves toward virtualization in public schools has been hotly contested by teacher´s Unions in several States. The teachers claim that these programs eliminate the need for teachers. The problem for the teachers is however is that virtual education is not only enormously less expensive for the schools, who spend tax payer´s dollars to pay for public schools. In today´s world of budget cuts most school boards and State Legislatures will be hard pressed to avoid going virtual.
Not all teachers will lose their jobs however. Online education will be available to all Americans and not all teaching will be done by parents, especially in the later years. Teachers will be recording lectures or conducting live webinars on a regular basis. If the entire American Public School System were to go virtual then the number of students would increase exponentially, requiring every more teachers. The only thing that will change is the presentation of the material and the sole teacher who can lecture to 100,000 students at one time.
Web based schools, or so called “Charter Schools”, can receive thousands of dollars in Federal educational subsidies for each student they enroll. One school district in Wisconsin for instance, was claiming more than $6,000 per student. The State Legislature however reacted badly to this and cut the payments to $3,000 per student. There has already been found to be a significant amount of fraud in the system with some schools claiming money that was never spent. Regardless of these fitful starts however, online schools will be the wave of the future.
