Christian school is unexpected leader in online education

Heritage Christian Online School is the biggest such school in B.C. and has one of the largest distributed-learning programs in the country. It markets educational products in other provinces and abroad, and this year it’s expecting to grow again thanks to legislative changes allowing more online learning opportunities in B.C.

The school’s exceptional success, and the fact that independent online schools in B.C. are attracting students at a faster pace than public online schools, has sparked debate among educators. Although enrolments at online independents are only a third of those at public online schools, the former has seen steady increases since 2003-04 while the enrolment in the public options has plateaued.

Some teachers worry about a lack of regulation of online education — also known as distributed learning — and say the Education Ministry isn’t monitoring student completion rates, teacher caseloads and program quality. Glen Hansman, vice-president of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation described it as the wild west.

Others disagree, saying distributed learning offers creative opportunities for a variety of students. Heritage Christian’s superintendent, Greg Bitgood, says his Kelowna school, which is operated by a non-profit society, found a solid constituency among Christian parents who home-school. By enrolling at Heritage Christian, those parents can still teach their children at home but they also have access — free of charge — to learning resources and teacher support. There are no tuition fees because per-pupil operating grants from government are sufficient cover all expenses.

The number of true home-schoolers in B.C. has plummeted while online learning keeps growing. During this school year, only 2,062 students were registered as traditional home-schoolers, while the number of online students in public and independent schools rose to 50,890 from 34,000 five years ago.

Heritage Christian has 2,050 full-time students. As well, it has an expanding number of part-time students who are enrolled at regular bricks-and-mortar schools but take a course or two from Heritage Christian — because the subject they want isn’t offered at their home school, its availability doesn’t fit with their timetable, they have failed a course or they simply want an online-learning experience.

Some students also regard online courses as an easy route to good grades, say public school teachers. “There’s definitely a trend of kids moving online to get a higher mark, and all teachers recognize that,” said Vancouver physics teacher Doug Smith.

Bitgood agreed that some students who “cross enrol” between traditional and online schools are shopping for inflated marks and a few might find a school or a teacher willing to help them. “That gives all of us a bad name,” he said, but he insisted those numbers are small and do not reflect the full-time students who take their full program online.

Grade inflation has been a subject of discussion by online educators, he said. Another hot topic is the completion rates, which some say are dismal for distributed learning students. Again, Bitgood noted a difference between full-time online students, who he said have excellent completion rates, and kids who take only one or two online courses and might not adapt well to independent learning.

Surprisingly, the Education Ministry does not require online schools to track completion rates, although that possibility is being reviewed.

Heritage Christian’s growth has riled the teachers’ federation, which doesn’t like the fact the school collects public money, boldly promotes itself as “B.C.’s online school,” employs non-union teachers as contractors and outsources some work. More than anything, the union is unhappy with the way independent and public schools are having to compete for students.

“Having about 60 public DL (distributed learning) schools and 18 private DL schools all in competition means that the province is not able to produce high-quality online programs that take advantage of the various tools that are now available to enhance online resources,” Larry Kuehn, the union’s director of research and technology, says in a recent report.

“Competition for students and a major focus on compliance audits means that the public-school DL courses do not take full advantage of technological tools and developments.”

While Smith, who teaches at Prince of Wales secondary, worries about students signing up for distributed learning simply to get better marks for less work, Prince George teacher Glen Thielmann frets about the quality of online courses in the public system. Based on his experience as a contract online marker, he said some school districts have not adapted well to the new technology.

“We have this old model where we give students stacks of paper and stacks of worksheets ... with assignments to send in and some tests to write,” he said in an interview. Some districts have developed more creative and interactive distributed learning but many delivery models are still locked in the 1980s, he added.

That means “the DL experience for most students is disembodied, impersonal and unchallenging,” Thielmann wrote on his blog after speaking to The Vancouver Sun. He stressed that he was not criticizing distributed learning staff, only lamenting the “default approach” to distributed learning, which is a result of difficulties in changing a large system and a lack of funding for new courses or project development.

Michael Maser, co-founder of SelfDesign Learning, which is another popular independent online school, said the public system hasn’t embraced distributed learning largely because of the teachers’ federation’s insistence that traditional education is better. The union is “most interested in kids in seats in brick-and-mortar schools,” which influences the public school approach to online learning, he said.

“There is a stigma that online learning is of a secondary quality and that is a common refrain in public schools,” said Maser, who has been involved in distributed learning for two decades, including when it was paper-based. “That becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy (in public-schools), despite the efforts of many, many excellent teachers out there who recognize the benefits of DL and are working through it to provide services to students. Their hands are often tied.”

The number of B.C. students learning online is expected to increase again soon. Until now, only Grade 10-12 students were permitted to cross enrol, but the opportunity to mix regular schooling with online education will soon be available to all K-12 students. Bitgood expects an influx of Grade 8 and 9 students, but said.Click on their website www.artsunlight.com for more information.