It could be at home, or the beach, another state, or perhaps a different country. These places may become schoolrooms for North Carolina students as cyber schools become a reality as an alternative-base learning environment.
University of North Carolina University of Chapel Hill law student Meghan Knight reported on the legalities of “cyber charters” in the North Carolina Journal of Law & Technology in 2005. Through much research, she determined online schools using state-of-the-art technology have started in other states and are inevitable in North Carolina.
“Increasingly, virtual education is seen as a model for the development of the 21st-century learning skills of working and collaborating with others at a distance,” she wrote. “If North Carolina’s public schools are to educate students so that they will be competitive in a marketplace that values online learning and virtual interaction, the state will need to ensure that its schools at the very least have a virtual component.”
Cyber campuses are considered cutting-edge, even for their charter school counterparts, Knight said, because the learning environment would operate outside the confines of “brick-and-mortar” institutions, providing most of the student’s instruction via the Internet, software programs and distance learning.
“Students who attend cyber-charters often ‘meet’ with other students and teachers online and may gather in person only for particular activities,” she said. “Primarily, students do their work on a flexible schedule from home, and in contrast to traditional schools, students’ homes are not necessarily located in a particular school district.”
Although public school educators within the state have resisted the idea of schools without walls, rejecting two cyber-charter school campuses because of accountability issues, the N.C. State Board of Education has vowed to keep an open mind and study the issue.
The groundwork is already laid in North Carolina to offer cyber education to pupils. Currently there at least seven cyber campuses across the state, making the transition possible.
JoAnna Goss, a cyber campus manager at A.L. Brown Cyber Campus in Kannapolis, said the school started in 1997 to help under-served children living in struggling communities get a better education in math, science, and technology.
The campus consists of a suite of computer rooms and two video conference rooms in which the students gather to interact and learn in real time with professors, scientists, biotechnologists, businessmen, and other experts.
Without the cyber campus, Goss said the children wouldn’t be able to sample the unique gamut of courses. “We couldn’t use our limited resources to justify a teacher for 90 minutes a week for half a dozen students,” she said. “It’s fabulous. It makes my job really fantastic. I see a lot of potential. It’s such a great resource that we have available.”
Goss said she can’t imagine where the future is going to take cyber learning, because it’s already grown considerably since the 56-year-old started her teaching career.
“I don’t think I can ever conceptualize what is going to happen,” she said. “I’m already living in the Jetson’s cartoon. I never dreamed I’d be doing something like this. But honestly, I do think in the years to come (cyber campuses are) going to become more and more prevalent. [Video conferencing] will become a plug and play sort of thing. Video conferencing will continue to grow and multiply. Although [online learning] is in the future, it’s probably closer than I think.”
Helen Nance, chief administrative officer at Gray Stone Day School on the Pfeiffer University Campus in Misenheimer, N.C., is one charter school administrator taking advantage of virtual learning. She said her high school charter program recently received a grant from the Office of Charter Schools for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction to build an interactive distance-learning center.
The cyber school, set to open during the 2007-2008 academic year, will allow the students attending from seven rural counties around the region to be taught by instructors in real time from all over the world.
“We can talk and see both ways,” Nance said. “I’m going to be able to bring the world to my children.”
The virtual classroom is also cost-effective. She said the technologically advanced learning will cut down greatly on traveling and other expenses that often drain a school’s budget.
Nance also said the school can be used by the community or the university or for staff development. “I’m just looking at it in a whole new light,” she said. “This is just the beginning. This is really big.”
Jack Moyer, superintendent for the Office of Charter Schools, agreed.
“[Gray Stone Day School] is really going to be set up with a tremendous school,” he said. “I think it’s a great idea.”
Although there are pros and cons to cyber charters and campuses, the tide is turning in favor of online learning and Knight warned that North Carolina needs to prepare by “rewriting its current charter school legislation or writing separate legislation for cyber charters before a situation arises in which it does not have the choice to turn down a cyber-charter.”
She said it’s imperative to have every virtual contingency possible in place before the inevitable arrives at the state’s doorsteps.
“Careful consideration of as many issues as possible in making amendments to the existing legislation or in creating new legislation,” she wrote. “ (This) will help to ensure that North Carolina plays an important role in guiding the development of virtual learning in the state as it attempts to provide a ‘sound basic education’ for each of its students.”
Karen Welsh is a contributing editor of Carolina Journal.