Once again we have David Hunt of Tipton gracing us with a guest post. David is a former teacher of the year from his days at North Cedar High School. He is also part of the Cedar Valley Voices group that has a coluin weekly papers around Iowa City to counter Republican legislators columns.

The Iowa legislature is currently debating the role of on-line schools. A number of questions have been raised and must be answered if we are to proceed down this road. The first concern is to follow the money. The funding that would go to a local school district and then percolate through the local economy now would go to an out of state corporation.

There is also the question of quality. The Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow(E.C.O.T) with 10,000 students in Ohio had test scores ranking above just 14 of the 609 school districts in the state. In 2010 barely half its third graders scored proficient or better on state reading tests, compared with the state average of 80%.

The Center for Research and Education Outcome looked at results in PA, specifically the arguments about individually tailored lesson plans which are provided to teachers who typically have classes of 50-100 students. Susan Ohanian, an educational consultant, created three on-line student identities and took all the first and second grade social studies courses as a research project. When she reported that “ Johnny wasn’t getting it”, the answer from K-12( another on-line company) was “repeat the lesson until you get it right”.

Students in these schools rarely hear from their teachers. At the Insight School of Wisconsin, owned by K-12, students need only sign in on the school website once every three days to prove they were actually attending. At times K-12 has outsourced paper grading to a contractor in India.  Angelique Smith, a parent of a student in a K-12 school for early elementary, said “ It’s more the parent teaching them”. Virtual school students started with higher test scores but ended up with learning gains that were “significantly worse” than students in traditional charter and public schools.

Finally, research shows us that the biggest factor in helping at risk students is personal contact with a caring educator, something you can’t replicate with on-line schools. Your tax money spent by districts is not going toward curriculum or teachers who get only 11-17%. A large amount is spent on advertising which public schools don’t do and the rest goes out of the district and state. Is this how you want your children and grandchildren educated? Is this how you want your tax money spent? Ask your legislator and legislative candidates where they stand on this issue.