Are you thinking about going back to school? Instead of sharpening your pencils, buying a new spiral notebook and heading into a traditional classroom with a blackboard, attending a class could be as simple as turning on your Notebook or tablet, and logging into a website called Blackboard from the comforts of your couch or while you are getting your caffeine fix at your neighbourhood coffee shop.

These days, an online education is opening up a new world of learning where information and knowledge is at every student’s fingertips.

“Education is basically the same today as it was in Greek times, even though there are now so many new and engaging ways to learn,” said Adrian Ridner, CEO and cofounder of Study.com, a Mountain View, California-based online education company.

An increasing number of post-secondary students have been logging into an online classroom in the past decade. According to a 2012 report by National Center for Education Statistics, around 12 percent of all students in the United States are enrolled in an online course, or in an online degree program.

Education experts note that non-traditional students – those pursuing either an undergraduate or a postgraduate degree over the age of 24 – prefer to take classes online when it fits in their schedule between juggling a full-time job and taking care of their family.

“[Online education] is available to those who can’t come to the physical classroom. Most online courses do not have textbooks or written exams administered by proctors,” Julie Mueller, Ph.D. and associate professor with the Faculty of Education at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario, told Caifu Magazine on Thursday, July 23. “The global aspect of online education is its appeal. It creates innovative thinkers.”

One of the greatest benefits of online education is that it allows a very diverse student population to interact in a virtual sense, added Robert R. Johnson, Ph.D. and president and CEO of The American College of Financial Services in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.

“Online discussions are much richer than traditional in-person discussions because the students are diverse – in terms of geographic location, functional specialty and experience,” he continued. “In-person programs tend to attract students with very similar backgrounds and perspectives.”

To be successful in an online learning environment, experts say students need to work hard, be flexible, apply self-discipline, and finish assignments in a timely manner to keep up with the fast pace of courses.

The Impact of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)
The first massive open online course, referred to as a MOOC, was launched in 2008 at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg. MOOCs use many different platforms to engage students, including Facebook groups, Wiki pages, blogs, forums and other online resources.

The New York Times dubbed 2012 as “The Year of the MOOC,” as thousands of geographically dispersed students signed up en masse free courses on the Internet. A typical MOOC class contains training sessions with an instructor virtually lecturing students in a series of videos, while students complete online assessment modules like forums and multiple-choice quizzes to show mastery of the material. Students devote between two to 10 hours a week on discussions and classwork.

Popular MOOCs that will be taught in U.S. colleges and universities in fall 2015 include introduction classes at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in corporate finance, financial accounting, and marketing and operations management. Stanford University will offer courses in game theory, social and economic networks and technology entrepreneurship on the Coursera platform, while Harvard University will repeat its popular The Political and Intellectual Foundations of China course on the edX platform.

Although MOOCs have lost their luster in North America the past couple of years, education experts like David Bolman, Ph.D. and provost of University of Advancing Technology in Phoenix, say they are a great starting point for figuring out how to fill a need for lifelong learning.

“Students can learn from the world’s experts, the authors of the standard text book, the most famous practitioners and greatest thinkers from each discipline and topic,” Perry Cook, cofounder of Kadenze, an online arts and technology education startup in California, wrote in an email.

“The MOOCs opened up education to the masses,” Mueller added. “Technology is changing. How [professors] teach and how students learn is also changing. While an instructor serves as a mentor and leads the group, students are now interacting and learning from one another.”

While taking a MOOC, students can absorb course materials, rewind videos, discuss class topics online, submit assignments, and receive instructor and peer assessments immediately, Cook pointed out. “[This system] is more effective for many kinds of learners,” he continued. “Machine grading is more fair than human grading, and can actually detect cheaters. Online in-video quizzes can make sure the student is paying attention, and getting the concepts in a one-on-one basis.”

Could China, a population with more than a billion learners, embrace the MOOC concept of critical thinking and online engagement? In modern China, its lecture-based education revolves around the teacher, where the learner is a passive student. Chinese students are not accustomed an education that requires inner motivation and self-discipline.

“The challenge for MOOCs to expand in China is pertinent to teaching and learning for what kind of audience or market,” emphasized Tony Bates, an expert in online and distance education.

Going Beyond the Virtual Community
Some education experts say that the online format has its drawbacks. “In my opinion, current classrooms like MOOCs are valuable, but lack the effectiveness of live interaction,” T. Michael W. Halcomb, Ph.D., and founder of the Conversational Koine Institute, wrote in an email. “It is one thing to watch a lecture on video, but it is another thing to engage in a live, real-time lecture.”

Halcomb noted students taking an online course should make the effort to engage with one another face-to-face to humanize the online experience. “In order to build authentic rapport, it’s important to see faces, hear voices, understand personalities, gauge each learner’s progress, and understand each student’s learning style. These things go a long way in making online education a success.”

One university that is transcending the online environment is American University’s School of International Service in Washington, D.C. They have offered their International Relations master’s degree program online since 2012.

“We liken our online platform to the image you see at the beginning of 'The Brady Bunch,’” explained Matthew Meekins, director of operations and online programs at American University’s School of International Service. “Everyone’s face is visible on the screen during classroom instruction – there truly is no back row. … This allows the opportunity to build rapport with faculty and classmates just as they would in an on-campus setting.”

American University also hosts Immersion experiences on its Washington, D.C. campus for students to join their classmates and professors in-person for networking and collaboration with leaders in the international community, Meekins added. “These features are all important, and go a long way to provide a valuable academic experience.”

Another online portal that is challenging the status quo is Los Angeles-based Yoyo Chinese, the first Chinese language education company to tap into videos to teach Chinese to Westerners. Yangyang Cheng, Yoyo Chinese’s founder and CEO, said her main goal is to debunk the myth that spoken Mandarin Chinese is too difficult to learn.

“Engagement is something we think about all the time,” Cheng shared with Caifu Magazine on Friday, July 24. “We’ve worked hard to make learning Mandarin easier by using English-language examples and very clear explanations. …I use humor, warmth and empathy to keep my students personally connected.”

Chen attributes Yoyo Chinese’s success among Mandarin learners because it teaches phrases and expressions that are hip, relevant and have a social impact with 1.2 billion Mandarin speakers worldwide. “[The courses] are fun, progressive, informative and completely practical,” Cheng continued. “Students don’t want a businessman from the 1950s teaching them out-of-date Chinese they are unlikely to ever hear on their next trip to China. This is about as unengaging as you can get.”

Time to Flip the Classroom
Education experts say students now seek a blended learning approach to their education, which combines face-to-face classroom practices with computer-based, online tasks.

An innovative method of teaching is turning the traditional classroom on its head. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, flipping the classroom involves teachers inverting traditional education methods by delivering instruction outside of class, and moving “homework” back into the classroom. Educations conceived the flipped classroom concept while strategizing how to teach a group when individuals learn at different speeds.

“Flipped classroom technologies have made in-class time much more valuable,” Ari Bixhorn, vice president of marketing at Panopto, a Seattle-based video content management software company told Caifu Magazine on Tuesday, July 21. “It’s one of the best ways for teachers to engage with their students. They allow students to watch a video lecture prior to class, and then discuss the lessons learned during class time.”

Advocates of the flipped classroom point out the practice promote better student-teacher interaction. Instead of lecturing at students in front of a classroom, teachers can circulate around the classroom and speak with students.

Studies show that the flipped classroom is working. At Villanova University’s College of Engineering in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, a flipped classroom in an engineering course showed that the bottom third of students’ grades were more than 10 percent higher than grades from a lecture-style class in the same subject.

Online Education’s 2020 Vision
Looking ahead to 2020, education experts predict that online education will change the way students learn, as they will take a more social approach, make connections with their peers and build a more interactive relationship with their instructor.

“Online education will continue to soar, and classrooms will be much more project based and
collaborative then the old lecture style focused primarily on theory,” stated Kristen Lee Costa, Ph.D., behavioral sciences chair and doctor of education faculty at Northeastern University
in Boston. “Students will be increasingly immersed in practical, experimental projects and roles to develop critical 21st century skills.”

Mueller said she envisions students will be building their own degree, where they customize their course of study to their personal, educational and professional goals.

“While the classroom model will likely always be around, increasingly learners are interested in individualized educational experiences,” Halcomb agreed with Mueller.

Tyce Henry, associate director at The Boston Consulting Group in Washington, D.C. labeled this phenomenon an “a la carte” education, where students cobble together a degree with different types of classes and other educational practices.

Chen noted that gamification could play a huge role as the online education market matures. While students are playing and interacting virtually with their peers, they will be learning at the same time. “Lessons are short, animated, simple and relatively easy to master,” Chen said.

Mueller added she believes data analytics will drive the online classroom of the future. Learning management systems like Canvas by Instructure, Desire2Learn, or Moodle captures data, including time spent on an assignment, frequency of postings, and a number of logins. Professors and instructional designers will work together to understand how the online classroom functions, Mueller explained.

Ridner forecasts that online education will be “the next generation college degree.”

“Online education is the great disruptive force in higher education,” Johnson concluded. “Those institutions that embrace it will thrive. Those that don’t [adopt online education] run the risk of becoming less relevant to the millennial generation.”