An Oxymoronic Education: Virtual Education in Brick and Mortar Schools

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Introduction: The problem
Students in America are not receiving the education they need in traditional brick and mortar public schools. High-performing students’ potential is often stifled as the current system holds them back and low-performing students often become frustrated and discouraged. My experience in a Virginia Title I elementary school offers specific anecdotal evidence of this. For example, a majority of my Kindergarten students (16 out of 20) were considered ESOL (i.e. English for Speakers of other languages). Most of the teachers employed by the school were unable to effectively communicate ideas with a number of students because of the language barrier. This should raise concerns for policymakers about the sustainability of the current education model as Education Secretary Arne Duncan recently reported that the majority of students in public schools will be minorities by this fall.
On another occasion, a high performing student in class wanted to read an advanced level book but was not allowed to do so because it was “not on the lesson plan for that day.” Additionally, a neighboring Kindergarten teacher had a student in her class who excelled at drawing and other artistically demonstrated skills. Unfortunately, he would regularly have to be pulled away from his work, despite his deep interest, skill, and focus to work on something else that did not inspire the same passion in him.
A final example of the failure of the current model to meet individual student needs is student mobility across school districts. According to U.S. Census data (Schachter, 2004, pg. 3), 14% of school age children (5-19) changed residence between 2002 and 2003. Students who experience high levels of mobility are more often minority o...

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...mentary-school.
Means, B., Toyama, Y., Murphy, R., Bakia, M., and Jones, K. (2010). Evaluation of evidence-based practices in online learning: A meta-analysis and review of online learning studies. U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from http://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/tech/evidence-based-practices/finalreport.pdf.
Schachter, J. (2004). “Geographic mobility: 2002 to 2003.” U.S. Department of Commerce, 1-16. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/p20-549.pdf.
Stewart, M. (2014). “K12’s online learning similar to ‘brick and mortar schools’.” The Daily Times. http://www.thedailytimes.com/news/k-s-online-learning-similar-to-brick-and-mortar-schools/article_a2a1f1b3-a999-53d2-bcab-ad830b147396.html.
Zittleman, S. (2013). Philosophy of education. In RTEC Faculty, (Eds.), Foundations of Education EDUC 200 (157-184). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Companies.

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