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Apparently people who attend online colleges have very high dropout rates. More interestingly, it doesn’t appear there’s any way to stop it. According to an article by Marc Parry in the Chronicle of Higher Education:
Students drop out of online classes at rates 15 percent to 20 percent higher than traditional ones…. Kennesaw State saw that problem reflected in its own classes, so a group of the university’s professors set up a study to find the best strategies that might improve retention.
And it turns out there are no strategies that work. This is according to a study by researchers at Kennesaw State University soon to appear in the International Journal of Management in Education.
In the study academics tried a variety of strategies that previous research implied might keep people in college. Researchers separated subjects into two groups. One group got calls at home, quizzed on the syllabus, broken up into small discussion groups, and extra help to develop “personal connections” with other students and the material. The other group got nothing.
But it didn’t matter. The dropout rates of both groups were the same.
According to one of the researchers, assistant professor of management Stacy Campbell, “If someone was going to drop out of the class, they were going to drop out of the class.” Frustrating.
Then again, it’s possible that students drop out of online programs because they discover the degrees they’re working to earn are actually worthless. In this case keeping them in might not be an effort really worth pursuing.
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cyffermoon on September 27, 2010 1:37 PM:
The research measured students enrolled in online classes through a traditional university. As far as I can tell, there is no mention in the article of all-online universities or all-online degree programs. Yet you end with this conclusion: "Then again, it's possible that students drop out of online programs because they discover the degrees they're working to earn are actually worthless. In this case keeping them in might not be an effort really worth pursuing." ???
Sammy on December 30, 2010 1:39 PM:
I was able to finish an MSN Degree program online. I can tell you from personal experience that there are fundamental reasons for online schools having drop outs. Some of the people I was in class with I could not believe that they had ever finished high school much less were they qualified to be in college. We are talking about people that could just not write at all, and getting a degree of any level online is very heavy when it comes to writing. The other problem is that it takes a strong person to complete online degree programs. That is because the limited amount of deadlines allows for people to put off reading assignments and writing assignments for to easily for most people. Online schools would be wise to have stricter deadlines. With today's technology they could test at least a bit more often to prove that people are online doing work, or at least that they are online.
Anonymous on December 31, 2010 3:52 AM:
The link under the word "useless" above goes to a Luzer post "The Truth about Computer College",
that sites a report by Jaggars and Bailey. Page 8 of the Jaggars and Bailey report states "Overall, then, the online courses showed no strong advantage or disadvantage in terms of learning outcomes among the samples of students under study." This Jaggars and Bailey quote implies that the online courses are roughly equal to face-to-face rather than "worthless".
Page 11 of the Jaggars and Bailey report cites a study that found that 70% of reporting students who were withdrawing from an online course said they withdrew because of 'technical problems' with connecting to the course material online. Its not clear whether the Kennesaw State University study cited in the Luzer article above addresses technical problems. If technical problems really are the major cause of dropping out of online courses then the interventions cited by Luzer from the Kennesaw State University study would indeed have small chances of working.
Bernard Schuster
Arrive2.net
twitter.com/Arrive2_net
Bernard Schuster on January 06, 2011 7:09 PM:
In a related story Linda Thor noted in an article in Chronicle of Higher Education that one college was able to lift its online course completion rate from 50% to over 80% just by improving the technology used, and expanding access to library and related services. http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/beating-the-not-invented-here-mentality/28849.
She said a "not invented here" mentality often blocks improvement in online practices that could improve completion rates.
Bernard Schuster
Arrive2.net
Twitter.com/arrive2_net