an editorial letter on advantages and disadvantages of online education
Answers
Explanation:
Editor,
I am a high-school student in Arlington, and I wanted to share my perspective about the pros and cons of online schooling. Being a student gives me an insider perspective of how to judge the upsides and shortcomings of this new way of doing school.
First, I’ll start with the upsides of online school. Besides being able to avoid the coronavirus, school has become much more convenient to attend. This is mainly due to not having to actually go anywhere, and being able to log onto a meeting in seconds, instead of having to spend a much longer amount of time preparing for school and catching the bus.
Another pro is the length of the school day. My school has decided to allow for 50-minute breaks in between classes, which both lets students catch up on work and shortens the amount of time we have to sit in online meetings.
And now for the cons.
The biggest con is the inability to see the other students in your class, as most of the time we’re just looking at the teacher’s screen, rather than actually seeing our classmates.
The lack of social interaction has been cited as the most major drawback of online schooling. Personally, this doesn’t affect me as much as it would someone younger, since I have an established group of friends and we can meet online or (socially-distanced) in person. I could, however, see how this would be difficult for someone in elementary school, or someone who has just moved from one school to another.
Another con is that the teachers seem to assign much more work than they would normally to make up for not being in class, and this usually has a negative effect on students. There is also a lack of hands-on learning, and since I take chemistry (which involves doing experiments) and engineering (which involves creating various gizmos), online learning takes some of the value away from those classes.
When all is said and done, I prefer having school online. I think it’s better to accept this system that is not quite perfect, rather than put people at risk of becoming sick. I do, however, understand that what works best for each student and parent depends on their individual circumstances.
Roy Vogel, Arlington