By Scott Miller
smiller@scbiznews.com

The solution to the state’s teacher shortage might be on the Internet.

The World Wide Web could ease the pressure on overcrowded classrooms as well as reduce the need to spend millions of dollars to build more and larger schools.

Three public cyber charter schools began offering courses this fall in South Carolina, serving about 2,300 students.And about that many more students are on the waiting list to enroll, said Timothy Daniels, superintendent of the S.C. Public Charter School District, which oversees the new online schools as well as two bricks-and-mortar charter schools.

Plus, the district has received two more applications from potential cyber charter schools, he said.

That’s a long way from aiding overcrowded schools like Oakbrook Elementary School in Ladson, which has to use nearly 30 temporary trailers as classrooms.

But the goal is to grow slowly.

“Typically in online schools, there’s growth of 200 to 400 students a year,” said Don Brown, principal of the K-12 cyber charter school S.C. Connection
Academy.

The district’s other two cyber schools are Insight School of South Carolina, which serves grades 9-12, and South Carolina Virtual Charter School, which offers K-12 classes.

Clayton Christensen, a professor at  Harvard Business School, predicts that, by 2019, half of all high school courses will be taught online.

Going online
The S.C. Department of Education launched its own online program in
2006, so students throughout the state might take some courses via the
Internet.

“Not only is there a lot of students in certain districts, but there is a shortage of teachers throughout the state,” said Dee Appleby, the department’s director of
e-learning.

She said online education could help solve both problems.

And because one teacher can serve students statewide, the online program allows some schools to offer courses they otherwise wouldn’t be able to provide, Appleby said.

“A lot of districts don’t have the qualified staff to offer those higher-level thinking classes,” she said.

Additionally, online courses can allow a student who is behind on credits to catch up while taking a full course load at his regular school.

The Education Department’s program serves 3,000 students a year, and Appleby said that she would like for it to grow but that the state hasn’t allocated the necessary resources for that to happen.

Not for everyone
Unlike the three cyber charter schools, the Education Department doesn’t offer a full slate of online courses leading to a degree.

The cyber charter schools do, but Daniels, the charter school district
superintendent, acknowledges that virtual school isn’t right for every student in the state.

One criticism has been that students aren’t as connected with other students as they would be at a traditional school and that they receive little face time with teachers.

“I think the families and the students are in the best position to make some of those choices,” Daniels said.

Brown said that, to foster relationships, his school is selecting parents throughout the state to serve as community liaisons to coordinate social and academic activities with students. And not all course work is done online.

The school conducts official group field trips; they’re going to the South Carolina Aquarium and the state capitol this school year, he said.

S.C. Connections Academy also offers special-interest clubs, such as a chess club, to connect students with each other.

Like it or not
In his publications, Harvard’s Christensen calls online education “disruptive,” meaning it will happen whether the world wants it or not.

The Internet is an everyday part of people’s personal and professional lives, Daniels noted. Businesses connect online; people trade stocks online; real estate agents sell homes online; people book hotels and buy airline tickets online; and so on and so on.

Daniels said that makes virtual learning all the more relevant. “What we can do with a cyber school is reflect the world as it is, not what it was,” he said.
Cyber schools send books to students, and some materials are digital. And the district pays students’ monthly high-speed Internet costs, Daniels said.

Right now, the three public virtual schools get their funding from the same state pool as do traditional public schools. If schools were to receive more funding, they could provide students with laptops, too, Daniels added, but fundraising efforts have been slow. 

Reach Scott Miller at 843-849-3119.