As course registration approaches, students have started considering whether to add online courses to their schedules.. These online courses are offered by both Georgia Virtual School (GAVS) and Forsyth Virtual Academy (FVA) and include Advanced Placement (AP). While most everyone agrees that online courses can be beneficial, there is still disagreement between teachers and students.
Students
Most students at Lambert are taking online courses for a couple of reasons. Some do not have space in their schedule to take the class in person, some are trying to go to the next step of a pathway early and others are trying to finish their credits.
Freshman Aahana Jain is taking AP Psychology online and noticed significant differences in teaching.
“Teachers don’t teach there,” she said. “You’re just given material and you just have to self study.”
The in-person equivalents require attention, are more in-depth and have more complicated assignments, while the online courses do not require as much dedication. The school has decided that those who are taking an online course that is offered at Lambert have to be off campus for that period. Accordingly, when deciding whether to enroll in an online course, students should consider their priorities and accessibility to transportation.
“For your grades, you would probably do the online course because it is much easier,” Jain explained. “If you actually want to learn it, then probably in-person.”
Teachers
All teachers believe that online courses are purposeful, but they believe that the classes have been taken for granted. AP Human Geography teacher Laura Watkins is one of the many teachers who believes that.
“I think that they can serve a purpose,” she explained. “But I think that they are way overtaken, here, specifically, at Lambert.”
While differences can not be seen right now, during the pandemic teachers could see the stark contrast. An example of this is the significant drop in grades that teachers witnessed. During that time, Mrs. Watkins was one of the many teachers who taught online classes.
“Having taught for a year online during Covid, I know that even me, who really is dedicated to the job, was not as effective at teaching AP Human Geography,” she noted. “The scores were lower. I know firsthand that students did not learn the material as well as they did in class.”
Freshmen and Sophmores tend to take GAVS courses due to their schedules being full. While GAVS does offer more variety, what is taught in these courses does not match the standards of Forsyth county. Teachers have noticed that students who have taken a prerequisite class online are more likely to struggle in the next class, possibly due to a lack of interaction between the students and the teacher.
“Even though I made videos for every single part of the curriculum,” Mrs. Watkins explained, “it’s not nearly as engaging to watch me in a prerecorded video as it is to have that in an in-person class discussion over the same topics.”
