Virtual High School links Ipswich with the world

www.townonline.com By Faith Tomei / FTOMEI@CNC.COM Wednesday, March 19, 2003

Chris Fay and Kristen Lindquist are juniors at Ipswich High School, but their teachers live in Temple, Ga., and Forks, Wash. David Dalton is the assistant principal at Ipswich High, but the students taking his course "Biotechnology: The Changing Face of Genetics" come from California, New York, South Korea and South America.

They're participating in the Virtual High School (VHS), an online school that offers courses in everything from "Calculus" to "Caribbean Art History." Fay is taking "Personal Finance" this semester, and Lindquist is enrolled in "Poetry Writing."

Instead of meeting teachers and classmates face to face, they meet them several times each week on the computer.

In addition to "Personal Finance," Fay has taken one-semester classes on "The Vietnam War" and "Pearl Harbor to the Atomic Bomb: The Pacific War, 1941-1945." He likes the flexibility of on-line classes.

"You can do your work whenever you want to," Fay says, explaining that the teacher gives assignments for the week each Tuesday. It's more like a college-style course, sometimes with 10 assignments, sometimes with five.

Fay can begin an assignment on a laptop computer in the school's Media Center and finish his work on his home computer later that day or on the weekend. He "talks" to his teacher, Bonnie Robinson, regularly.

He knows what she looks like because her photo is posted on the VHS course Web site, but he doesn't know the sound of her voice. He knows his classmates from their short resumes. Some choose to post their photos; others post cartoons, caricatures, pictures related to hobbies - whatever they feel like putting next to the descriptions they provide.

Conversations between VHS teachers and their students are in writing. Students can talk to each other as well with discussion threads. "The teacher opens the discussion; we respond. I can see what the other kids are saying, too," Fay explains.

Most classes have about 20 students; the cutoff is 26. Fay likes having discussions with students from all over the country. He's had classes with students from Colombia and Venezuela as well.

Lindquist says the students in her poetry class can talk to each other in what's called "The Coffee House." Fay's chat group is called "The Water Cooler."

This semester is the first time Lindquist enrolled in a VHS class. She likes the course content. "It's a class I couldn't get otherwise," she says, but admits it's an adjustment getting assignments once a week and not having a teacher to encourage and remind her to get the work done.

Lindquist enrolled in the class when she couldn't find a seventh period class at IHS that met her needs. She enjoys the freedom of accessing her class work from any computer. "I just type in the screen name and password," she explains.

Both Fay and Lindquist are comfortable with writing. Lindquist is currently composing a poem in iambic pentameter. Last year Fay took a political science class where he had to write "a huge essay" on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

This semester 13 IHS students are taking online courses; last semester 20 were enrolled. They're taking such specialized courses as "Pre-Veterinary Medicine," "Music Composition and Arranging," "Practical Law," "Career Awareness for the New Millennium," "Technology and Multimedia," "History: Same as it Never Was," "Writing and Telecommunications" and "Integrated Mechanical Physics."

VHS saves dollars, adds options

Ipswich High School is saving valuable dollars and at the same time offering more electives with the Virtual High School, says Principal Barry Cahill. For a $6,000 membership fee, they can sign up as many as 25 students per semester.

Ipswich is getting a real bargain, considering teachers' salaries and the limited classroom space at the high school with enrollment increasing. At the same time, it gives the students more course options.

IHS's full participation is contingent on supplying an online teacher. David Dalton is filling that need. In addition to serving as assistant principal at Ipswich High, he is the site coordinator for Ipswich High's VHS program as well. All Ipswich students who want to sign up for virtual courses go through Dalton.

Before enrolling a student, Dalton talks candidly to him or her about the pros and cons of taking courses by computer. It's important for virtual learners to be able to work and solve problems independently, be organized and able to manage their time well.

"It's not a model for everyone. Students sometimes start a class and drop it," Dalton says, noting that the number of students who start and don't finish online classes is high at most school sites. If a student doesn't do well in a regular classroom, he or she probably won't do well on line.

Students also have to be comfortable with waiting for feedback from their long-distance teachers, who may live in a different time zone or correspond with virtual students from home after a day of face-to-face teaching, Dalton says.

A student may post a question one day and receive a response 24 hours later - sometimes longer. With school vacations falling at different times, sometimes it can take almost a week to get feedback, he says.

This year freshmen enrolled in VHS courses for the first time. Dalton says they did well - two learning Java programming and a third learning what's involved in setting up a business.

Dalton, who taught biology classes at Ipswich High for several years before becoming athletic director, then assistant principal, says teaching in the Virtual High School is both rewarding and challenging. Before launching the biotechnology course, he had to complete 300 hours of graduate-level classes himself, learning how to design and teach in the Virtual High School.

For two years, he shared responsibilities for the class with a teacher at Cathedral High School who has left the teaching profession. This year he's on his own, monitoring the work of 20 students from different parts of the globe.

Before each semester begins, he works out the course schedule, determines how much each assignment is worth, sets up discussions and sets up online links to articles and Web sites for students to access.

His main requirement is that students have successfully completed a one-year biology class. Then he "meets" each student online, gradually learning the strengths and weaknesses, the study habits and personalities of those in his class.

"The virtual high school is a great neutralizer. I judge students on what they write, not what they look like. Sometimes I don't even know if I'm working with a boy or girl, with gender-neutral names like Chris," he says.

One bad thing about writing is that students can misinterpret that others' motives. Sometimes one student is offended by another's seemingly sarcastic tone. Often no sarcasm was meant, and they have to resolve the argument by asking questions like "What do you mean?"

"In the regular classroom, we rely on eye contact and body language when we're talking," Dalton says.

Dalton breaks his students into teams for some assignments, asking each group to respond to a question or situation separately, then sharing the results with the big group later. "I can keep track of the work of all 20 students, but they have access only to their team's work," he says.

A virtual class leads to good interactions between a teacher and the students, but it's more demanding than a face-to-face class. "I can speak to a team of five students in five minutes, but when I'm responding in writing, it's sequential - five times five," Dalton explains. He rarely gets to his online class during the day and does most of that work late at night or on weekends.

But it's a good learning experience, he says, one he's glad he's been part of.