When talking about educational choice, most people focus on choosing a school. But true educational choice shouldn’t stop after a family chooses a school. After all, few schools can meet the educational needs of all of their varied students—or can they?
Course choice, a growing trend in K–12 education, provides public school students with expanded course offerings across learning environments from diverse, accountable providers. It may sound impossible, but for many Ohio students, this is already a reality. CTE programs offer personalized paths toward earning high school credits, industry credentials, and college credit. The College Credit Plus program empowers students in grades 7–12 to attend classes at participating public or private colleges after they’re admitted based on their college-readiness. For students who aren’t interested in existing CTE programs and aren’t deemed college- and career-ready, ilearnOhio seems like the perfect solution. Dubbed a “powerful tool” for students and educators alike, the online platform provides classroom resources (e.g., instructional support materials, assessments, and professional development resources) and a marketplace with online courses from a variety of developers. The marketplace offers students extended course options—but only if their family has a few hundred dollars to drop, since many of the credit-bearing courses are “fee-based.”
While some schools offer plenty of course choices and might not need ilearnOhio, not every Buckeye kid is lucky enough to attend a course-rich school. Thousands of students across the state, especially in rural or urban areas and small school districts, love the school they’re enrolled in and don’t want to choose another. But staying often means sacrificing the chance to take one—or more—courses that they want or need to take.
Ohio isn’t an anomaly. This is the case for thousands of students across the country (check out this sobering brief on limited course access from the U.S. Department of Education). I saw it firsthand as a high school English teacher in Memphis. At my urban, low-income school, students were severely limited by a lack of access to a wide variety of courses. Spanish and French were offered, but only for two years each. The only available sciences were physical science, biology, and chemistry, with no AP options. The highest math course was advanced algebra and trigonometry. Electives were rare. It was a painful reality, particularly since nearby schools’ options weren’t much better. Families and students alike asked the same questions each year: What about upper-level Spanish and French, or even an option for a different language—particularly since colleges like students with four years of a foreign language? What about the aspiring scientists who wanted to take physics, geology, anatomy, or an AP version of any of the core classes? What about the math aficionados who, without pre-calculus, statistics, or AP courses, didn’t have much of a chance to deepen their knowledge before the ACT or college? And let’s not forget electives.
A recent white paper from the Foundation for Excellence in Education explains that in states where a course access policy is in place, students are able to enroll in and earn credits from courses that aren’t traditionally taught in their own schools. Louisiana, for instance, has a course access policy that includes face-to-face, blended, CTE, and online courses. If you compare course access policies in states from Digital Learning Now’s Digital Learning Report Card 2014 with what the Buckeye State already offers, it’s clear that Ohio’s strong CTE programs and its College Credit Plus program are already two-thirds of a stellar course access policy. The remaining third is online courses that specifically meet the needs of students who aren’t interested in CTE and aren’t yet college- or career-ready. Well-intentioned as it may be, ilearnOhio doesn’t cut it as the third part of a course access policy; its course fees deny access to thousands of low-income families. If Ohio wants to complete the trifecta of course access, it must start offering free online classes to all students.
Before I lose half of my readers with sighs and grumbles about the well-documented struggles of Ohio online charter schools, let me be clear: The online courses we need for a complete course access policy don’t have to be offered through Ohio’s current online schools. In fact, I’d argue that they shouldn’t be. Ohio’s online charter schools have been an all-or-nothing proposition, forcing students to choose between their local school and an online option rather than allowing them to structure a hybrid model including both traditional and online classes. To make room for such a hybrid, Ohio could create a new mechanism for online course access—one that is independently run, financed, and held accountable for its results. The best example of this is the Florida Virtual School (FLVS), which Brookings evaluated in 2014. But Ohio wouldn’t have to copy Florida’s entire model. Instead, it could create an equivalent that complements the CTE and College Credit Plus programs. Obviously, this would need to start as a pilot program to determine its validity, but if it successfully met the needs of the kids it served, it could grow into a statewide program available to all schools.
It’s time for choice to extend beyond choosing a building. Ohio needs to take a deeper look at free course access for students. How would it work? And why would schools want to opt in to yet another new policy? Stay tuned for a more in-depth look at how Ohio policymakers could make expanded course choice a reality.
