Cyber High Schools - History

History

The mid 1990s saw the advent of completely virtual schools. Many of today's virtual schools are descendants of correspondence schools. It has been suggested that virtual schooling is largely a phenomenon that occurs within North America. However, other countries have been seen to operate some form of online or web-based learning content. While it has been suggested that the individuals who can benefit from virtual classes are individuals who tend to lack such opportunities, research suggests that virtual schooling tends to reflect a higher percentage of student failure and dropout.

Sometimes referred to as "distance learning," correspondence schools offered students an alternative to the traditional brick and mortar meetings within a schoolhouse. These schools utilized the postal service for student-teacher interaction, or used two-way radio transmissions, sometimes with pre-recorded television broadcasts. Students were expected to study their learning material independently and, in some cases, meet with a proctor to be tested. Modern virtual schools provide similar alternatives to students with a more ubiquitous and, often, interactive approach.

Virtual schools now exist all around the world. Over the past decade, K-12 online instruction has dramatically increased in both Canada and the United States. Some of these virtual schools have been integrated into public schools (particularly in the United States), where students sit in computer labs and do their work online. In other situations, students can be completely home-schooled, or they can take any combination of public/private/home-schooling and online classes.