5 Things You Should Know about Online Courses

 

You might want to ask. What's is the origin of online courses? How did it evolve and what basic things does an online course entail?

Online education is nothing new. While the technology is relatively new, the concept is over 170 years old and has its origins in a correspondence course offered in Great Britain where the instructor sent lessons and received students’ completed assignments by mail.

Distance learning was born, and today’s online courses are modern versions of their humble predecessors. Online education overcomes the biggest throwback of correspondence courses, mail transit time, and allows students to interact not only with the instructor but the other students in the class in real time.

As we approached the end of the first decade of the new century, the impact of online learning on education could no longer be denied. The number of students taking online courses jumped a whopping 187%, and there were about 5.5 million students worldwide who were taking at least one class online. Moreover, traditional universities began expanding not only the number of online courses but the number of entire degree programs available online.

More than three-quarters of CEOs and small business owners stated that they viewed the quality of online education programs to be on par with traditional degree programs, refuting arguments that online courses and programs would not be recognized by employers. Previously, a task assigned to faculty or associate professors, prestigious faculty at traditional universities begin recognizing the opportunity and start teaching online courses.
 

As regards people paying for online courses, the basis is first, the reason why people start such courses in the first place. The truth is that if you check them in months, you’d find them with the same problem. Same way you’d remain with your disease if you refuse to pay for the treatment.

Learn to pay for value. Give something for value. It would save you a lot. Pay for that course— not everytime free courses. Pay for some. Pay for that app. Upgrade your self.

We have to change the way we look at things. See paying for an online course as investing in yourself. The money is not going— the money is multiplying when you use it for yourself.
Pay for consultation. Pay for people’s time (I learnt this early enough and it helped me). Pay.

I consulted for a friend recently and it was on this issue of how to pay for what you know (this one is a course I have on its own) and I realized that it’s a mindset people have to carry— charge for that thing because you worked for it.

No matter how close you are to that person, learn to pay.

Before you say “Can we schedule a time to talk?”, you have to know that the person would spend time and a lot of energy to make sure you’re fine with the answer. Appreciate them. I have had my friends say “What’s my bill?” after a consultation no matter how short.

As a knowledge broker, learn to charge too. If only two people pay, take them like that and take it with all your strength.

Talking about this from experience again, why do people drop out from online courses? Both free and paid?

What would you recommend to reduce the rates of online course dropouts?

with the rampant nature of online courses today, do you think some courses are irrelevant? What is the future for online courses?
 

So, what is the future of online learning?

Predictions that online learning would completely replace traditional programs have proven unfounded.

However, there is little doubt about predictions that the number of students expected to have at least one online course in their class schedule will quadruple in the coming decade. 

From the first online correspondence course to now, the biggest change has been with our perceptions. No longer something that a student chooses only when it is impossible to take a class in a traditional setting, online learning has emerged triumphant as a viable education choice in its own right.

Each student choosing an online course or an online program gets to play a small role in that evolution, shaping the course of online learning for the students of tomorrow. And if we look at this pandemic era, a lot of what is going on with online courses has surfaced.