Virtual learning becomes 'viable option'

The St. Mary Parish Virtual Learning Program has grown its enrollment since its humble beginnings of 25 virtual learners a few years ago.
Currently, 221 full- and part-time students are enrolled for fall 2015.
“St. Mary’s Virtual Learning Program has developed into a viable option for students who need courses beyond the typical schedule or time constraints inherent in traditional schooling, said St. Mary Parish School System Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction Teresa Bagwell.
“The program has enabled our district to meet the unique needs and circumstances of our student population at any given time in their educational career. It has also allowed us to offer technology driven courses that students enjoy.”
According to the St. Mary Parish Virtual Learning Program website, the program seeks to meet the needs of three category types of students:
—Full-time students (grades 6-12) enrolled in district schools who choose to complete coursework from locations of their choice.
—Part-time students (grades 8-12) enrolled in district schools who schedule one or more online courses to supplement their traditional face-to-face courses.
—Part-time students (grades 9-12) enrolled in private schools or home schooling programs who choose to schedule one or more fee-based online courses to supplement their existing programs.
Fall semester courses begin in August and end in December. Spring semester courses begin in January and end in May.
Most of the business courses were created by the St. Mary Parish School System.
There is one full-time instructor and 22 part-time instructors.
Classes are just as rigorous as face-to-face classes.
“When you’re sitting in a regular face-to-face classroom, a lot of the learning is passive,” said St. Mary Parish District Technology Facilitator Susan Dupre. “You just sit back, and you’re listening.
“If you’re a good listener you can learn quite a bit, maybe C or D, just by sitting there and listening.
“Virtual learning is active. Nobody’s going to pick up that mouse and click that link for you. You have to do it.
“So it puts the child’s education firmly in his or her hands. And that’s a different method of learning.”
The virtual learning program is not a one-size-fits-all alternative learning option for students.
“For some students they take it, fly with it, and they love it,” Dupre said. “And they’ll come back and say, ‘This is exactly what I’ve been looking for to supplement my regular face-to-face learning.’
“And for other kids, they will struggle.”
The learning curve for adjusting to a virtual learning format takes about four weeks. There are some students who attempt to take online courses that are unsuccessful.
“We have assistance, an intervention, built in to try to help them,” Dupre said. “Sometimes they’ll discover by the end of the course this is not my type of learning. This is not how I learn best.
“And we totally respect that.
“When you have an instructor teaching a virtual learning class it’s almost as if a kid has his or her own individual learning plan because every child is going to approach it differently,” Dupre said.
“When you start teaching in a virtual learning environment, you suddenly realize you can hear a child’s written voice more clearly than you can hear his spoken voice because he’s had a chance to think about his answers.
“And I love it for that.”
Cheryl Darce is the only full-time online instructor with the St. Mary Parish School System virtual learning staff. This is her third year teaching full-time.
She taught part-time the first year the virtual learning program started in 2012.
Darce taught career technical courses for 20 years at Patterson High School. Ten of the 20 years were spent also teaching for the Louisiana Virtual School.
She continues to teach career technical courses along with web design.
Darce teaches 67 students and 10 different career technical classes.
“It’s a different way of teaching and presenting the material,” Darce said.
Darce loves teaching in the virtual online setting due to the challenge it provides professionally.
“Every day is a challenge to get that material across to all students to make sure they are getting that assignment,” Darce said.
“Even if it means on my computer remoting into their computer and discussing back and forth while watching them work to see what the problem is.”
Dupre and Darce earned master’s degrees in instructional technology online through Northwestern University.
“That’s when I fell in love with virtual learning,” Dupre said.
Dupre taught junior high and high school level English through the Louisiana Virtual School for several years. Both levels of English curriculum were written by Dupre.
Dupre also has a doctorate in administration and supervision with an emphasis in instructional technology from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
Darce described some of her most heartfelt virtual teaching moments as “seeing a student who struggled at the beginning of a semester and passes at the end. And to hear the joy in an email or phone conversation with them that they pass.”
“They got it,” Darce said.
At the end of this school year, the first full-time virtual learning student will graduate from high school.
As it relates to relevancy in the 21st century for education in St. Mary Parish schools, Dupre said, “usually the first but by far never the last.”
In other news, St. Mary Parish School System is supplying students in grades 5 through 12 with a Microsoft Office 365 account for the 2015-16 school year. This account provides an email address, access to use Microsoft Office Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and One Drive cloud storage.