Rise in Online Classes Flares Debate About Quality

Josh Anderson for The New York Times/Class time at Whitehaven High in Memphis, where every student must take a course online.
By TRIP GABRIEL
Published: April 5, 2011

MEMPHIS — Jack London was the subject in Daterrius Hamilton’s online English 3 course. In a high school classroom packed with computers, he read a brief biography of London with single-paragraph excerpts from the author’s works. But the curriculum did not require him, as it had generations of English students, to wade through a tattered copy of “Call of the Wild” or “To Build a Fire.”

Mr. Hamilton, who had failed English 3 in a conventional classroom and was hoping to earn credit online to graduate, was asked a question about the meaning of social Darwinism. He pasted the question into Google and read a summary of a Wikipedia entry. He copied the language, spell-checked it and e-mailed it to his teacher.

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Full article at nytimes.com

"Students’ strong desire to pass, she added, meant most were diligent about the work. ..."

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