Every year, millions of American students load up on buses and head out to museums, farms, factories and galleries. It’s a public school institution known as a field trip. But a new study reveals some kids’ grades improve when they sign up for a field trip that never leaves the classroom.

“Everyone say it: ‘Liquid transportation apparatus,’” says the instructor. And the kids respond, “Liquid transportation apparatus!”

But this isn’t your typical sixth grade science class – it’s a field trip to a science museum 150 miles away.

And the subject matter is bound only by the limits of a television screen or personal computer.

“It’s going to take them to places that they couldn’t go that their parents couldn’t take them,” says Allison Martin, distance learning coordinator at Taylor Elementary School in Lawrenceville, Ga., explaining the benefits of this type of class.

According to a Maryland Public Television study, middle school kids who went on “virtual” field trips scored better on reading tests than those who didn’t.

Dr. Jerry Lehner, principal at Taylor Elementary, explains why he thinks ‘distance learning’ works: “If we pique the interest of students that are those visual learners, or those auditory learners, or those students that want to have that interaction that are good thinkers on their feet, that’s going to be a memorable experience for them.”

He says old-fashioned field trips won’t go away any time soon. But clearly these students like tuning in.

“It actually feels like you’re not really in the classroom with a TV,” says one enthusiastic student. “It actually feels like you’re in a classroom with a real guy, doing all the experiments.”

Allison Martin says that’s a common reaction among the children.

“If you can give a quality learning experience,” she says, “they will turn on, and they will come along with you and learn with you. And I think that’s what distance learning does for children.”

Some schools offer interactive field trips online. The school you saw in this report currently is being wired so that its distance learning program can be offered over the Internet in any classroom with a computer.

University of Idaho
United States Distance Learning Association

For 12-year-old Leticia Sanchez
and 13-year-old Daniel Romero… summer used to be long, hot,
and slow.

“I would be at home doing nothing,” says Romero

“I was inside the house. Boring. Just watching t-v,” says
Sanchez.

Not anymore. Earlier this year… their local library… working
with the Mexican government… opened a portable learning
center in their trailer park.

They can get classes on Mexican history… or take online
lessons direct from Mexico.

“Because many of these children don’t know too much
about Mexico,” says Program Coordinator Miguel Vicente, “They
don’t know too much about Spanish speaking countries. And
here they have this opportunity to know more about where their
parents came from.”

Educators at Hispanic learning centers are incorporating books and
the Internet to help their students learn. Books have been a part of the
learning process for hundreds of years, but the Internet is still a relatively
new player in the education field. In 1999, Congress established the Web-based
Education Commission, a 16-member body charged with exploring and maximizing
the educational opportunities of the Internet for all students, from pre-K
to post-secondary. Their findings structured the foundation that allows public
school systems to use federal monies to fund online learning programs and
centers.

Websites are no longer static; today’s technology enables
an interactive environment when online. Streaming media technology
provides real-time learning and demand distribution of learning materials.
Streaming sites also receive feedback from students, thus creating
an optimum learning cycle. Some benefits of online learning include
the following:

• It provides cost-effective resources to rural educators and
  others with limited means.
• Students with special needs often find greater educational advancement
  through online learning.
• Online courses avoid many scheduling conflicts
  by providing convenience and flexibility.

One benefit of using the Internet at the learning
centers is that children will become more familiar with the Internet and
computers. This will give them a head start over other students during the
school year as more schools begin incorporating online learning into their
curriculum. Some schools even offer parents the ability to enroll their children
in elective online classes throughout the school year. Class.com lists schools
worldwide that offer these educational opportunities. As a parent, there
are many elements to look for when considering your child’s enrollment
in an online course. Among the questions you should ask are:

• Does an established, traditional school run the online course?
• Does the teaching staff have sufficient knowledge about the
  subject?
• How is the teaching staff held accountable for their work?
• What is the student-to-teacher ratio? The Distance Learning
  Resource Center recommends this ratio be between 25:1 and 8:1.
• Does the course provide student-to-teacher interaction?
• Does the course provide student-to-student interaction?
• Is the class structured with a specific start and end date or
  is the completion time flexible?
• Does your child have time available each week to devote to this
  class?
• What portion of the tuition is refunded if the course is dropped?
• How are assignments made? The Distance Learning Resource Center
  recommends essays and projects over multiple-choice formats.
• Are assignments submitted in electronic or hard copy form?
• Is the class taught using textbooks or software?
• Will your child’s current school accept an online course
  as a substitute for a traditional class?
• Will the college(s) your
  child plans to attend accept the online class as a legitimate
  high school course for college admission?

Performance learning centers can be extremely important for students who
are considering dropping out of school … it can mean the difference
between getting a diploma or not, and research has shown it can lead to a significant
difference in lifetime income. The dropout rate has experienced little variance
over the past decade. According to the National Center for Education Statistics,
in 2001, 11 percent of the U.S. population between 16 and 24 was not enrolled
in school, did not have a high school diploma, or lacked a General Educational
Development (GED) credential. In 2000, adults aged 25 to 34 who had dropped
out of school or had not acquired a GED earned up to 30 percent less than their
peers who had completed high school or had GEDs.

The strongest predictors that a student is likely to drop out are
family characteristics, such as socioeconomic status, family structure,
family stress (e.g., death, divorce, family moves) and the mother’s
age. Students most likely to drop out come from low-income families;
are the children of single, young, unemployed mothers; or have experienced
high degrees of family stress. Of these characteristics, low socioeconomic
status bears the strongest relationship to students’ tendency to
drop out. One study shows such students are four times as likely
to drop out. Consider the following statistics concerning dropouts:

• Rates of high-risk behaviors such as teen pregnancy, delinquency,
  substance abuse and crime are significantly higher among dropouts.
• Hispanics have the largest dropout rate of any ethnic or racial
  group.
• During the 2000-01 academic year, nearly 9 percent of Hispanics
  in grades 10 through 12 dropped out before the end of the year.
  Overall, only 5 percent of high school students dropped out.
• Sixty-three percent of high school dropouts who were in eighth
  grade in 1988 had earned a high school diploma or an alternative
  credential (such as a GED) by 2000, eight years after their expected
  graduation.
• At the federal level, the School Dropout Prevention Program
  was authorized by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 to provide
  three-year grants to states and school districts to assist in dropout
  prevention and school re-entry activities.
• The No Child Left Behind Act requires states to report graduation
  rates and demonstrate that schools are making progress in curbing
  dropout rates.
• Students who repeat a grade, even as early as kindergarten,
  significantly increase their chances of dropping out.
• The language
  barrier and socioeconomic factors are cited as reasons why Hispanics
  tend to have higher dropout rates than other ethnic groups.

Reasons why students drop out include:

• Dislike of school.
• Low academic achievement.
• Low retention at grade level.
• A sense that teachers and administrators do not care about students.
• Inability to feel comfortable in a large, depersonalized school
  setting.

Schools tend to approach the dropout dilemma in one of three ways:

• Provide supplemental services, such as tutoring, social services
  and counseling, for needy students.
• Offer different learning environments as an alternative to the
  regular classroom.
• Institute school-wide restructuring efforts.

A high school diploma will determine your child’s standard
of living for the remainder of his or her life:

• High school graduates earn $143 more per week than high school
  dropouts.
• High school dropouts are two-and-a-half times more likely to
  be on welfare than high school graduates.
• High school dropouts are four times as likely to be unemployed
  as college graduates.
• Eighty-two percent of America’s prisoners are high school
  dropouts.