Gaining Academic Maturity

Brad Rathgeber

I used to make the argument that it was essential for secondary school students to take an online course before heading off to college.  At some level, given the number of students who take online courses at the college level, I think that is right.  But, I don’t believe that thinking is complete anymore, nor is it descriptive enough of the rationale for online course work.

Taking an online course just for the sake of learning online misses the point.  And, if you listen to students, their parents, and teachers involved in online courses, it becomes more clear.

• Student comment: I have truly enjoyed my experience in this course. My main goals for the course were to learn and practice independently and to work on time management. I spent the first few weeks getting used to the course and how everything worked, but by the fourth week I really got the hang of everything. Every week I tried to learn and practice more independently than the week before. As my teacher may have noticed, at the start of the course I was constantly asking for her help. As the weeks went by, I tried to work out the problems that I didn’t understand myself, rather than asking for help. I know that asking for help is actually a great thing, but I really wanted to strengthen my independence as a student. 
• Parent comment: It takes a good deal of organization and time management to be successful in an online course, and I believe that my student - already fairly on top of things - learned a lot through this course. It certainly has benefits in terms of preparing students for college.
• Teacher comment: For each unit students are given pathways choices that help them become more academically mature. My growth goal is to help sure students understand the way in which they learn best, so that within the first few months, the students made choices that benefit their learning.

Listening to these voices has helped us to re-define the competency and has also helped us be more purposeful in this work – establishing it as a core competency for all students in our course to master. We’ve restated this competency as “gaining academic maturity.”

Gaining academic maturity: Courses are scaffolded to promote iteration and designed to reward persistence. Students practice responsibility, intellectual adaptability, interpersonal flexibly, self-regulation and organization, and a range of communication skills. Because students are given voice and choice in how they access new knowledge, practice new skills, and self-assess for understanding, they set measurable goals around efficiency and effectiveness.

This competency along with the one that I wrote about last month –  “Engaging Constructively in a Diverse and Changing World" – form the core of our work with students, and the promise that we make to schools that engage their students in our online courses: your students will work towards these competencies, and we will support them in their journey to master them.

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