Equity Online: Making Online Learning Accessible and Effective for All Students

• In Event: Diverse Perspectives on Improving Online Learning Theory, Research, and Practice

Abstract

Purpose
Equitable learning occurs when every learner belongs, contributes, and thrives, regardless of race/ethnicity or socioeconomic status (OECD, 2018). Differential access to the physical, human, and social resources needed for digital learning has long exacerbated social and educational gaps in U.S. society. Student performance gaps between online and face-to-face instruction, and amplified gaps among sub-populations, such as underrepresented minorities and students with low socio-economic status, were consistently documented prior to the pandemic (Xu & Xu, 2019). This situation has been worsened by the pandemic (Authors, in press). In this paper, we synthesize research findings related to equitable online education both prior to and during the global pandemic, based on our review of the literature and our own research work in undergraduate education. We highlight issues of access — attending school — and achievement — learning once in school.

Perspectives
Using Warschauer’s (2003) three-dimensional framework on social inclusion, we highlight the physical, human, and social resources needed to fully participate in online learning.

Methods and Data Sources
We synthesize studies from K-16 contexts in the United States that illuminate the differences in (a) who takes online courses and why and (b) student attendance and performance. Then we discuss online learning trends during the pandemic, which we refer to as emergency distance learning (“EDL”) (Hodges et al., 2020) to distinguish it from online learning that was created intentionally in the online modality (Rice et al., 2020). Using Warschauer’s framework as a lens on reviewed studies, reveals equity issues across all three dimensions (physical, human, social) both before and during the pandemic.

Results
We present the physical, human, or social resources that were (or were not) available equitably across groups along with the implications of heterogeneous access. Results specifically address the impact on students designated as English learners or in special education, in addition to minoritized students and those with fewer socioeconomic resources. We provide suggestions for meeting more students’ needs when learning goes online based on promising interventions. Online learning is extremely challenging and requires students and teachers to adapt to the affordances of the modality rather than simply exporting face-to-face classes without modification to an online environment; researchers have found that focusing on creating a community of learners and scaffolding self-directed learning can be key to improving online learning.

Significance
Online learning options will continue to grow in both K-12 and higher education. Most schools, teachers, and students have now experienced online learning in its emergency format, which is likely to increase the availability of online learning in multiple formats. Even when learning takes place face-to-face, we believe that educators will increasingly rely on online tools such as learning management systems and utilize the affordances of hybrid and flipped learning to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of in person class time. For these reasons, even though K-12 schools at least have largely returned to traditional modes of learning during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, improving the equitable nature of online learning remains a high priority.

Authors

• Tamara Powell Tate, University of California - Irvine
  Presenting Author

• Mark Warschauer, University of California - Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author