This past summer the U.S. Department of Education released a fascinating research report comparing online education with traditional classroom based education (http://bit.ly/Xqyvc).  They evaluated over 1000 academic studies of online learning and applied rigorous criteria to find those of highest quality. The final meta-analysis yielded over 90 studies with appropriate methodology comparing online learning to traditional classroom instruction. Their findings?  “…students in online learning conditions performed better than those receiving face-to-face instruction.”

The Sloan Consortium performs a survey of online education in the U.S. each year  (http://bit.ly/Dws1L). According to their 2008 survey:
• Over 3.9 million students were taking at least one online course during the fall 2007 term; a 12 percent increase over the number reported the previous year.
• The 12.9 percent growth rate for online enrollments far exceeds the 1.2 percent growth of the overall higher education student population.
• Over twenty percent of all U.S. higher education students were taking at least one online course in the fall of 2007.

Business, universities, and K-12 schools throughout the country have recognized what a powerful and effective educational model online learning can be. Yet, in the massage profession we still don’t recognize or acknowledge this. Many states do not allow distance education as part of the entry-level curriculum in massage schools. In those states that do, very few massage programs use online learning at all.

I often hear the argument that online learning is not appropriate for massage because this is a hands-on profession. I would heartily agree that the techniques of massage should be taught in a supervised classroom environment. However, there are many subjects (anatomy, physiology, business, kinesiology, pathology, etc.) that could be taught very effectively using innovating online learning strategies. There are some exceptional new technologies that are highly effective at teaching these types of subjects and we are lagging far behind by not employing them for our students’ benefit. It’s time for us to start forging new ground as educators and explore the opportunities of innovative 21st century learning