Mythbusting: Who Says Online Learners Can’t Network or Build Communities?

Here at edX, we’re experiencing an exciting and pivotal moment in the history of online education. Never has online learning been more accessible than it is today, and never has it seen such widespread adoption. 

Online courses are remaking the world as we know it. They’re closing critical skills gaps in fields where demand for qualified professionals far outstrips supply. They’re enabling learners of all ages, across the globe, to make educational advances without risking their health, regardless of current COVID-19 infection rates in their local communities. And they’re meeting lifelong learners’ needs — for flexibility, cutting-edge skills, and increased academic engagement — at a cost that’s radically more affordable than that of traditional campus-based degree programs.

However, online learning’s reputation continues to be plagued by the idea that online education doesn’t present opportunities for networking, community-building, or developing meaningful relationships with peers and professors. While teaching at MIT and while helping build edX into the trusted global educational platform it is today, I’ve seen firsthand that this simply isn’t true. 

Cultivating community online does require care and effort, but it’s very possible

Students seeking to develop meaningful relationships with their peers and teachers in online courses must cultivate skills that may be different from an on-campus education. They’ll have to participate in online discussion forums and collaboration platforms associated with the course, as well as engage in live group webinars on Zoom or Google Hangouts. For example, on edX, students and faculty have the ability to interact via the ‘edX Live’ feature, which allows them to connect and communicate in real time. They should also take advantage of messaging platforms like WhatsApp group chat, Google Classroom or Slack whenever they can, and join relevant social media groups, such as a LinkedIn forum for program alumni. And it’s a good idea to participate in local community-building activities if these are available for the program. 

Faculty, too, can take key steps to foster the growth of rich relationships with and among their students. By assigning group or team projects, making themselves available during online office hours and encouraging discussion in a wide variety of formats – synchronous and asynchronous, within small groups and student-student pairs, in wikis and in informal discussion boards and peer review sessions – they can encourage students with diverse interpersonal and relational styles to connect. Some may in fact find it easier to communicate online than in the physical confines of a brick-and-mortar classroom.

The reward for students and faculty of exploring and mastering these new ways of networking and connecting will be the development of a rich and diverse community that supports their career and academic goals.

What’s different about online education: collaboration with global reach, scale and diversity

I’ve mentioned before that learning at scale comes with the ability to build relationships at scale. On-campus degree programs cannot match the global reach, diversity of student perspectives, or variety of career experiences that learners encounter among their peers in top-tier online educational programs. Because online courses aren’t limited by geography or students’ schedule constraints, these programs can bring together far more heterogeneous groups than their traditional, campus-based counterparts could hope to attract.

Let’s take Georgia Tech’s Online Master of Science (OMS) degree program in Cybersecurity in partnership with edX as an example. Compared to students in Georgia Tech’s on-campus Master of Science in Cybersecurity program, online students are more likely to already be employed. In fact, 97 percent of current online students are in the workforce, and one-third already have graduate degrees. The majority of students in the on-campus program, by contrast, are traditional graduate students who have recently completed an undergraduate degree. The online student population is also more geographically diverse than on-campus students, coming from 27 different countries, with a much wider age range of students, from 20 to 72 years of age.

What does this mean for learners who enroll in the OMS program? The benefits from collaborating with a more diverse group of peers who also tend to be more professionally accomplished than their on-campus counterparts are likely to be much greater. More senior students with more on-the-job experience bring increased knowledge of real-world problems and current industry needs to group projects. They’re able to share news of job opportunities with their classmates, and in turn, gain a fresh global perspective on industry-wide challenges from their peers. 

As Nelson Baker, Georgia Tech’s Dean of Professional Education, explains, “[online learners’ access to] faculty and fellow students from all over the world enables them to build valuable professional networks that can serve them throughout their careers long after they graduate.” Some institutions even look to alumni to hire for program support or ambassador roles.

Bertram, an edX learner, photovoltaic (PV) system design engineer, and instructor at Solar Energy International in the Netherlands, concurs. “The fact that you’re able to learn from anywhere in the world is an incredible benefit,”  he says. “I had classmates from Yemen who were there to learn how to do a PV installation for their community that hasn’t had reliable electricity in years, and another one in Brazil who was developing solar modules to install on boats sailing through the Amazon. The multicultural aspect was priceless.” 

Learn from renowned researchers, scholars and experts in high-demand professions

By nature, the physical campuses of the world’s most prestigious universities will never be able to accommodate all the qualified students who could benefit from enrollment. Online degree programs make it possible for these institutions to open their metaphorical doors to a much broader population of learners.

At Harvard University, for instance, Professor Greg Nagy is celebrated for his extensive publication record, his pioneering approach to oral composition and performance in Greek literature, and his seminal contributions to Classical studies. More than 174,000 students from around the world have enrolled in his edX course, The Ancient Greek Hero. Nagy had previously used components of the edX course to enhance the learning experiences of his on-campus students.

But now the course is no longer being offered on campus due to the pandemic and is instead being taught exclusively in a remote learning model. As a result, Nagy is turning to techniques he developed in the online edX version of the course to amplify student engagement and increase the sense of community. For instance, he’s redeploying assessment techniques developed for the edX course as part of Harvard’s online class.

In Professor Nagy’s words, “It is possible in an online classroom setting to create community that is not impersonal. The potential for achieving a new sense of community was the big thing that we learned from our experience in working with edX. Also, more generally, we discovered that humanities can in fact be done online in a successful way.”

Developing strong connections with online classmates does require effort and a willingness to step outside your comfort zone and invest in new relationships. But the rewards — being part of a global community of accomplished professionals, gaining access to highly esteemed faculty, and connecting to a world-wide alumni network — are more than worthwhile.