Post-secondary online enrollments are higher than ever
We often discuss the reasons that students choose online or hybrid schools: flexibility to pursue a variety of interests, catching up on courses or getting ahead, physical and mental health issues, and so on.
Another reason, although less discussed, is that high school students who have taken at least one course online may be better equipped to handle college, where an ever-increasing number of students are taking one or more online courses.
Our source for the following numbers (and quoted text) is analyst Phil Hill, who has studied the National Center for Education Statistic’s IPEDS data. We appreciate his clear and concise reporting!
Key points:
“In academic year 2019-20, the percent of students enrolled in distance education courses in postsecondary institutions was 51.8%.” This includes both full-time and part-time online students. (These days in the U.S., “distance education” largely means online; the term itself seems to be a legacy from when “distance education” included other modes of instruction.)
Much of those data are drawn from pre-pandemic counts, but not all, because of spring quarters that began in March or April 2020. Therefore, to the extent that we are seeking a pre-pandemic baseline number of students taking at least one online course, perhaps 40-45% is a reasonable conservative estimate.
Just under a quarter of all post-secondary students (23%) were enrolled as full-time online students.
These numbers appear to far exceed comparable K-12 numbers, but as there is limited similar federal reporting of K-12 online (or “distance education”) enrollments, it’s hard to know for sure. We estimate that about 1% of all K-12 students are in full-time, statewide online schools. Many additional students are enrolled in district-operated full-time online schools, but even counting the district schools it seems unlikely that the total number of full-time online students is more than about 2% (pre-pandemic). The post-secondary number is on the order of 10x higher. The difference between post-secondary and K-12 single online course enrollments is probably lower than 10x, but still perhaps 5x higher.
Some of this difference makes sense, of course. Adults, whether of traditional college age or older, are much more likely than high school students to have jobs, families, or other responsibilities that require flexibility. In addition, when comparing K-12 education overall to post-secondary, we are of course including very young students who don’t face the same set of flexibility needs.
Still, the much higher rate of enrollment in post-secondary online courses and schools, compared to K-12 education, has at least two implications:
Taking one or more online courses is likely to help high school students be better prepared for college, should they choose to go on to a post-secondary institution.
Demand for K-12 online courses and schools likely exceeds availability, even if some of that demand hasn’t yet been fully expressed because many students and parents aren’t aware of online course and school options.
Of course, the other issue related to supply and demand for online schools and courses is that such opportunities are not evenly distributed. This cliché is overused but remains true: regarding online and hybrid learning (and many other issues), a student’s opportunities are still determined by their zip codes. Too many students still live in locations in which a publicly-funded online school or course is not available to them.