Don't believe everything you read (about digital learning…or anything else)
K-12 Online Education Service Market Poised for Explosive Growth, reads the headline on the press release.
That headline does exactly what it’s meant to, which is to catch my eye and get me to click on the link.
But it didn’t get me to take the next step, which is to buy the report that is available for sale. Instead, I’m going to comment on the points being made in the press release.
Why am I doing this? Because reports like this are routinely quoted, and you should be aware that some of what gets quoted in the press, and by people who should know better, is sometimes, not to put too fine a point on it, total BS.
Let’s get to it.
“The K-12 online education service market has experienced remarkable growth in recent years, fueled by increasing digitalization and the rising demand for accessible education. This market encompasses a variety of services tailored to primary and secondary education, providing students with flexible learning options. As more schools and institutions adopt online platforms, the market is projected to continue expanding, reflecting broader trends in educational technology and personalized learning.”
Hmmm, interesting. Tell me more! (If you’re of a certain age and can remember Jon Stewart from his early days on Comedy Central, just picture him saying that.)
“Prominent players in the K-12 online education service market include,
Chegg
LinkedIn Learning
Codewars
Pluralsight
HackerRank
LeetCode
Skillshare
DataCamp
Udemy
Udacity
Coursera
edX
Interview Cake”
Wow, interesting! And completely, totally, wrong!
Chegg is primarily a post-secondary company.
Linkedin Learning….yeah, I’m sure a lot of middle school students are on that.
Pluralsight—they’re not primarily an education company! I’m starting to think the authors have no idea what they are talking about.
And so on. Udemy, Udacity, Coursera, and edX are post-secondary companies related to program management for universities. The others are no closer to K-12 online learning.
Moving on:
"Geographically, the market is divided into North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, and the Middle East & Africa."
Ummm, isn’t that how the planet is divided, more or less? Is their point that there’s not a lot of online learning in Antarctica?
I could go on, but you probably get the point. There’s a significant amount of not just useless, but totally wrong, information out there.
And, again, this stuff gets used and quoted, so it’s worth the reminder to all of us that some of what gets quoted isn’t worth the paper that some people will print this out on.
By the way, this report has a “single user” price of $5250 and an “enterprise” price of $7250. If you know anyone who is tempted in the least to waste their money on this, tell them to save 95% of their money and register for our upcoming DLAC instead.