Online education on notice

Johann Neem, professor of history, Western Washington University

I was asked to explore how the recent Department of Education Office of Inspector General’s findings might shape how Western Governors University and similar institutions should approach the faculty’s role. My answer is simple: WGU should hire professors and let them teach.

In 2011, when WGU was coming to Washington State, I wrote in the Seattle Times that WGU does not offer a “real college education,” because education “requires students to struggle with difficult material under the consistent guidance of good teachers. WGU denies students these opportunities.” The inspector general came to the same conclusion. WGU failed to meet the expectation that, to qualify for federal aid, distance learning institutions would use new technologies to “support regular and substantive interaction between the students and the instructor.”