Culturally Relevant, technology & Retention

Hi Everyone,
My Name is Sharee (Sha-Ree)

Culturally relevant, technology, retention

The first representative choice I made was culturally relevance in education. Classrooms today are as culturally diverse among the student body as our encounters with cultural diversity online. In this regard, I worked on a quantitative research study about multiculturalism in education and its complexities. I also participated in a research study through the AECT about cultural relevance in the career place, and how culture has its advantages and disadvantages during the interview process.

My second choice was technology. It’s here to stay and today’s students are digital natives. They have always interacted with technology unlike digital immigrants who have been passive observers of technology. Face it, we are teaching screenagers, and this is a relevant and current trend redefining the education system altogether.

Finally, Retention. Virtual student retention rates are horrendous. After reviewing some peer -reviewed literature on the retention rates of higher education students in the United States, I became interested in finding out why so many students are not making the commitment through to graduation. As an interdisciplinary education specialist, I have learned that motivation, satisfaction and communication play a leading role in the retention of distant education learners. Community, connection, and student services are not just for the traditional students, but are the life line to those in the virtual classroom as well.


Comments

  1. UnknownJuly 9, 2017 at 3:57 PM

    Sharee,
    Thank you for sharing your thoughts. I found your thoughts on cultural relevance in education to be quite informative and it gave me some ideas of where to focus my future endeavors in distance education. I would be interested to look into this concept more just to better prepares for the all around students I may encounter. I never really thought about retention as it relates to distance learning, but you have brought my attention to it. I suppose it is quite possible but I too was astonished at how much it really happens in the online education world. I hope to look more into that as well. Thank you for all you shared, I look forward to learning more from you in the weeks ahead.

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  2. Dayna FJuly 9, 2017 at 7:12 PM

    Hi Sharee! Thanks for your post! I really like what you said about having a community connection for the online learner. Online learning fits so easily into our already busy lives that we tend to forget how isolating it can become. We still need to feel connected to a learning community in spite of the physical distance we may have from the school that we attend. I believe that Liberty has done a great job with connecting online learners to each other and thus it has helped their retention rates. I remember college and the sense of community I felt by living on campus with my fellow students. Online learners want to still feel that sense of community as online learners. Communication is definitely key in retaining the online student. The more communication there is the more likely they are to complete their program of study. Thanks for sharing!
    ~Dayna

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  3. UnknownJuly 9, 2017 at 8:06 PM


    Hi Sharee, it’s great working with you and certainly looks like God has blessed us with a wonderful team! You are spot on in pointing out that technology is here to stay and we are now teaching digital natives who have grown up interacting with technology and expect it in all aspects of there life, including the classroom. Ian Jukes’s discussions on this topic have been enlightening to me and helped to motivate me in rethinking my approach in the classroom. You said it well in stating that this is redefining education. Becker, Giesinger, Cummins, & Yuhnke (2016) state in the K-12 Horizon Report that “the introduction of mobile technology into the classroom is redefining how the space can be used, including its ability to enable learning anywhere, bolster individual creativity, and untether teachers from cumbersome equipment.” (p. 9). I believe this use of mobile technology is the next step in transforming K-12 education in much the same way we have seen it affecting higher education. It’s an exciting time to be in the classroom.

    Becker, A., Freeman, A., Giesinger, H. C., Cummins, M., & Yuhnke, B. (2016). NMC/CoSN
    Horizon Report: 2016 K-12 Edition. Retrieved from http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2016-nmc-cosn-horizon-report-k12-EN.pdf

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