Others believe the educational outcome of an online course is similar to that of a classroom course. Hawthorne related an anecdote about a World Campus student from the West Coast who won plane tickets to anywhere he wanted to go. But the level of learning in a standard classroom setting compared with an online course depends on the individual course. For example, Harwood said, a large lecture class can be quite impersonal, whereas any given online course can be as good as its classroom counterpart. Faculty and technology support are major concerns for the Office of Educational Technology, as well as Penn State's College of Education.
Teacher training is another of the office's national goals.
And because proper training is important for our future teachers, the College of Education has taken steps to ensure its graduates are ready. Teaching children with computers and the Internet will spark a new technology-competent generation, one in which educators will have to keep up. Technology can significantly enhance the productivity of the teacher, and we need to think carefully about how these new teachers can best be prepared. Teachers' abilities can be enhanced by technology, Harwood said. And what teachers can pass on to students is crucial, and technology allows more students, lifelong or otherwise, to be reached.