On a recent January morning, five students at Kinston High School in North Carolina were attending their first class at East Carolina University despite being virtually locked out of the lecture hall.
But they weren鈥檛 stranded out in the cold; they weren鈥檛 even on the Greenville, N.C., campus. The students鈥攚ho are earning three credit hours in a website design and maintenance course鈥攚ere sitting comfortably in Kinston High School鈥檚 cyber campus, working their way around the campus as avatars in the virtual world of Second Life.
Although distance education is nothing new in North Carolina, the Kinston High seniors are taking advantage of a new approach to online education, the university鈥檚 Early College Second Life Program. The students are attending a virtual college鈥攂uilt to resemble ECU鈥攊n the virtual world.
Second Life is a cyber world that launched in 2003. A free client program called the Second Life Viewer enables its users, called residents, to interact with each other through avatars.
Sharon Collins, the director of the early-college high school program at ECU, said the course is designed to combine the convenience of online education and the atmosphere of a college classroom.鈥淲hat we found in distance education classes is that students didn鈥檛 feel like they were part of the university, they felt isolated and wanted more connections,鈥� Ms. Collins said. 鈥淪econd Life works because we can connect [the student] with a faculty member and they actually have class with their avatars.鈥�
Attending Classes
Campus Technology magazine reported that it鈥檚 estimated that at least 200 universities have some sort of Second Life presence, but only a portion of them use the simulation for course delivery.
Ms. Collins said she knows of no other institutions employing it in similar early-college programs. At ECU, she said, the idea was conceived after it became apparent the university wouldn鈥檛 be able to finance a traditional early-college high school program, which requires its own on-campus space and other resources.
鈥淚t鈥檚 actually kind of spun off from all this funding going south in education, and finding alternate methods,鈥� Ms. Collins said. 鈥淲e actually think it鈥檚 a little bit more beneficial [than an on-campus program]. When we bring [students] on campus, we have to worry about so many things.鈥�
Ms. Collins said the program has been successful in the 23,000-student Pitt County school system, the county where ECU is located, and Kinston High鈥檚 involvement is the first for the 9,200-student Lenoir County school system. She hopes to involve the other high schools in Lenoir next school year.
Students had set up avatars to help the recent January class run smoothly, but hit a road bump when they could not gain access to the virtual building鈥攈ence being locked out. Fortunately, the entire class was able to move their avatars outside the virtual building and class continued. Kinston High School senior Jeremy Merritt said he had no experience with Second Life before the course, but said he鈥檚 always liked computers.
鈥淚 thought [the course itself] would be cool because I鈥檇 be able to learn how to make websites and stuff like that,鈥� Mr. Merritt said. 鈥淪econd Life just makes it a little bit more fun because you are in a game. Obviously, that鈥檚 going to be a little better than sitting in a class looking at a professor.鈥�
Kinston school counselor Jennifer Hollingsworth said the course鈥檚 daily time doesn鈥檛 align perfectly with the school鈥檚 period schedule, but by using part of their remediation time after first period, students would not miss time in either their high school or college classes.
For Steve Hill, the director of secondary education in Lenoir County, the program is an example of the county working around the looming budget cuts at the K-12 level.
鈥淵ou鈥檝e got two options: You can quit and give up or you can get innovative,鈥� Mr. Hill said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e having to rewrite ourselves on how we do things, because we don鈥檛 have the money anymore. We鈥檙e looking for any and every opportunity, and ECU was able to step up and help us with that.鈥�
Tyquan Dove said the class is a way for him to prepare for college before physically arriving on campus.
鈥淚 want to go to ECU anyway,鈥� said Mr. Dove, a senior at Kinston High. 鈥淚 just wanted to experience college to get ready before I [graduate].鈥�
