Community College Students Perform Worse Online than Face to Face

This article is based on a new study released by the Community College Research Center at the Teachers College at Columbia University. The study is based on enrollment history of 51,000 community-college students in Washington State between 2004 and 2009. According to the study there an 8 percent decrease in completion rates by the students that took online classes. As an online instructor, I agree that online courses have traditionally had a higher drop out rate. My personal experience is that retention is getting better as students become more technically proficient and more aware of the realities of the online environment. What do you think? Are you seeing significant differences between online and face to face student completion rates?