Some universities now offer their courses on the Internet so that people can study online. Is this a positive or negative development?

Study has become so integral a part of our life that universities now enable online courses. From my perspectives, this trend is beneficial, but its drawbacks clearly outweigh the merits.

On the one hand, I accept that online study has a positive influence on students. Owing to the instant availability of classes facilitated by the interim development of network, the so-called ‘’’distance’’ problem has been holistically surmountable. For instance, students in the remote regions of Vietnam could attend classes fully and punctually without the need to travel such a massive distance, which significantly reduces the rate of accidents and the overuse of fuels. On top of that, Internet-based study can be a venue for students from various areas, enhancing the diversity of cultures in the classes.

Lucrative as it might seem, online courses contain a host of downsides. Firstly, distant learning drastically undermines the value of face-to-face communication. It is the fact that social skills aslo count as the most valuable factors to integrate into society. Accordingly, studying via online platforms could adversely deteriorate first-hand contact with both teachers and peers, which triggers the decay of self-confidence and the lack of reasoning skills. Secondly, online learning is not accessible to the whole population, including those in the outback regions with limited access to the Internet as well as superficial knowledge of computer usage. This can cause a major disadvantage for the poverty-stricken students, if the sheer focus is shifted to online studying.

The aforementioned evidences form a concrete conclusion that although online course are useful, their shortcomings surpass the perks in some aspects.