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Pre–COVID-19 data shows that the outcome divide between online and in-person learners existed long before the pandemic accelerated the online sector’s growth, according to a report published last week by Third Way, a center-left think tank.
While online-only programs are touted as a more flexible, accessible higher education option for students who may not otherwise be able to attend college, the report shows that those enrolled in online-only degree programs between 2012 and 2017 were 8.3 percentage points less likely to complete a bachelor’s degree than their peers who had some in-person instruction.
“By not taking any courses on campus, students enrolled entirely online may not have the opportunity to benefit from personalized and consistent interactions with professors, which can be critical to their sense of belonging and likelihood of success,” the report said.
“Consequently, exclusively online students may be forced to rely more on self-directed learning than face-to-face instruction, resulting in worse outcomes.”
Between 2008 and 2020, the percentage of college students enrolled in exclusively online programs jumped from 3.9 percent to 23.4 percent, with the bulk of the growth happening between 2012 and 2020, when enrollment nearly quadrupled.
To find out more about what that period of tremendous growth meant for degree completion, researchers analyzed a large-scale, federal data set known as the Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study for 2012–2017, which is the most recent longitudinal tracking of a nationally representative sample of college students.
Though the data is old at this point, it nonetheless offers insight into a learning modality that’s only becoming more prevalent and sophisticated as the 2020s progress.
“Whether the data tracked students until 2017 or 2024, it’s important to have rigorous evidence pertaining to whether students are helped or harmed by enrolling in exclusively online programs,” said Justin Ortagus, co-author of the report and an associate professor of higher education administration and policy at the University of Florida. “A key point here is that not all exclusively online programs are bad for students.”
But much of the completion gap was driven by online students at for-profit colleges, which “exacerbated the negative influence of exclusively online enrollment on students’ likelihood of completing a bachelor’s degree,” according to the report. Meanwhile, those online-only students “who enrolled at selective four-year institutions were more likely to finish their degree than fully online students at other four-year institutions.”
For-profit colleges have come under increased regulatory scrutiny since 2017, when the report’s analysis concludes.
Those regulations are “an important first step to protecting college students,” Ortagus said. “But they don’t change the fundamental problem associated with for-profits prioritizing advertising and marketing to a further extent than the quality of their academic offerings or support services.”
