Students Working at Home: Benefits and Challenges

The shift towards students working at home has been ignited nationwide. Hybrid and online learning models have emerged as alternatives to traditional in-person education, offering increased flexibility and parental involvement. While these approaches present numerous advantages, they also pose unique challenges for students, parents, and educators.

The Rise of Hybrid and Online Learning

Not that long ago, the vast majority of K-12 learning happened in brick-and-mortar public schools. But the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic has ignited a nationwide shift. In many cases, parents are seeking educational opportunities that allow them to be more involved in their children’s learning while giving their children more flexibility. Hybrid learning-also called blended learning-combines time in a physical classroom with time learning at home online. Fully online schools offer many of the same benefits while addressing the most common challenges of hybrid learning.

Flexibility and Personalized Learning

One of the most appealing benefits of students working at home, whether through hybrid or fully online models, is flexibility. Online school offers the level of flexibility many students and parents are seeking. Most classes allow students to complete their lessons at the daily and weekly pace that works best for them. If a student would rather focus on math in the morning and English in the afternoon-or vice versa-that is often possible. This flexibility extends to scheduling, allowing students to learn at times that suit their individual needs and preferences.

At an online school like Connections Academy, students work with parents, teachers, and staff to put together an individualized learning plan focused on their unique needs and specific goals. Those who need additional help can find specialized courses and support from counselors and teachers. Those who want to accelerate their learning can move at a faster pace and take advanced courses.

Accessibility and Affordability

Distance learning enables students to access and engage with quality educational content, all from the comfort and convenience of home. Accessibility and attendance are both key benefits of distance learning as well. As you can learn from anywhere in the world whilst wearing your fuzzy pyjamas in the comfort of your own home - binge watching Bridgerton in the background - only requiring your average laptop with an internet connection, it eliminates the need to travel (another money saving benefit), and you can fit your studies into your schedule with greater ease.

Another appealing benefit is the affordability of distance learning. The most obvious element of the financial savings is the absence of university fees - a three-year course will land you in £27,750 of debt which, although not a financial priority (because we all know that actually being able to pay off 100% of the loans is merely a dream), is not a pleasant thought. These university loans don’t include the extra maintenance costs a student faces such as travel, rent, food, learning resources etc - distance learning is far lest costly, especially if your employer is able to contribute to or even cover the fees.

Building Skills for the Future

Quality online schools deliver their curriculum in ways that are designed by experts to be interactive and effective. Students who attend Connections Academy experience the best of real-time and anytime learning led by certified teachers trained in online education. This method of learning helps students build their critical-thinking skills along with life skills like adaptability and responsibility. Students are challenged with being able to pace themselves appropriately, which is something that comes more naturally in a face-to-face class with peers and friends to help you stay focused.

Parental Involvement and Support

Most children learning outside of a traditional, physical classroom rely on their parents or guardians for support. While the level of support they need varies by student, it’s unusual for students to learn online without at least some parental assistance. Quality online schools know that learning is a collaboration between the school and parents. As a Learning Coach, you can be there for your child and help them learn in the way that works best for them. For many parents, spending more time with their child and being involved in their learning is an extraordinary opportunity. Connections Academy provides Learning Coaches with a wide range of resources designed to answer questions and supply expert guidance. Learning Coaches can also reach out to the school at any time.

Challenges of Working at Home

Despite the benefits, remote work presents several challenges. First is effective communication as collaboration can be difficult when team members are not physically present. Managers must also adapt to overseeing a remote workforce, which can be challenging without face-to-face interaction.

However, for every good reason to choose distance learning, there is a challenge lurking under the surface. Time management is a key challenge for students. Although distance learning offers far more flexibility, a student needs the ability to manage their time properly. According to an article published in 2019[1], many students find it hard to balance their studies, work, and social activities which leads to poor sleep patterns and increased levels of stress. It is hard to comprehend any more stress in addition to what we have already faced from the pandemic, so it is extremely important for students to be aware of this and plan how to manage potential stress.

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Another challenge that students can face is faulty technology. Although you should only need an average laptop that doesn’t cost hundreds of pounds, if your technology suddenly fails you then you could lose not just study resources, but you could be stuck with no access to learning portals or remote exam sessions. A third challenge is lack of motivation. Despite the challenges that distance learning throws at a student, I would still highly recommend it as a learning route if you are looking for next steps to take in your career.

Addressing the Challenges

Fortunately, it’s possible for educators to mitigate distance education issues and challenges for students. Effective time management is a fundamental skill for distance learners. Encourage your students to take advantage of the numerous time management apps and resources that are available to e-learners - many of them for free. Education experts also recommend periodically surveying your students, which provides you with actionable insights into how your students allocate their time toward various tasks.

To mitigate technical issues and boost digital literacy, it’s crucial for institutions to offer robust technical support, guiding learners through any technical difficulties encountered. Furthermore, providing digital literacy training enhances students’ ability to navigate online platforms and digital tools with ease. Cultivating a sense of community is vital in online learning environments. By promoting the creation of virtual study groups using tools like Zoom or Google Meet, students can collaborate and support one another academically. Online forums and platform-specific social media groups offer spaces for learners to connect, share insights, and foster a supportive network.

Just because communication occurs over the internet doesn’t mean it has to be lagged or asynchronous. In fact, there are countless tools - many of them free to use - to help students and teachers communicate in real-time. For example, you can use video conferencing software to have live conversations with your students, either one-on-one or in group settings. This gives your students a chance to ask you questions, raise concerns, and work through complex course material more successfully. In addition to video conferencing software, you can also use instant messaging apps for students who prefer to communicate via text.

Students need timely, meaningful feedback in order to gauge and improve their performance. One method is to schedule one-on-one or group sessions with your students, on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, that are dedicated to providing feedback on recent assignments. Providing verbal feedback lets you save time on writing and editing documents, without sacrificing the detail or quality of your evaluation. Another method is to let your students engage in more peer review, or the process of providing feedback on each other’s work. Rubrics and syllabi are important tools in the traditional classroom. Make use of them in the virtual classroom, too!

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The Academic Perspective on Working From Home

Working away from the traditional office is increasingly an option in today’s world. Internet access and the increase of personal IT infrastructure made WFH a growing trend throughout the last decades. The literature suggests that people working from home need flexibility for different reasons. Non-academic areas report work-efficiency benefits for WFH but they also show some downsides of this arrangement. A good example is the broad-scale experiment in which call center employees were randomly assigned to work from home or in the office for nine months [10]. A 13% work performance increase was found in the working from home group. These workers also reported improved work satisfaction.

Home-working has several straightforward positive aspects, such as not having to commute, easier management of household responsibilities [11] and family demands [12], along with increased autonomy over time use [13, 14], and fewer interruptions [15, 16]. Personal comfort is often listed as an advantage of the home environment [e.g., 15], though setting up a home office comes with physical and infrastructural demands [17]. People working from home consistently report greater job motivation and satisfaction [4, 11, 18, 19] which is probably due to the greater work-related control and work-life flexibility [20]. Often-mentioned negative aspects of WFH include being disconnected from co-workers, experiencing isolation due to the physical and social distance to team members [22, 23]. Also, home-working employees reported more difficulties with switching off and they worked beyond their formal working hours [4]. Working from home is especially difficult for those with small children [24], but intrusion from other family members, neighbours, and friends were also found to be major challenges of WFH [e.g., 17]. Importantly, increased freedom imposes higher demands on workers to control not just the environment, but themselves too.

Compared to the private sector, our knowledge is scarce about how academics experience working from home. Researchers in higher education institutes work in very similar arrangements. Typically, they are expected to personally attend their workplace, if not for teaching or supervision, then for meetings or to confer with colleagues. In the remaining worktime, they work in their lab or, if allowed, they may choose to do some of their tasks remotely. Along with the benefits on productivity when working from home, academics have already experienced some of its drawbacks at the start of the popularity of personal computers. Until now, the academics whose WFH experience had been given attention were mostly those participating in online distance education [e.g., 30, 31]. They experienced increased autonomy, flexibility in workday schedule, the elimination of unwanted distractions [32], along with high levels of work productivity and satisfaction [33], but they also observed inadequate communication and the lack of opportunities for skill development [34].

Survey Results: Academics Working From Home

The results showed that 94% (n = 662) of the surveyed researchers worked more from home during the COVID-19 lockdown compared to the time before. Of these researchers, 47% found that due to working more from home their research became, in general, less efficient, 23% found it more efficient, and 30% found no difference compared to working before the lockdown. Within this database, we also explored the effect of the lockdown on the efficiency of people living with children (n = 290). Here, we found that 58% of them experienced that due to working more from home their research became, in general, less efficient, 20% found it more efficient, and 22% found no difference compared to working before the lockdown.

When comparing working from home to working in the office in general, people found that they can better achieve certain aspects of the research in one place than the other. We also asked the researchers how much of their work time they spent working from home in the past, and how much it would be ideal for them to work from home in the future concerning both research efficiency and well-being. Comparing these values for each researcher, we found that 66% of them want to work more from home in the future than they did before the lockdown, whereas 16% of them want to work less from home, and 18% of them want to spend the same percentage of their work time at home in the future as before.

Taken all their other duties (education, administration, etc.) and provided circumstances at home (infrastructure, level of disturbance), of researchers who would like to work more from home in the future (n = 461), 86% think that it would be possible to do so.

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