My full-time job is teaching political science at American Military University, and I do some online teaching in poli sci and political science for La Roche College as well.  I've been in the online education field for two years now, and based on that experience, I really believe in its quality.  Sometimes it can be better, even a lot better, depending on the engagement levels of the students and instructor.

Therefore I was very surprised to see this article in today's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.  To summarize, the American armed forces treat a graduate of an online high school as a Tier 2 enlistee, equivalent to someone with a GED, whereas someone who graduates from a brick and mortar school is a Tier 1.  There are limits to the number of Tier 2 enlistees that the services are willing to take, and recruits may find themselves shut out of desirable specialties.

The reason is a regulation, going back to 1987, that dealt with paper-based "correspondence schools," which produced graduates that the military found had poor rates of retention.  Today though, twenty-seven states have state-regulated and approved cyber high schools, from which a diploma is considered equal to one from a standard high school.

In your opinion, is this bias as valid as it was twenty-four years ago, before the emergence of online education, or online anything for that matter?  Or is it something that needs to be reviewed and revised?