What would you do if you permanently lost your voice? Would you able to continue doing your job?

According to an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Dr. Elaine Smokewood, an English professor at Oklahoma City University, lost her ability to speak as the result of Lou Gehrig’s disease. You might think that this devastating handicap would end her career as a teacher, but in fact, by using online education technology, Dr. Smokewood has been able to continue teaching, providing her students with the information and guidance they need in a rather straightforward way.

Empowering her to overcome the effects of a debilitating disease, online education technology has enabled an otherwise bright and vibrant woman to do her job, do it well, and (perhaps unbelievably so) humbly see the ways in which it was better than when she could speak. She was a better listener and her students were forced to take more responsibility for their own learning.

Seeing how online education has positively touched Dr. Smokewood’s life is a definite argument for the good of online education. It is a tool that reaches the hard to reach. It makes teachers teach differently and students learn differently. It keeps a woman with a painful and devastating disease working, learning, and contributing to others.

How do you feel about online education as a way of teaching and learning? Do you know of anyone who has used online education as a way to make a difficult situation better? Please share your thoughts, experiences, or opinions in the comment section below.