E-learning in emergency situations

People have been trained in emergency situations for many years now. However e-learning is a new tool in comparison. What can e-learning bring to the table over other methods and is it really any more effective or just a sounds a lights show?

Earlier I linked you to a press release about a Canadian company CSA standards who is a clear proponent of e-learning for emergency situations. (http://smr.newswire.ca/en/csa-standards/saving-lives-and-building-bonds-emergency-ready-communities)

A paper from the journal of Minevra anestesiologica on E-learning as a tool in emergency and disaster medicine teaching provides a compelling argument for its use.

E-learning is a new project for education based on the adoption of new computerised, multimedia and telematic technologies. Its application has deeply changed the concept of a teacher-based teaching to a student-centred educational project. It offers a great flexibility in the educational methodology, in the administration of contents, in the synchronous and/or asynchronous interaction between teachers and students, in the organisation and in the structure of the course, in the educational plans, in the support, the tracking and the evaluation of the student. E-learning could represent a great resource and a possible revolution in the concept of education and in the field of medical education as well. In some specific fields of application, as Emergency and Disaster Medicine, where the interaction between the student, the teacher and the patient, even if of great importance, are difficult to obtain in a quiet setting and have a lot of organizing, technical and economic troubles, e-learning approach could find a fertile field of application. (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/7903539_E-learning_as_educational_tool_in_emergency_and_disaster_medicine_teaching)

I scoured the web looking for some arguments against e-learning and came across some lecture notes from of all places - The Institute for Software Engineering and Interactive Systems, Vienna University of Technology. The lecture itself was not against e-learning, in fact it was for e-learning however contained a section posing the other side of the argument. (http://ausweb.scu.edu.au/aw02/papers/refereed/kohle/paper.html)

There were some generally weak points such as "one needs to learn how to use a computer before one can utilize e-learning". However there was one interesting point made; that e-learning is still generally new and experimental. What this leads to however is inevitably an experiment at the students expense.

I have not heard of any disasters arising from a poor e-learning module to date however a wakeup call may be around the corner - perhaps not. It is important to remember the huge difference e-learning can make on even simple issues of subject matter.

I recall clearly my frustration as an e-learning teacher trying to engage students over webcam about experiments which traditionally were done in person with the facilitator. Or my inability to go on an excursion with students to a marine park or bush work etc. for biology lessons. They had all the technology in the world and the Internet at their fingertips but that was just it. It was at their fingertips but in reality they were still chained to their desk.

E-learning is an invaluable option to have when designing learning however it should not automatically be seen as a substitute. We did not spend the last million plus years evolving to learn through e-learning after all.