Why Distance Learning? is a podcast about the decisions, design choices, and assumptions that determine whether live virtual learning becomes shallow and transactional—or meaningful, relational, and effective at scale.
The show is designed for education leaders, instructional designers, and system-level practitioners responsible for adopting, scaling, and sustaining virtual, hybrid, and online learning models. Each episode examines the structural conditions under which distance learning actually works—and the predictable reasons it fails when it doesn’t.
Through conversations with researchers, experienced practitioners, and field-shaping leaders, Why Distance Learning? translates research, field evidence, and lived experience into decision-relevant insight. Episodes surface real tradeoffs, near-failures, and hard-won lessons, equipping listeners with clear framing and language they can use to explain, defend, or redesign distance learning models in real organizational contexts.
Hosted by Seth Fleischauer of Banyan Global Learning, and Allyson Mitchell and Tami Moehring of the Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration, the podcast challenges outdated narratives about distance learning and explores what becomes possible when live virtual education is designed intentionally, human-centered, and grounded in evidence.
Latest Episodes
#82 All Learning Is Social: Jered Borup on Social Presence in K-12 Online Learning (Part 2)
In this episode of Why Distance Learning, your hosts continue their conversation with Jered Borup — professor at George Mason University and one of the most-cited rese...
#81 School and Personal Communities Must Work Together to Make Online Learning Engaging with Jered Borup
In this episode of Why Distance Learning, your hosts talk with Jered Borup — professor at George Mason University, co-creator of the Academic Communities of Engagement...
#80 Parents: the Co-Teachers No One Trained with Bobbie Sandberg
In this episode of Why Distance Learning, Seth and Allyson speak with Bobbie Sandberg — an educational researcher who recently completed her PhD in instructional psych...
#79 Eight Steps To Make Synchronous Online Learning Really Work with Dr. Helaine Marshall
In this episode of Why Distance Learning, your hosts talk with Dr. Helaine Marshall — retired professor of education at Long Island University Hudson and creator of SO...
#78 The Next Shutdown Is Coming. Are You Ready? with Michael Barbour (Part 2 of 2)
This is the second of a two-part conversation with Michael Barbour, one of the most cited researchers in K-12 distance and online learning. Michael is assistant dean f...
