Virtual Schools at the Elementary and Middle School Levels
We've had this for adults, and now we have it for kids. From the Daily Bulletin and www.caliva.org:
Fearing middle school culture would expose their daughter to violence and bad influences, Jonathan and Patricia Haney looked for alternatives to public school.
After Monique finished fifth grade at Georgia F. Morris Elementary School in Colton, her parents enrolled her in California Virtual Academies....
The academy provides a computer, printer, Internet access and course materials. Students are assigned a teacher in their area, who meets face-to-face with them four times a year....
As long as they complete all subject areas, students can proceed through different topic areas at their own pace. Monique is almost done with seventh grade math and might get a jump start on next year's math -- after she catches up with science, her mother said....
But the program isn't for everyone. Daily adult supervision is required, so virtual schooling isn't viable without a stay-at-home parent.
And while students are scrolling, clicking and typing through their work, they are missing the social opportunities of the campus.
"We're human beings, not human doings," said John Bartelt, an education professor at the University of La Verne." If you do everything at home, you're missing out on group interaction and being able to ask questions face-to-face."...
Although the school arranges monthly activities, social interaction still depends on the parents....
"I get to work at my own pace, I can have breaks and have lunch whenever I want," Monique said. "And I don't have to listen to foul language."
Kindergarten through the eighth grade are taught, but plans call for rolling out ninth through 12th grades during the next several years. The school has about 2,300 students, with 523 in Los Angeles County and 173 in San Bernardino County.
Interactive demonstrations of the course work are available at the academies' Web site, www.caliva.org.
The California Virtual Academies are a network of virtual public charter schools, founded in the summer of 2002, that blend innovative new instructional technology with a traditional curriculum for students all across California. The charters are sponsored by the Spencer Valley School District in San Diego County; Armona Union Elementary School District in Kings County; Maricopa Unified School District in Kern County; Jamestown School District in Tuolumne County; Liberty Elementary School District in Sonoma County; and Burlingame Elementary School District in San Mateo County.
There are many benefits to our unique learning model, including a rigorous and comprehensive curriculum based on the Core Knowledge sequence, the flexibility of learning anytime and anywhere, the support of qualified professional educators, the credibility of being affiliated with a public charter school in the state of California, and an individualized and self-paced learning program that adapts to your child's unique needs.
The California Virtual Academies are committed to putting a top-quality education within reach of thousands of students in California. We hope you are as excited as we are about this innovative adventure in learning.
In my usual non-trendy way, I'm catching on late to something that's been around for a while. Here's a 2002 article that talks about the virtuous supporters and opponents:
K12 Inc., the brainchild of former U.S. Education Secretary William Bennett, is not the first organization to offer Internet-based education, but with Bennett's backing, is the most prominent....
Opposition to K12 is being mounted, predictably by the National Education Association, but also by an unlikely source, home school advocates....
Taxpayers pay for the computers, printers, Internet access, books and other tools used by the students at the K12 virtual academies.
The National Education Association (NEA), which opposes home schooling in general and supports charter schools "with certain provisions," calls Bennett's K12 taxpayer "facilitated home schooling."
"We are raising the bar in terms of accountability in public education every day and now to simply suggest that we're going to spend public funds for a child to be taught at the kitchen table by someone that is not a qualified educator is ... sort of counter to everything else we're saying about what we want in public education," said Barbara Stein, senior policy analyst for the NEA....
Although the curriculum is home-based, K12's founder and CEO Ron Packard told CNSNews.com that its mandated rigorous curriculum, enforced accountability through state tests, and access to state-certified teachers makes it "dramatically different" than the home school approach....
Tom Washburne is an attorney at the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), as well as director of the National Center for Home Education, the HSLDA's federal policy and lobbying arm. Washburne said the HSLDA is reluctant to mix home schooling with public education.
"We've made great grounds in the last couple of decades on home school freedom and we don't want to see us taking a step back," Washburne told CNSNews.com.
The virtual charter schools' offer of a free education could tempt home schoolers to trade in the private freedom they currently enjoy, Washburne said, placing them "back under the public school umbrella."
Washburne said this would undermine the "political presence that you need to fight back the regulations on home education." Even though virtual charter schools might feel like home schooling, their affiliation with the states in which they operate is an invitation for government intrusion, he said....
Packard said he was "shocked" by the opposition being mounted by home school advocates. "It's really amazing to me that a group that has fought so hard for [its] right to home school would oppose someone else's parents who are fighting for their right to be doing at home a great public school education," Packard told CNSNews.com.
"The same level of intolerance that you saw in the education establishment toward home schooling, I think home schooling [groups] are showing toward us," he added.
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