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Virtual classroom gives students a 21st century education

May 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment

School officials say the cost to the student will be about $90. And students who choose to go to school online will still be able to participate in on campus activities if they want to.

“Through a virtual partnership, if they are enrolled in a virtual school but at least attend one of their classes at the high school campus,” said Bart Swartz with Greenbush Education Services. “so let’s say five of their classes are virtual, and they attend one campus class. Then that school district has the opportunity to allow them to participate in activities in the district.”

Tonganoxie district officials say enrollment will begin in August.

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Class pictures

March 7, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Ruskin High School in the Hickman Mills district is the most recent school to offer access to a studio, where students can create movies or produce television news shows.

Ruskin’s “Virtual Learning Environment” was dedicated a few months ago, and now many different classes can use the equipment as it applies to their curriculum.

Since the school began the program, students have made a video for wellness and nutrition education. An English class has used it for taping a Shakespeare piece.

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Efforts to fix Missouri’s school aid formula, transfers appear knotted — again

March 4, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Public school leaders across the state have implored the Missouri Legislature to fix a knotty student transfer law and an underfunded school aid formula.

They’ve warned that open-ended transfers could result in overcrowded suburban classrooms and bankrupt city schools. They’ve predicted that a quirk in the aid formula could force some small rural schools to close.

Some wealthy St. Louis County districts have their state funding basically frozen at an earlier level. Thus, if no formula change passes this year, they could escape cuts, with other school districts — which are predominantly poorer — bearing the burden of the underfunded formula.

As for the rest of the omnibus bill, Dieckhaus said he lumped expanded charter schools, virtual schools and tax credit scholarships into the package because they are part of the Turner fix and would help accommodate the thousands of students who want out of failing city schools.

While the St. Louis Public Schools have made academic strides, Dieckhaus said children shouldn’t have to wait for the district to regain accreditation. That, he said, is expected to take three more years.
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Cunningham Proposes School Accreditation Fix

February 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment

ST. LOUIS, MO (KMOX) – Chesterfield Senator Jane Cunningham says she has a plan to give students in unaccredited schools options for where to go. The law currently says students in unaccredited schools can go to a county school of their choice for free. Cunningham says they should also be able to go to charter schools, virtual schools or private schools if they want.

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U.S. Virtual Ed. Companies Court Global Clients

January 30, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Within U.S. borders, online learning providers often approach districts, schools, and individual students and families by pitching the idea that virtual courses can help a student reach beyond a school system that falls short of addressing all student needs.

International e-learning consumers, by contrast, are approaching American virtual providers because they represent not an alternative to traditional American education, but an extension of it.

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Proposals could bring dramatic changes to Missouri schools

January 28, 2012 By Leave a Comment

National School Choice Week is ending in Missouri with a flurry of proposals that would sharply increase the number of charters, establish scholarships to private and parochial schools, solve the dilemma over students in unaccredited districts transferring to nearby schools and carve the Kansas City school district into pieces annexed by surrounding districts.

Whether the reshaping of schools passes — and whether the St. Louis Public Schools win approval to sponsor two charter schools this fall — is now up to the Missouri legislature and the state Board of Education. State Sen. Jane Cunningham, the Chesterfield Republican whose bill would bring about the most drastic changes, says if lawmakers don’t act to settle what has become known as the Turner case, the courts will.

Her bill, introduced Thursday and set for a hearing next week, would go much further than just the provisions addressing Turner. It would include these changes to Missouri education law:

  • Establish the Passport Scholarship Program, to grant financial assistance for students up to the age of 21 who live in unaccredited public school districts for use at a non-public elementary or secondary school. Taxpayers could contribute to a qualified educational assistance organization and claim a tax credit for what they give.
  • Allow an accredited school district or cooperative association of accredited districts to sponsor or operate a charter school in or for an unaccredited district.
  • Remove the two-year waiting period between the time a district loses accreditation and the time the state may take it over; under the bill, the takeover could happen immediately after accreditation is lost.
  • To change the current Turner situation, require an unaccredited district to pay tuition and transportation for resident students to attend an accredited district in an adjoining area. Receiving districts could establish criteria for how many students they would accept, based on the availability of “highly qualified teachers in existing classroom space.” Receiving districts would not have to include the test scores of transfer students in their assessments for up to five years.
  • In what is called the Hinson Plan, after the superintendent of the Independence School District outside Kansas City, require that if a district outside St. Louis or St. Louis County loses accreditation, surrounding accredited districts must divide up its territory, annex it and draw up new attendance boundaries.
  • Direct the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to establish a clearinghouse to help students in unaccredited districts transfer to an accredited district, a charter school, a virtual school or a nonpublic school using a Passport scholarship.
  • Require student performance to be a factor in teacher evaluations.
  • Give school principals the right to select teachers for their schools who have shown they are qualified and effective.

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Private school options considered for unaccredited districts’ students

November 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment

According to Cunningham, students in the St. Louis City school district are being “locked” in failing schools. By law, students in districts that have lost accreditation can apply to, and must be accepted in, surrounding districts. She says those applications are being refused, “and so, they are not getting their present rights.”

She plans to file a bill that reflects the testimony she heard during the Committee’s hearings. For her, that means seeking legislative approval for private schools to accept students living in districts that have lost accreditation. She says, “…we certainly have excellent ones out there who are willing to take these children and provide them an excellent education, and the other advantage that they noted to us was they’re in the city, or very near the city, so we would not have to spend the money and the time transporting the students out to county districts.”

She also anticipates lawmakers considering the expansion of charter schools, encouraging surrounding school districts to open their own charters in the St. Louis City Limits, expanding online virtual school options for parents who want that to help meet the needs of the number of students who will seek transfer.

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Rockwood classes offered by virtual method

October 12, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Rockwood students are using technology to take advanced courses through a virtual learning environment. The experience is made possible with online meeting software or videoconferencing equipment that allows students to attend class and ask questions using an online chat feature.

At Eureka High School and Lafayette High School, students are using this technology to take calculus II through Wildwood Community College. Next semester, they will have the opportunity to enroll in calculus III.

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Downtown elementary school principal inflated attendance figures, audit finds

September 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The principal, Esperansa Veal, was placed on administrative leave in May. Superintendent Kelvin Adams Jr. told reporters after Schweich released the report at the auditor’s office downtown that Veal is being paid while on leave. He said she would remain on such status until a hearing into her situation is conducted; he could not give an estimate on when that may take place. Her annual salary is $76,823, the school district said.

Schweich (right) said the attendance changes may have helped Patrick Henry meet progress requirements under the No Child Left Behind act and could have resulted in the school receiving extra money.

In a low-key response to the findings, Adams said that “the data speaks for itself.” He said the district has done internal audits on schools for attendance and test scores and not found any other examples of such manipulation of the figures.

Asked if he was surprised to find out about what was going on at Patrick Henry, he replied:

“What surprised me is that we weren’t aware of it.”

Adams said that academic achievement had been rising at the school and because such improvement often is the result of higher attendance, he did not realize the figures had been inflated. He also said that the school had had some virtual classes, and he thought that some increase in attendance could be attributed to that component.

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High school offerings in the pipeline

September 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The University of Missouri’s College of Education plans to launch a virtual school later this year that will provide online courses aimed to supplement what students take in their traditional high schools.

Eventually, the virtual school is expected to provide online courses to all K-12 students — although that’s likely years in the making.

In its infancy, the school will offer semester-based classes to help traditional students recover course credits, take advanced courses not offered in some districts or provide more options for homebound kids with special needs, said Director Monica Beglau.

It’s unclear how the program will be funded. Beglau is in the process of applying for federal grants and soliciting foundational support to get the school up and running. Then, she envisions funding for operations to come from a variety of sources.

School districts that don’t have the resources to offer Advanced Placement courses, for instance, might contract with the virtual school to provide them. Or, parents who want their children to take a foreign language not offered by their home districts might pay the virtual school to provide them.

The Missouri School Boards Association is in the process of surveying school districts to get a better idea of what courses they need the most. Beglau hopes to have a few of the most in-demand classes ready by January.

The virtual school is not intended to replace or compete with MU High School, which was moved under the helm of the College of Education this summer after the university repackaged two programs previously in MU Extension. The former MU Direct and Center for Distance and Independent Studies previously operated MU’s online and distance programs, including MU High School.

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