District Administration - February 2012 - (Page 27)

SponSoreD SUppLeMenT Offering options in a growing district K12-supported virtual school eases burden on burgeoning classrooms For a Colorado public school system bursting at the seams during a crippling economy, online education has been key. “We are a very crowded school district struggling to pass bonds,” said David Knoche, principal of Falcon Virtual Academy in Colorado Springs. “Falcon Virtual has provided us some real options to deal with outgrowing our buildings while keeping students moving forward academically.” The school uses K12 curriculum for all K-8 classes, and Aventa Learning by K12 for high school. Soon, the A+ Anywhere Learning System by K12 will offer even more options for an area that includes four military bases, known for very mobile families. “Sometimes we see that students who’ve moved around a lot have missed something in their educational career,” Knoche said. “We see A+ as a way to fill in gaps where students have lost information at a unit level, not an entire course. If we have to make up an algebra unit on polynomials, we can do that effectively with A+.” Falcon opened last year with 59 students completing all coursework via the Internet. Today, the school’s 339 students complete most work online, but they also are encouraged to go each week to the school—now housed in a former office Enrollment in 2010, school’s opening year: 59 339 Soon the district added credit recovery and a virtual high school to help students relearn challenging concepts and maintain semester progress. “We even use it for the alternative school,” Sucharski said. “It allows us to change the scope and sequence to meet our needs. “A+ allowed us to add benchmarks, midterms and finals,” Sucharski added. “We could make exams look like district exams. We could design independent programs or an entire course. There wasn’t another program out there that did all of that.“ She’s also impressed with the company’s full range of courses and support. “They’ve added the ACT and Ap www.k12.com Enrollment in 2011: building, but soon to be relocated to its own, larger facility. Teachers hold in-school office hours to ensure students are on pace, and lead classroom-based lessons to address skill deficits and reinforce concepts learned online. They also teach in-school enrichment courses that complement the virtual curriculum. “Kids who come in have tremendous academic success,” Knoche said. “I think there are going to be some amazing changes district-wide in how we look at blended schools because of what we’re doing at Falcon Virtual.” 74% programs, and they also plan to provide teachers,” Sucharski said. “When we started designing studentspecific programs, the graduation rate was moving from 74 to 76 percent in 2004,” she said. “Last May, the graduation rate was 94 percent!” Those numbers reflect students who graduated high school in five years with Graduation rate in 2004: 94% a regular diploma; 93.5 percent graduated with a regular diploma in four years. The district also has adults who’ve come back to complete their high school diploma. Online Ed Today 3 Graduation rate in 2011: http://www.k12.com http://www.k12.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - February 2012

District Administration - February 2012
Contents
From the Editor
News Update
District Profile
Administrator Profile
Conversations
Product Focus
What Can U.S. Schools Learn From Foreign Counterparts?
A New Prescription for Fighting Drug Abuse
The Game Changer
The Legal Implications of Surveillance Cameras
CIO News
Mobile Devices Drive Creative Instruction
Products
Crisis Response
Professional Opinion
Problem/Solution
New Directions

District Administration - February 2012