Khan Academy Launches Global Online High School Program 24
Khan Academy, a non-profit educational organization that offers free online tools to help students learn, is opening an online global high school in August 2022. "This full-time online school will combine the expertise of Khan Lab School, Schoolhouse.world, and ASU Prep Digital in a unique model based on the principles of the [...] founder of Khan Academy," says the company in a press release. "The core principles include mastery-based learning, personalization of each student's experience and learning together as a community." From the report: Each day will include a seminar where small student peer groups will have the opportunity to interact online and actively dive deep into society's most challenging questions with support from mentors and world-class learning guides. This inaugural class of 9th graders will work together solving real-world problems in a unique virtual school model that rewards curiosity, empowers agency and provides them with the skills and confidence needed to excel in college and careers. The organization is partnering with Arizona State University to make this initiative possible. Out-of-state students will need to pay tuition to attend, but Arizona residents will be able to attend for free.
"Interested students will need to apply through ASU Prep Digital, the full-time online school," notes the press release. "The 2022-23 class is open to incoming 9th grade students with plans to expand the program to grades 9-12 the following year."
"Interested students will need to apply through ASU Prep Digital, the full-time online school," notes the press release. "The 2022-23 class is open to incoming 9th grade students with plans to expand the program to grades 9-12 the following year."
Regulators coming after it in 3.. 2.. 1.. (Score:2)
You can't run a school without complying with some very strict laws and regulation, including meeting teaching material requirements and elaborate vetting of your staff. I'm expecting regulators to point out these facts to Khan Academy very, very quickly.
Re:Regulators coming after it in 3.. 2.. 1.. (Score:4, Funny)
Thankfully you have posted this useful insight on a slashdot comment! I don't think anyone at Khan had even considered this!
P.S. Do you have a high school diploma?
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Ha, nice one. I just think that, as always, they will try to play the system and stretch facts rather than try and adapt to the regulation, and that when they are forced to do so, they will realise that they massively underestimated the task.
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From TFA:
Khan World School is part of the ASU Preparatory Academy charter school network in Arizona
Seems they've already thought about this sort of problem, and have partnered up with an existing brick and mortar entity to help resolve it.
At the worst, they'll be able to help their students acquire a GED, which is the administrative equivalent of a high school diploma.
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Have you ever been to Mississippi, or pretty much any Southern state?
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Maybe this should replace public school in places (Score:3)
Seems like a number of areas really do not want teachers to go back to work... in those cases, why not just shut down the schools altogether, pay for every student to have a good laptop (along with replacing them), and sign them all up for this? A globally run high school would probably have much better course material than local school teachers trying to figure out how to do remote teaching properly.
and the kids at public school for the free lunch? (Score:2)
and the kids at public school for the free lunch? do what? free laptop, free data plan, EBT card, etc?
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and the kids at public school for the free lunch? do what? free laptop, free data plan, EBT card, etc?
Yes, that is normally the way it works. Kids who qualify for free lunches get other stuff for free as well.
I helped to run an after-school GATE* class. The fee was $100 but was waived for any free-lunch kid.
GATE=Gifted And Talented Enrichment (Mindstorms, Arduinos, dissecting cow eyeballs, etc.)
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I helped to run an after-school GATE* class. The fee was $100 but was waived for any free-lunch kid.
GATE=Gifted And Talented Enrichment (Mindstorms, Arduinos, dissecting cow eyeballs, etc.)
Good for you! I imagine it was a huge amount of thankless work, but never underestimate the impact on the students of running a program like this... even on the dim ones who you don't really think should be in the class :-)
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I imagine it was a huge amount of thankless work
Quite the contrary. The work was very thankful. I received more than a dozen gift cards for Christmas. The 4th, 5th, and 6th graders are in college now, and some of them still keep in touch with me.
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sign them all up for this
The problem is that about 35% of the kids won't do the work and don't care if they fail.
Online schooling works well for about a third of students, works sorta ok for another third, and not at all for the last third.
Many students need to sit in a real classroom with a real teacher making them do the work.
But for those students and parents that want to learn online, this looks like a great opportunity.
That's the state anyway (Score:1)
The problem is that about 35% of the kids won't do the work and don't care if they fail.
Hey guess what, that is ALREADY THE CASE in the areas I'm talking about, that continue online learning! Millions of students just went dark and are doing nothing.
But honestly it was also the case for kids *in* public school. Far better to remove the 65% that can function from the %35 future homeless people that just drag down every other student they interact with.
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> The problem is that about 35% of the kids won't do the work and don't care if they fail.
That's a good indication that literature and number crunching aren't right for them. That means the schools are failing most of these kids.
The schools are run by egghead nerds and they will keep trying to pound square pegs into round holes, which means many of these kids would be better timber framers than their teachers.
Re:Maybe this should replace public school in plac (Score:4)
"keep trying to pound square pegs into round holes, which means many of these kids would be better timber framers than their teachers"
So not only are you ignorant of pedagogical methods, you are also ignorant of timber framing methods.
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> The problem is that about 35% of the kids won't do the work and don't care if they fail.
Problem? if you can assign 70% of kids into that kind of school, I would assume you save something like 400 billion in the USA by using that kind of system by reducing teacher and school costs. Or you can keep the budget and triple the expenses of the remaining kids in the school.
It might even be possible that you save the money and still get better results for the remaining kids as they might be better matched with
Real-world problems? (Score:2)
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bifurcation (Score:2)
The local HS will switch policy next year in favor of an all out effort to improve graduation rates. They pretty much translates into dropping all the higher-level classes and forcing students to take grade level classes regardless of their academic progression (I'm sure I've misrepresented some nuance, but I understand that to be the gist of it)
Previously, high-performing students could skip years (not a great solution and unevenly applied) in, say, math and there were AP classes available etc.
I'm not sure
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