EAGAN, Minn. – Ashley Jones* has always had a difficult time adjusting to school. When she arrived at Eagan High School two years ago, the teen, who struggles with an emotional behavior disorder, needed time to get to know her teachers and other staff members before she could feel comfortable learning in the classroom. Because of this challenge, Ashley fell seriously behind in her courses.
“We thought we were going to lose her to another (alternative) school because there wasn’t a chance for her to recover credits during a normal school day,” said Stephen Thompson, assistant administrator for the school.
Thompson wanted Ashley to remain on Eagan High’s campus because “sending her to another building would have set her back a year.”
Recently, the school had created Eagan Academy, a successful on-campus, after school credit recovery program that helped students get back on track once they’d failed one or more classes.
But for Ashley, that option alone wasn’t enough.
Fortunately, administrators decided to improve their summer school program and tailor it specifically to students seeking to recover credits.
“We knew we needed help, and looked at ways of increasing the rigor of summer school to make it more difficult,” Thompson said.
Rather than trying to create their own online program— which would have been expensive and time consuming-- the school chose to expand its use of EdOptions™’ Web-based Novel™ courses.
“Because of EdOptions, we can keep her in school and it looks like she’s going to graduate on time.”
Novel, a library of 39 courses that can be accessed anytime, from anywhere with an Internet connection, was already helping their after school credit recovery program achieve amazing results.
Thompson anticipated similar results for summer school, and many students were eager to sign up.
Ashley was one of them.
For the first time in a long time, Ashley began making progress in her classes and was motivated to learn. Taking the courses at home and in the computer lab enabled her to recover most of her lost credits.
“Because of EdOptions, we can keep her in school and it looks like she’s going to graduate on time,” Thompson said.
“We still see a huge value in having a kid sit down in a classroom and learn the traditional way, but that doesn’t fit every kid,” Thompson said. “This is kind of a ‘second shot’ at it.”
