Challenge

Synchronous and asynchronous learning open opportunities to students and schools that allow for greater flexibility and expanded course offerings, which is precisely what sparked a partnership between Edmentum and Guilford County Schools (GCS) in North Carolina in 2008.

Now, with over 120 schools and more than 66,000 students, GCS is the third largest school district in North Carolina. Because of the various needs of the diverse student population, the administrative team knew that the district needed to make changes regarding the types of classes and support it offers to students and teachers.

“We are going to always have students with virtual needs,” expressed Alan Schubert, a blended learning lead teacher with GCS. “Whether it’s that they physically can’t be in a classroom or they are picking up that last-minute credit or they are trying to take more advanced classes than their school offers, EdOptions [Academy] offers that flexibility.”

Solution

Course Credit Options

EdOptions Academy combines Edmentum’s digital curricula with state-certified virtual teachers, giving students the ability to work at their own pace and receive virtual, human-centered instruction. It also provides a superior and flexible level of support, which is beneficial to students at GCS. Often, when students move into the district during high school, they lack required credits for graduation in North Carolina. When this happens, students are enrolled in EdOptions Academy so that they can complete the required courses on a schedule that is more flexible than the regular day-to-day timetable of the brick-and-mortar setting.

Additionally, because there are so many schools in the district, the scheduling of classes can vary by building. Some schools have a traditional four-core semester, allowing students to continuously take core courses one right after the other, but other campuses have a block two-core semester, which means that students could have an entire semester separating core courses of the same subject. For example, if students move from a block semester to a traditional semester midway through the school year, they would be ahead of schedule for two core courses, but they would be behind schedule for the remaining two core courses. EdOptions Academy provides the opportunity to fill those types of gaps within scheduling so that students stay on track for graduation.

Mr. Schubert commented, “We’re an urban district, and some of our students are very mobile. So, if you move to a school that’s a year-long school and you need four entire courses because you just completed four, then we can adapt that way.”

Acceleration and Intervention Options

GCS also utilizes Edmentum Tutorials to fill course-specific knowledge gaps and reduce the need for full semester credit recovery. Additionally, Tutorials are used as an acceleration tool for students who are working at a faster pace than their peers.

“When people hear Tutorials, they automatically think it is a way to bring a student up, but it’s also a way to accelerate your students that are going a little faster and give them additional opportunities,” Mr. Schubert explained.

Tutorials and Courses—one of Edmentum’s digital curricula offerings that provides first-time credit and credit recovery and expands course access—are also used at the end of the school year during a quasi-credit-recovery period called 5th Quarter. This additional time is an opportunity for students to recover specific units or pieces of a course that they did not pass and is used as an incomplete-credit prevention tool.

“For students who did fail a course, instead of taking credit recovery, they come in the summer for a few days, depending on what they need,” Mr. Schubert described. “Having the [Edmentum] software allows us to not just say the student did it. It allows us to go back and look and provides that evidence that a student has reached proficiency.”

Result

The keys to the successful implementation of the Edmentum programs have been focused on two parts, proper program support and districtwide awareness. Mr. Schubert and his Edmentum Program Manager have created a solid communication stream to ensure that the implementation continues successfully. Also, they work together to provide opportunities for staff members in the district to learn and ask questions about the programs on scheduled professional development days and as needed.

Mr. Schubert pronounced, “Everyone at Edmentum has been very generous with their time and just extremely friendly and helpful. I think that’s been a great part of working with Edmentum.”

Supporting educators by providing various options for success has also paid off for students at Guilford County Schools. Students who utilized EdOptions Academy had a 96-percent course completion rate within the program. At the end of the 2022–23 school year, the district had a four-year graduation rate of 90.6 percent, over 4 percentage points higher than the average for the state of North Carolina.

Mr. Schubert illuminated, “The students get to graduate. They can take the class, and if they want to, they can take that class in a shorter amount of time and not end up a statistic. They get to graduate, and I appreciate that flexibility.”