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Catholic high school returns to Pueblo
February 5, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment
Catholic high school education has returned to Pueblo after a 41-year absence.
St. Therese Catholic School started an online high school program in the fall, building on the school’s 11-year-old pre-school-eighth-grade program.
“We’ve had a number of people over the years that have been looking for an alternative for their kids at the high school level,” said John Brainard, St. Therese principal. “They want their child to continue to be in a faith-filled environment.”
This fall, Brainard decided to pilot an online high school program at the St. Therese building.
The program is the first Catholic high school in the city since the Diocese of Pueblo closed all Catholic schools in 1971.
St. John Neumann, a private pre-school-eighth-grade Catholic school, was opened in 1977 and St. Therese, also a pre-school-eighth-grade school, opened in 2000.
Based on parent request, Brainard said he decided to expand the St. Therese program to high school by implementing an on-site, online curriculum for students in grades 9-12.
Currently, there are four students enrolled in the high school program, three freshmen and a junior.
The students take classes at St. Therese through the accredited online Catholic Schools K-12 Virtual program.
“This is really an online version of our school here,” Brainard said of the Internet program.
Online K-12 School Leaders Discuss Policy ‘Roadmap’
“Last year alone 16 states passed legislation related to online learning. We’re expecting just as many this year,” she said. “It’s about access, it’s about quality and it’s about creating new learning models.”
Patrick says right now 33 states allow full-time online learning programs. 55 percent of all public school districts offer online classes or online learning programs.
Last fall some of Colorado’s full-time online schools came under scrutiny for poor student performance, high dropout rates and inefficient use of taxpayer dollars.
For the rest of the article, go to Online K-12 School Leaders Discuss Policy ‘Roadmap’
Online schools to get more state oversight
The state Board of Education is tightening the screws on cyber-schools that critics say have been fleecing the state by collecting money but delivering sub-par education to an ever-increasing base of students who get their instructions online rather than in a classroom.
According to an AP article in December, more than 14,000 Colorado K-12 students are expected to be taught online this year. Private companies that run these cyber-schools—some of which are for-profit—recruit students as young as kindergarten age and they receive the same per-pupil rate from the state as traditional schools that teach kids face-to-face; Colorado is expected to spend about $85 million this year teaching kids online.
But a 2010 Board of Education report shows much of this money is spent with little oversight or accountability, making state officials wonder if taxpayers are getting what they’re paying for. According to the AP, the Board of Education found that test scores for online students are below average, dropout rates can be as high as 50 percent and—in one instance—the student-to-teacher ratio was as high as 317 to 1. Online schools are paid by the state for the entire school year, even if a student drops out after registration enrollment is tallied on Oct. 1.
For the rest of the article, go to Online schools to get more state oversight
