Since 2000, VHS has been partnering with middle and high schools in Virginia to expand educational opportunities for the state’s students.
Designed to supplement a school’s classroom curriculum, the organization is a non-profit, worldwide collaborative of high schools, teachers and students. VHS member schools have access to 200 online elective, Advanced Placement and honors courses, which are taught by VHS teachers who actively teach in classrooms at their member schools. All are certified in their specific discipline and have completed a VHS graduate level professional development program in online teaching. Instructors facilitate and continually monitor all courses, engaging students in discussions, and assessing each individual student’s progress.
Currently, seven schools in Virginia are members of the VHS collaborative, including Alexandria City Public Schools and Fauquier County Public Schools.
“Since 2005, VHS has been providing our students with quality courses we would never be able to offer in-person, such as Multiculturalism, The Holocaust, and Screenwriting,”
Fauquier County Public Schools has had similar experiences that necessitated increasing the number of VHS student seats the school has starting this coming school year. “We are doubling our membership anticipating a higher demand in the district,” said Craig Carscallen, Principal of the Southeastern Alternative School. “There are many reasons for the program’s success, but as a school in rural Virginia, a lot of it has to do with VHS’s global footprint. Many of our students have never even been out of the county. By participating in courses with students in other states and countries the subject matter becomes much more interesting and the entire experience, more rewarding. We’ve repeatedly seen underperforming students taking an online course and excelling.”
“This approval opens the door for us to collaborate with more schools in Virginia,” said Liz Pape, President & CEO of VHS. “As an approved online provider, schools can easily work with us to offer a wide array of enriching courses which provide an authentic, collaborative learning experience and help prepare students for their choice of college majors and careers.”
For more information, visit http://www.govhs.org.
About Virtual High School (VHS)
Virtual High School is the pioneer of online course design and instruction for teachers and online education for high school students. Virtual High School partners with schools to provide rigorous, student-centered online courses that help expand rather than replace existing curriculum options. The VHS collaborative includes 770 member schools and 15,000 enrolled students from 35 U.S. states and 45 countries. The recipient of the United States Distance Learning Association (USDLA) 2005, 2007 and 2008 awards for Excellence in Programming and Excellence in Best Practices and the Stockholm Challenge 2001 Award for exemplary use of technology in education, VHS was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in Maynard, Massachusetts. For more information, visit www.govhs.org or call (978) 897-1900.
Press Contact: VHS: Carol Arnold, Arnold Communications, carol@arnoldcomm.com, (877) 718-4604 x2.
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The pioneer of K-12 online learning and course design for teachers, Virtual High School (VHS) is a non-profit collaborative of high schools, middle schools, teachers and students.
