Blog: Virtual Schools

The Boston Globe and the Boston Herald are reporting that last week the Greenfield School Committee voted to shutter the state’s first and only public virtual school. Here’s the Globe piece by Evan Allen: The academy opened in 2010 and serves about...

Back in January 2010, there was a lot of hope that the charter school expansions associated with the new law would work out well. The data on that is largely tremendous. The new charters are faring very well, thank you. There were...

A number of readers of recent posts on virtual (or digital) learning have asked for some definitions around jargon used by proponents and experts. I wanted to share a brief video on “blended learning,” a term that you hear increasingly, especially in...

Back at the start of December, I blogged on the need for both an open door to online learning and also a greater focus on accountability for those who would operate in that space. Understanding the quality of the choices in the...

There is so much energy in the virtual learning space right now, with a number of products that are maturing and others that are continuing to grow exponentially. The free Khan Academy has provided almost 100 million exercises, now boasts about 3.5...

If Massachusetts has because of lack of leadership within the Board and the Department of Education, ground to a halt on digital learning, other states are moving fast. Let me give you two examples — one (Michigan) where the governor is particularly...

Mirror-mirror on the wall, which states are pushing innovation most of all? Not Massachusetts. A number of other states are at this point moving faster than Massachusetts on key educational innovations. The good news for Massachusetts is that last January the state...