ne of the lowest wealth schools taking part in the Virtual High School is Center High School, located in the San Luis Valley of Colorado. I asked the Superintendent of Schools how he could afford to free up valuable teacher time to take part in the VHS. His response was "It's a no-brainer. I give you one teacher and I get 30 new courses in our catalog." A year later, even though we knew technology issues had hindered student participation during the first term, we asked for a brief retrospective from him and from the teacher he selected to teach the first VHS course in his school. Their responses follow.

Bruce Droste
Director, Virtual High School

Gary Kidd was the Superintendent of Schools in Center when the Virtual High School project started. He is now the Director of Information and Technology Services for the Littleton, Colorado, Public Schools:

Building a technology infrastructure, integrating technology throughout our curriculum, and participating in the Virtual High School were only one component of a larger restructuring project, called the Student Centered School, which the Center School District initiated at the opening of the 1992-93 school year.

The need to recreate the educational systems in Center was driven by our acceptance of the realization that the traditional paradigm of public education in America was not created with Center students in mind. The students in Center are just as bright, talented, and capable as students anywhere in the country. Yet the levels of poverty found in the San Luis Valley of Colorado present some unique challenges for educators and parents. We realized that the traditional solutions for at-risk students had not been successful. In order for graduates of Center schools to compete with graduates of more affluent urban and suburban schools, we had to change the rules of the game.

The first rule we changed was our attitude toward teaching and learning in the late 20th century. It is obvious to all of us involved in the Virtual High School program that students today are different than they were ten years ago. Yet many teachers are still teaching the same material in the same way. Everything in the old paradigm was designed to be taught without technology. Hence, the first 15 months of our restructuring around technology was spent questioning everything. We kept some things, eliminated others, and revised the remaining. At that point in the process, most of our hardware was three generations behind the curve, but so were our attitudes. I presume the same is true in most schools today, despite what most of us like to believe. As a consequence, before we installed a single new computer, we started 15 months of extensive staff development. Put simply, our attitudes determine the ways we think; how we think determines our actions.

Our district vision statement speaks to our commitment to our people, our commitment to partnership, and our commitment to excellence. Through the work of our staff and their willingness to provide the opportunities all of our students deserve, and the commitment of a community to accept the challenge of change on behalf our students, we have created a learning environment very different from the school district of four years ago. We have created an environment which personifies our vision.

Children have always been explorers, born with the ability to interact and learn about the world around them. Children between the ages of three and 18 are being referred to as the "Nintendo generation" or the " 'Net generation." They live in a world which is increasingly interactive, communications intensive, and knowledge based. They are the standard bearers in the information revolution, having never known anything else. Because of their ease in and with the information age, society needs their active involvement and interaction.

The concept of education is being redefined by a world we can barely imagine. Everything we have known as reality is going to be challenged or changed, yet our challenges are undefined. What is going to happen by the time our current generation of students leaves our high schools? We have the responsibility to let go of the past in order to embrace the future. And the future has arrived; it just hasn't been evenly distributed.

Terri Day has taught science at Center High School for 10 years and is teaching Introduction to Microbiology for VHS:

My experiences with Virtual High School have reminded me of my first year or two of teaching. I have had those same feelings of trying to stay caught up with the students and working hard to get everything organized. Learning new software made those feelings of not knowing how everything in the school works come up again, also.

I have really enjoyed planning a course that I would never get to teach in my district because of small enrollment and small staff. We are able to offer the basic courses with a few advanced ones, but none as specialized as this course. Although the planning and implementation of this course took many, many hours of my time, I enjoy this aspect of the Virtual High School. It allows me to get excited about my field again.

Some aspects of teaching a VHS course are the same as a "real" course. I found that the students fall into predictable personality types. I have students that are really self-motivated and can follow directions without any extra help, some need a little extra push but then move along well, and those that just "don't get it" no matter how much instruction they receive or how much push I provide. They are no different than my "real" students. I remember wondering whether I could get to know my virtual students very well through this type of learning, but I feel that I do know them.

As with any course, I am constantly refining and modifying the lessons as needed. A course is never done, never exactly the way you envision. This is particularly true with courses that rely heavily on information from the Internet, which my course does. These students visit web sites for the information they need to complete the course. Sometimes these sites change from one week to another, so I spend a lot of time going back to my original sites looking for changes and then refining the lessons accordingly. I also spend time looking for new sites that would be helpful for my students.

VHS has allowed me to grow as a teacher. Although it takes time, I have enjoyed learning lots of new techniques that apply to all classes, not just virtual ones. I hope that this experience has made me a better teacher, I know I have become a better learner.

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