Provost Academy celebrates first year of online education

Imagine going to math class at midnight, writing an English paper at 1 a.m. or finishing up Spanish homework while drinking coffee at Starbucks. This is a typical day for high school junior Lindsey Hickman, whose high school is not so typical. It is entirely online.

Hickman and fellow senior Ashley Row are students of the Provost Academy, an online public high school that functions just as a regular public high school, only students do their assignments when they want to, wherever they want to, as long as they have Internet access.

“The Provost Academy is very different — the kids care about it,” Hickman said. “It is also all customized for me, so if I want to get up and do math at 8:30 in the morning, I can.” Row said the online school environment has taught her self-discipline and prepared her for the real world better than a traditional high school would have.

“The teachers are not going to beg you to do your work,” she said. “Just like in a real job, they wouldn’t beg you to come to work. You would just get fired. “But it really does get you ready for college and the real  world, where someone is not going to be there reminding you what you have to do.”

Row said she also likes the fact that the school allows her to have a flexible schedule outside of academics. “If you want to work during the day or all night you can and you know you are OK with school,” Row said. “If you want to stay up all night and do your school work you can.”

Executive director and administrator Darrell Johnson said the school is up to 1,200 students, and is celebrating its first anniversary this year. While Johnson said this first year has been like a rollercoaster, it has been a wonderful time for him as well as the students.

“We have tremendous success because Provost Academy is about choice and tailor making individual students needs,” Johnson said. “We have removed the barrier of time, so it is 7/24, and while we don’t have instructors 7/24, kids can learn 7/24, and they can do it anywhere they wish to.”

Johnson said that the unique thing about Provost is that if students want to work during the day and go to school at night, they can. And if they have other activities they need to get done before they do academics, Provost makes that possible. “If students have jobs, activities or interests other than academics that could happen between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. that they couldn’t do with the traditional school, they can do with Provost,” Johnson said.

Johnson said the students go through a series of online lectures through live video chat with instructors. They do online reading and lessons and utilize chat rooms and e-mail to complete each course. Johnson said the students can choose from more than 100 rigorous courses, including AP and honors courses. Foreign language courses offered at the school can be from the traditional Spanish course to Japanese or Latin, while students interested in law enforcement work can take crime scene investigation classes.

The school is also traditional in the sense that they have a National Honor Society chapter, a yearbook, history and book club and literature magazine.

But no matter what classes they choose, Johnson said that unlike a typical school, the students at Provost complete all 180 lessons for each course. “Unlike in the traditional sense where sometimes they may never get out of World War II in U.S. History, the last day comes and everyone says goodbye and you get your final grade, we do not allow that to happen,” he said. “They have to finish all 180 lessons before they can get their final grade.”

Students at Provost are also given an extra 20 days after the final day of school to complete any assignments they need to turn in. “Failure is not an option with us,” Johnson said.

Johnson said the school has had problems, not unlike any other new school, most recently with setting up testing centers and getting 700 students around the state to testing sites to take their High School Assessment Program, a test required by the state.

“We had to make arrangements for 700 students to be at test sites and follow all the necessary security procedures, but it was well worth it,” Johnson said.

The school also gets less state funding than a traditional mortar and brick high school because it lacks a building that requires maintenance, Johnson said. “We are lobbying strong with our legislators to get the funding that we need,” Johnson said. “We are weathering the financial storm just like everyone else.”

Johnson said the success rate of the school is in the 66 graduates they have this year around the state and a 95 percent satisfaction rate among students and parents. He said there are many students who are enrolled in the school who would have never received their high school diploma if it weren’t for Provost.

“It’s like how do you measure success, sometimes it’s not always with test scores, itis how we impact children’s lives for the rest of their lives,” he said.

Johnson said students who have a choice in their education do better and care more about getting their diploma. “All my students have asked to be at the school, and I think when kids have a buyin to their school, they do better,” Johnson said. “For the first time, high school students, which I think are young adults, can have a choice and voice in their education.”

Academic advisors keep parents informed on how their kids are doing and keeps the kids on their toes. And for skeptics who believe the one-on-one interaction among kids is something they need, Hickman said she actually gets to know people better attending Provost then she would at a regular school.

“It’s not like I am only seeing my friends for five minutes in between classes,” Hickman said. “You really get to know people through email and chatting with each other, and then exchanging numbers and going to the movies or the mall together.”

Johnson said relationships are a critical component to the academy, so they schedule events in different areas of the state for students to attend, including dances like traditional high schools and family nights for parents to meet other students as well as their kids’ advisors and instructors. This year, they’ll have a junior/senior day at Carowinds.

“We have found that many of our students host their own events for other students,” Johnson said. “Two students on their own even had a slumber party for other students like in a traditional school.”

While their goal for next year’s enrollment was 2,500, Johnson said they might not see the school grow that large because of funding. “When we started, we wanted 1,000 students the first year, and we met that goal in the first two months,” Johnson said. “While 1,500 is now our goal now for next year, there is still that need to provide quality education for each student.”

Hickman said the budget restraints have not affected her education and the school will only improve. “We are getting more clubs, more extracurricular activities, more subjects and more social with more people becoming involved,” she said.

For parents and students who want more information about the Provost Academy, visit the school’s website at sc.provostacademy.com or call them at 877-265-3195.