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The field of education is constantly innovating as schools across the country search for the best ways to improve learning for each student. On the TLA Blog, The Learning Accelerator team and guest experts investigate and help you navigate the latest research, commentary, and useful tools to push the field forward.
3 Ways to Improve Accessibility in Virtual Learning Environments
by Nate Kellogg on June 30 2023
For students with disabilities, accessibility is a critical issue, but technology has played a significant role in improving access and working to ensure all students get what they need. Given assistive technology’s effect on improving...
Asking the Right Questions to Improve Equity in Virtual & Hybrid Learning
by Nate Kellogg on June 27 2023
In working to prove their worth in an ever-changing education landscape, virtual and hybrid schools across the country are looking to hone their craft and make improvements. Over the past year at The Learning Accelerator (TLA), we have supported 20...
Improving Teacher Morale in Virtual Schools
by Nate Kellogg on June 25 2023
Teachers have a history of being underappreciated and overworked. Teaching in and beyond the pandemic has been particularly thankless and unsustainable, as schools respond to the unfinished learning needs of their kids while curricula became a...
Learning Alongside Others Sparks Plymouth-Canton’s Virtual Redesign
by Nate Kellogg on June 20 2023
Amanda Pelukas joined Plymouth-Canton Community Schools (P-CCS) in Michigan to transform P-CCS’ Virtual Academy. “COVID remote learning,” as Pelukas described it, needed to improve. Instead of solving the problem on their own, Pelukas and her team...
Perception, Exclusion, and Quality: Virtual Course Access Challenges for State Leaders
by Michael Ham and Nate Kellogg on February 22 2023
With support from the Walton Family Foundation, The Learning Accelerator (TLA) is exploring ways to support State Education Agencies (SEAs) in developing and strengthening virtual and hybrid learning models as part of a broader student-centered...
Articulating the “Why(s)” for Learners: Going Beyond “As Good As” to Demand More Through Virtual and Hybrid Learning Efforts
by Beth Rabbitt on September 21 2022
We’re often asked to explain how virtual learning outcomes compare to those in traditional, analog classrooms. This is a fairly straightforward question to answer based on research: generally speaking (and outside of emergency models launched during...
Clarifying the “What:” Centering Learner Experiences and the Instructional Core as We Define Virtual Learning
by Beth Rabbitt on September 14 2022
Given our lack of unified language, conversations about virtual learning often feel confusing. Is my district’s “hybrid” learning your school’s “simultaneous” instruction? Has one state codified policy for “blended learning” in a way that looks a...
What We’re Learning About Virtual Learning
by Beth Rabbitt on September 7 2022
In August 2021, our team published Launching Forward, the culmination of our six-monthlong Hop, Skip, Leapfrog project. Hop, Skip, Leapfrog aimed to identify, codify, and make sense of new school system strategies and capabilities that emerged...
Flexibility in the Face of Volatility: Three Shifts for Managing Enrollment Fluctuations in District-based Virtual Schools
by Rashida Kimbrue Major & Nate Kellogg on June 28 2022
In response to pandemic-induced school closures, virtual schools across the country saw enrollment rates skyrocket. At Highline Public Schools’ Highline Virtual Academy in Washington state, for example, enrollment increased from 200 students in...
New Tools Support Our Strategy Lab: Virtual & Hybrid Cohorts
by Beth Holland on June 9 2022
In March 2022, The Learning Accelerator (TLA) launched the first of three Strategy Lab: Virtual & Hybrid cohorts to tackle the challenge of developing more effective, engaging, and equitable virtual or hybrid learning environments. Working through...