Students at Heritage Peak Charter School in North Highlands go to class when they want, leave when they want and chew gum if they want.
There is no dress code, no designated lunch period and no physical education class on campus.
Yet student test scores and graduation rates have continued to improve at the 4-year-old school, even more so since merit pay for teachers was instituted during the past school year.
Since then there has been a 50-point increase in the school's overall API scores, said Executive Director Paul Keefer. He said 78 percent of 10th-graders passed both the English-language arts and mathematics sections of the California High School Exit Exam on the first try, up from average scores in the 60th percentile in the 2006-07 school year. Thirteen of the school's 80 graduating seniors have been accepted to a four-year college this year, compared with one last year.
It's really true, that one size does not fit all:
Heritage Peak, a public charter school, teaches kindergarten through 12th-graders from throughout the region, using a hybrid model of independent study, home schooling and classroom instruction. The school also has satellite offices in Vacaville and Lodi.
"Our goal is to keep them, get them interested in learning and get them into a four-year university," Keefer said.
Many students come to Heritage Peak because they have failed in a traditional school and need to make up credits, said school board President Sonja Cameron. Most of Heritage Peak's 682 students didn't fit in at other schools, she said. Some were bullied or had behavior problems; others had always been home-schooled.
"We started the school with the idea that one shoe doesn't fit all," Cameron said.
Click here to read the rest of the story.
No comments:
Post a Comment