VIRTUAL SCHOOLS IN THE U.S.: Directory and Performance Review (2016 Update)

Record: Gary Miron and Charisse Gulosino, Virtual Schools Report 2016: Directory and Performance Review. Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center, (2016). [Available Here]

Introduction: This report is the fourth in an annual series published by the National Education Policy Center (NEPC). The first report in 2013 was followed by the 2014 report (reviewed here) and the 2015 report (reviewed here). I recommend reading the previous reviews first since this post will only cover the information that is new for 2016.

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ONLINE CHARTER SCHOOLS: Evolution and Concerns

Record: Lisa H. Waters, Michael K. Barbour, and Michael P. Menchaca, “The Nature of Online Charter Schools: Evolution and Emerging Concerns” in Educational Technology & Society 17, no. 4 (2014): 379-389. [Full Article]

Summary: Waters is a Technology Integration Specialist at Flint Hill School in Oakton, Virginia. Barbour is the Director of Doctoral Studies for the Isabelle Farrington College of Education and an Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut. Menchaca an Associate Professor with theDepartment of Learning Design and Technology at the University of Hawaii. Their goals for this literature review are to:

1. Provide a definition for online charter schools.
2. Describe how online charter schools have evolved.
3. Explain how they operate.
4. Discuss emerging concerns such as governance, funding and effectiveness.

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VIRTUAL SCHOOLS IN THE U.S.: A Comprehensive Analysis, part 2

Record: Alex Molnar, ed., Virtual Schools in the U.S. 2014: Politics, Performance, Policy, and Research Evidence (Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center, 2014).  Available here.

Summary: This post summarizes the second of three sections of this report.  For a summary of section one, which surveys recent legislative activity concerning virtual schooling, click here.  For a summary of section three, which provides data about the number of online schools and the type of students attending them, click here.

Section two surveys the research literature on virtual schools.  It was written by Michael K. Barbour of Sacred Heart University.

Barbour begins with the general statement that despite the fact that we’ve had 20 years now of virtual schooling, the research base for this form of education remains very weak. 

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VIRTUAL SCHOOLS IN THE U.S.: A Comprehensive Analysis, part 1

Record: Alex Molnar, ed., Virtual Schools in the U.S. 2014: Politics, Performance, Policy, and Research Evidence (Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center, 2014).  Available here.

Summary: This report is the second in a projected annual series of reports published by the National Education Policy Center (NEPC).  The first report was published in 2013 and can be read here.

The 2013 report chronicled the 311 full-time virtual schools enrolling around 200,000 students, 67% of whom were being taught in schools run by Education Managament Organizations, or EMOs.  The largest such organization is K12.  The report also found that despite serving a student population that has fewer Black, Latin@, poor, or special needs children than attend conventional public schools, academic achievement at virtual schools lagged significantly behind brick-and-mortars. 

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND NUTRITION: Comparing Home and Public Schooled Children

Record: Douglas E. Long, Lisa M. Gaetke, Stephen D. Perry, Mark G. Abel, and Jody L. Clasey, “The Assessment of Physical Activity and Nutrition in Home Schooled versus Public Schooled Children” in Pediatric Exercise Science 22, no. 1 (February 2010): 44-59. [Abstract Here]

Summary:  Previously I reviewed a recent article by Cardel et al. that found a sample of Alabama homeschoolers to consume on average 120 fewer calories per day than a comparable group of public schoolers.  That article cited this 2010 piece, which I had previously failed to notice.

In this 2010 article a similar study was conducted to compare the food intake and amount of exercise between comparable groups of home and public schooled children. 

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HOME SCHOOLED CHILDREN ARE THINNER: A Nutrition Comparison between Public and Home Schooled Children

Record: Michelle Cardel et al., “Home-Schooled Children are Thinner, Leaner, and Report Better Diets Relative to Traditionally Schooled Children” in Pediatric Obesity 22, no. 2 (February, 2014): 497-503.  Abstract Here.

Summary:  In this piece 11 authors compare the diets of 47 home schooled children in the Birmingham, AL area with 48 demographically similar children from the same region who attend public schools.

Going into the project the authors wondered, given that both homeschooling and childhood obesity have grown markedly since the 1970s, if homeschooled children might be more prone to obesity. 

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RELIGION, VOLUNTEERING, AND EDUCATIONAL SETTING: How Does Homeschooling Impact Civic Engagement?

Record: Jonathan P. Hill and Kevin R. Den Dulk, “Religion, Volunteering, and Educational Setting: The Effect of Youth Schooling Type on Civic Engagement” in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 52, no. 1 (2013): 179-197 [Available Here]

Summary:

Hill and Den Dulk, both professors at Calvin College, here present results drawn from the massive National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR) directed by Christian Smith and Lisa Pearce.  Read my summary of an excellent earlier study by Jeremy Uecker using this data set here.

In the piece before us today Hill and Den Dulk want to know whether the type of schooling a child receives goes on to have an impact on that individual’s habits of volunteering in young adulthood, and if so, why.  As the NSYR was a multi-stage longitudinal study of a representative sample of the American population, it can answer this question.

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WHY WE NEED HOMESCHOOLING: Perry Glanzer Critiques Democratic Education

Record: Perry L. Glanzer, “Saving Democratic Education from Itself: Why We Need Homeschooling” in Peabody Journal of Education 88, no. 3 (2013): 342-354.

Summary: Glanzer, an education professor at Baylor University, here argues that homeschooling provides a helpful corrective to reductive definitions of education fostered by some advocates of public schooling.

His fundamental point is that many public school advocates have raised the concept of education for political citizenship to such a high level that it has become something like an established religion. 

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CONFRONTATION AND COOPERATION: Public Schools and Homeschooling

Record: Donna M. Johnson, “Confrontation and Cooperation: The Complicated Relationship between Homeschoolers and Public Schools” in Peabody Journal of Education 88 (2013): 298-308. [Preview here]

Summary:  Johnson, an education professor at Dakota Wesleyan University, here summarizes a wide range of issues and initiatives connecting homeschooling and public schools.

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My New Article that Reviews ALL the Homeschooling Research

The journal Other Education has just published an article Rob Kunzman and I wrote together titled, “Homeschooling: A Comprehensive Survey of the Research.”  It is the culmination of years of work by both of us compiling every piece of research on homeschooling ever written, culling through them all to select the best material, organizing them into coherent categories, and writing up the results.

Several months ago I reviewed Joseph Murphy’s excellent book Homeschooling in America: Capturing and Assessing the Movement, which is a very thorough review of the scholarly literature.  Our article is not nearly so long as Dr. Murphy’s book and thus it lacks some of the detail he provides.  Anyone interested in homeschooling research should read his book cover to cover and keep it on the shelf for frequent reference.  But despite its length and depth of coverage, there are some topics and a few key studies Dr. Murphy leaves out, and he sometimes fails to differentiate between high and low quality studies or between studies published recently and those published decades ago.  I think our article provides even more breadth and does a better job discriminating between sources.  Plus you can download it for free!  Do so here.

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