Redwood Academy—looking towards the future
Redwood Academy of Ukiah, established in the year 2000, is a free local charter school serving grades 7-12. This year, it has been offering a unique approach to distance learning. The Redwood Academy staff worked through the summer designing an innovative response to the needs of its approximately 140 college-bound middle and high school students. Using a model pioneered by Colorado College, students, in general, are taking only one core course at a time for a period of four to five weeks. Students rotate every four weeks or so to complete at least four core academic classes each semester. This concentrated approach has allowed students to engage meaningfully with one teacher and one subject at a time. Currently, all students at Redwood Academy have access to small socially-distanced support groups on campus if they are in need of extra guidance or a quiet place to work. In addition, Redwood Academy’s juniors and seniors continue to have access to the school’s College Program where they can choose to take Mendocino College courses each semester alongside their Redwood Academy classes.
With the second semester already underway, Redwood Academy, like other area schools, is looking forward to the addition of hybrid learning this spring. In this model, students will continue to take one class at a time, allowing student groups to remain stable and minimizing the number of contacts for each student. All students will still be able to choose whether they want to come to campus or learn from home. In both cases, whether in person or online, students will continue to learn together and benefit from daily live instruction with their current teachers.
With the end of this pandemic in sight, Redwood Academy will also begin enrolling students for the 2021-22 school year in February, and plans to resume its full on-campus college preparatory program whereby students take classes on campus daily in a block schedule that mirrors the scheduling students will see at most colleges and universities. Through this pandemic and beyond, Redwood Academy remains a small school for big thoughts—a place where students and teachers care about each other and work together to build understandings about themselves and the world around them. For more information about enrolling, call our office at 707-467-0500 or check our website at www.caredwoods.org.