After-school options tackle credit crunch

It’s a familiar tale — Students heading into Grade 12 realize they won’t have enough credits to graduate.

“You wouldn’t believe how many times that happens,” says Frank McCallum, associate principal at Vista Virtual School in Calgary, which offers online and correspondence courses for high school upgrading.

The reasons students need to catch up can vary widely. Some may have missed school due to illness. Others are newcomers to Canada, who need to take additional courses such as English as a second language to keep pace in regular classes.

Some students simply realize the path they’ve chosen isn’t the one they want to pursue after all, so they switch gears and may need more math or science credits, says Elizabeth Gouthro, acting superintendent of instruction services at the Calgary Board of Education.

For whatever the reason, they’re often all a few credits short of the required 100 they need to get their diplomas.

“They realize, ‘I’m only going to have 95, so I need to take credits in some other courses.’

Many of them will go to summer school for that.”

Fortunately, students playing catch up have plenty of options.

“At the Calgary Board of Education, we offer summer school for high school students who live in the Calgary,” she says, adding it’s offered through Chinook Learning Services. “For example, we have had 5,000 students enrolled this summer.”

Another option is Vista Virtual , which also provides online learning experiences.

McCallum says the school, a public program through Alberta Distance Learning, has about 1,800 students enrolled throughout the year.

Bow Valley Community College is another for students. Director of learning resource services Russ Wilde says it’s not uncommon for high school students to take summer courses, evening classes or online courses.

“Our single, fastest growing area is what we call asynchronous learning,” he says.

These online courses frequently offer the right mix of flexibility and independent study for high school students seeking to squeeze a few extra credits into their busy schedules.

This popular style of learning also makes the bulk of the courses offered at Vista Virtual, McCallum says.

“It basically means they have access to the materials and they’re working at their own pace on their own time, so they don’t have to be bound by a particular set of hours,” he says.

While many students are playing catchup, it’s increasingly common for high school students to retake courses they’ve already passed, says Gauthro.

“Maybe they already have a 70 in their math 30, but that might not be a high enough mark for the particular faculty they’re applying,” she says, “so they come back to see if they can raise that mark.”

A few students even take classes on the side because they can’t fit all the required courses into the normal school schedule.

“Increasingly, what we’re seeing is many students don’t want to take all their diploma courses all at once, so maybe they take one course in the summer to make their workload easier,” says Gothro.

“This way, they can devote more time to getting a higher mark.”

It’s about ensuring students have the options to succeed on their own terms, she adds.