Five Important Steps When Launching a Virtual Academy

As the landscape of education continues to shift, influenced heavily by the infusion of enhanced technologies, school districts have begun to embrace alternative approaches to meeting students’ academic needs. One of these areas has been K-12 virtual academies. While this trend is only growing in popularity, there’s still some trepidation and hesitancy from districts on how to launch a virtual academy. With this in mind, this article will explore the five important steps necessary when launching a K-12 virtual academy.

1. Surveying stakeholders

An essential first step when your district has decided to explore the launch of a virtual academy is to understand the needs and expectations of your academic community. This includes students, guardians, staff, and other community members. There are a number of ways to solicit this feedback, from anonymous surveys to town hall discussions.

Often, it can be helpful to “ladder” the escalation of community involvement by starting with an online survey of all stakeholders to allow the district to gain a more holistic insight into the current attitude, hopes, and concerns. Then, once the district has had an opportunity to synthesize this information and research talking points around this feedback, it can allow for more synchronous forms of discussion and development.

2. Evaluating current structures

Once you’ve received feedback from stakeholders, it’s a good idea to evaluate how the current structure and scheduling of your schools can operate with a K-12 virtual academy. Valuable questions to ask include:

• Will your K-12 virtual academy mirror the existing schedule and tap into the use of existing staff members?
• Will your school district try to accommodate more flexible scheduling or look to supplement staff with those experienced in this pedagogical approach?
• If your current structure isn’t as conducive to the launch of the K-12 virtual academy, how does this impact the district’s timeline and necessary resources to effectively implement?

As your school district gains deeper insight into the structures currently in place and how potential shifts to these—as well as scheduling adjustments—can impact the opportunity for educational success in a K-12 virtual academy, strategies can then be implemented to align previously relied-upon brick-and-mortar approaches with the new flexibility of untethered learning experiences.

3. Acquiring the right technology

As your school district combines the knowledge gleaned from stakeholder surveys with an understanding of current structures in place, the transitionary process to launch a virtual academy requires effective technology as a foundation. When evaluating the various virtual classroom platforms on the market, there are a number of important aspects to consider, including a few here:

• Integration: How effectively does your potential virtual classroom platform perform in collaboration with the rest of your tech stack? From your learning management system (LMS) to collaborative tools and other popular educational tools, a highly integrative online classroom platform is a necessity.
• Features: Does the platform you’re considering offer features designed to heighten learners' engagement, such as breakout rooms, in-platform video control, and more?
• Intentional design: Is the virtual classroom platform designed specifically for education? Or is it a square-peg/round-hole alteration of a web conferencing tool for business?
• Analytics: Does the platform provide access to real-time, insightful data that can be used to influence coursework and identify yellow flags for learners who risk falling behind?

4. Digital community building

The shift to a K-12 virtual academy possesses obvious benefits, especially around flexibility and accessibility; however, this does not mean the shift occurs naturally or won’t require modifications. This is evident when it comes to community building for learners, as well as educators. While there are a number of organic ways by which students can build relationships in a physical classroom setting, the same holds true virtually—but must be intentionally cultivated.

When launching a virtual academy, it’s imperative to consider how students can build interactions, both within the coursework and outside of it, to develop a sense of community virtually. Creatively using virtual events, topic-based forums, leveraging audio, video, and chat communications, and more can all help to develop interpersonal connectivity.

5. Training

Last, but clearly not least by any stretch, is the need for training. All stakeholders can benefit from a more thorough understanding of the technology, structure, and community elements involved in a K-12 virtual academy. Making hands-on training readily available to educators, not just around technology implementation but also pedagogical models, best practices, and expert-led insights surrounding virtual learning environments, is vital.

This sort of hands-on training should not be reserved exclusively for educators and staff—students and guardians can also tremendously benefit from a deeper understanding and awareness of their K-12 virtual academy experience.

Bonus step: Selecting a trusted partner

Each of the five steps outlined above is crucial to your school district effectively—and efficiently—navigating the launch of a virtual academy. In addition, having an industry expert who can help guide you through the implementation process and stick around to also share valuable insights around analytics, teaching strategies, and more can take a successful launch and send your K-12 virtual academy experience into the stratosphere.

Are you ready to see how your school district could transform access to top-tier academic experiences with a K-12 virtual academy? Reach out to a Class team member today, and let’s talk next steps.