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Feds Give LAUSD $3 Million to Study Efficacy of Online Credit Recovery Programs

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) has awarded the second largest public school district in the nation, the Los Angeles County School District (LAUSD), a grant of $3.256 million over five years to study the efficacy of online credit recovery classes for high school students.

The nonprofit, nonpartisan American Institutes for Research (AIR) was selected to conduct the research, with Cynthia Lim from LAUSD and Jordan Ricks from AIR as co-principal investigators leading the study. The researchers will “investigate how online credit recovery affects students content knowledge, credit accumulation and graduation,” the grant description explains. They will also compare a blended learning model of online credit recovery courses and face-to-face courses to identify differences in instructional experiences for each.

The study will take place at 15 LAUSD high schools and involve 3,000 sophomore students who:

  • Entered grade 10 for either the 2017-2018 or 2018-2019 school years; and
  • Failed either Algebra I and/or English 9 and require course credit.

Teachers and students in the blended learning portion of study will utilize curricula and content from online course provider Edgenuity, the Los Angeles Times reported.

One of the key outcomes for the study is to advance student content knowledge, the description explains, which will be measured in several ways. For example, researchers will collect and analyze feedback from participating teachers, like surveys and monthly logs. In addition, results from end-of-course assessments and state-issued Smarter Balanced math and English/language arts assessment results will be collected.

To measure student credit accumulation, researchers will utilize districts’ administrative records to gather demographic, enrollment and course data.

Finally, the study will administer a student survey that gauges students’ experiences in their credit recovery course.

About the Author

Sri Ravipati is Web producer for THE Journal and Campus Technology. She can be reached at [email protected].

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