White Papers & Policy Briefs

Classifying K-12 blended learning
By Heather Staker and Michael B. Horn
As blended learning continues to evolve, so does the research. This white paper provides key definitions related to blended learning and identifies four overarching models, down from six. Find out how blended learning is taking shape in K-12 education.

Flexibility, Innovation Must Guide Implementation of New State Assessment Systems to Measure Mastery of Common Core State Standards
An open letter
A diverse group of over 60 educational leaders representing and working for a variety of organizations, from academic institutions to state boards of education and from foundations to education providers, released an open letter calling for the states and the assessment consortia designing the next generation of assessments to move with all haste to deploy an assessment system that not only explicitly accommodates emerging models of innovative schooling, but also supports them. To read the letter, click here. To add your signature, click here.

Moving from inputs to outputs to outcomes: The future of education policy
By Michael B. Horn and Katherine Mackey
Online learning has the potential to transform the nation’s education system into a student-centric one. But currently the vast majority of policy does not reward operators for moving toward this potential. This policy brief offers insights into how policymakers can change the equation.

The rise of K-12 blended learning: Profiles of emerging models
By Heather Staker
How does blended learning look in the trenches? What tools and policies are making it work? This 178-page white paper reveals 40 organizations that are early blended-learning pioneers and the technology that is leading the way.

Beyond Good and Evil: Understanding the Role of For-Profits in Education Through the Theories of Disruptive Innovation
AEI’s Private Enterprise in American Education Series
By Michael B. Horn
For-profits and nonprofits both have a place in delivering quality education. Education policies should define the desired outcomes from government spending without specifying the process used to achieve those outcomes.

Disrupting College: How Disruptive Innovation Can Deliver Quality and Affordability to Postsecondary Education
By Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn, Louis Caldera, and Louis Soares
Higher education is in crisis across the nation. America’s colleges and universities are strapped for resources, students and families are faced with eye-popping tuition increases, and we are falling behind other developed nations in postsecondary attainment. This paper analyzes how disruptive innovation can bring quality and true affordability to higher education.

The rise of K-12 blended learning
By Michael B. Horn and Heather Staker
Online learning is sweeping across America, and it’s no longer only a distance-learning phenomenon. Most of the growth is in blended-learning environments, which are defined and chronicled in this report. As blended-learning grows, it has the potential to transform America’s education system into one that offers more personalized learning approaches for all students.

Rethinking student motivation: Why understanding the ‘job’ is crucial for improving education
By Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn, and Curtis W. Johnson
What job might students hire schools to do? This white paper, an excerpt from the 2^nd edition of Disrupting Class, seeks to understand this crucial question and unearths some surprising conclusions on the road to better motivating students to learn.

Virtual Schooling: Disrupting the Status Quo
By Michael B. Horn
Ever since the creation of the Florida Virtual School in 1997, Florida has been among the nation’s leaders in the fast-growing online learning movement. This policy brief discusses how to use online learning, a disruptive innovation, to transform the education system into a more student-centric one.

Case Studies

AlphaSmart
By James Sloan
Too many products fail because companies don’t understand the job their customers are trying to do. Read about how AlphaSmart nailed the job for elementary school teachers and scaled across the country.

The engine behind WGU
By Heather Staker
What can the K-12 sector learn from WGU about how to set up an information system for a competency-based model? Read this case study to find out.

Advanced Academics: Pioneering an innovative teaching model
By Katherine Mackey
This case study explores the future of teaching by looking at how one online school, Advanced Academics, has rethought the current teaching model in a radical–and liberating–way.

Providing ACCESS to Alabama: Connecting rural classrooms through distance and online learning
By Heather Staker and Andrew Trotter
One-third of Alabama’s K-12 students live in rural areas. The state has struggled to provide them with advanced courses, foreign languages, and electives. This case describes how the ACCESS Distance Learning program has mobilized online learning to equalize learning opportunities for students across the state.

Implementing Apex Learning: A comparison of online-learning programs in three school districts
By Katherine Mackey
This study examines the various ways that three districts–Auburn School District in Auburn, Wash., Volusia County Schools in Volusia County, Fla., and Wichita Public Schools in Wichita, Kan.–are using Apex Learning in their online learning programs to help students who were not being served well by the traditional school system, or who, in many cases, had already left the system.

The North Carolina School Connectivity Initiative: A public-private approach to improving school data networks
By Kerry Herman and Heather Staker
Faced with rural schools and unreliable Internet access, the North Carolina Connectivity Initiative upgraded the state’s K-12 data network in only three years. This case study describes how North Carolina used E-Rate funds and existing networks to improve connectivity statewide.

Wichita Public Schools’ Learning Centers: Creating a new educational model to serve dropouts and at-risk students
By Katherine Mackey
In the fall of 1999, Wichita Public Schools launched a computer-based learning program to help dropouts and at-risk students earn high school diplomas. This case study details the history of the program and the steps to set it up.

VOISE Academy: Pioneering a blended-learning model in a Chicago public high school
By James Sloan and Katherine Mackey
In the fall of 2008, Chicago Public Schools opened a new high school in a poverty-stricken, crime-ridden neighborhood that blended a traditional brick-and-mortar school environment with something much less familiar–a fully online curriculum. This case study details the policies and decisions involved in launching and operating a hybrid school.

Florida Virtual School: Building the first statewide, Internet-based public high school
By Katherine Mackey and Michael B. Horn
From its beginnings with a small $200,000 grant in 1997, the Florida Virtual School has grown to serve over 70,000 students a year. This case study details the policies and decisions that led to this disruptive growth.

Alpine Online School: A Utah school district’s move into K-8 online education, August 2009
By Leland Anderson and Michael B. Horn
In the winter of the 2005-06 school year, Alpine School District decided to form an online K-8 school to support home-schooled students in the district. This case details that decision and the process of launching an online school.

Share this article