Saturday, July 28, 2007

What this BLOG is about... and who it is for.

My name is Pat Parris. I am a Cyber teacher at a school in Pennsylvania. There are 11 Cyber schools in our state. A Cyber school is a school that sends computers to students who then log onto a web based portal to complete their lessons each day. Cyber schools typically pay towards a high speed internet connection as well. All Cyber schools are publicly funded. The funding comes from the school districts that would spend a per capita tuition on that child who is enrolled in the school. Cyber schools do not receive the full state reimbursement. The actual school district that the students live in receives a percentage of the money that would typically be reimbursed wholly to the school district.

My wife and I have home schooled our 5 children since 1983. We currently have three children through college one in college and one caboose of 12 years who is still at home. I am also very proud to say that I have my first grandchild this year. I am a second career teacher with 20+ years in sales and management. I have been a social studies teacher for the past three years. I have taught World
History, US history, World Geography, and Civics. I have also published a BLOG about my study of World History. I currently have been offered a position with the Leadership Center in our school. In this capacity I teach a course about service learning and help out in the administration of our programs and international trips to places like Panama, Quebec, Egypt and China. Students can perform group service learning projects in these countries while they work on their lessons online in our school back in Pennsylvania.

I started this blog because I truly believe that this is an excellent alternative education for many students. I know that this concept is extremely challenging too many people currently involved in education, but nothing great was ever achieved with out some controversy. My hope in posting this BLOG is to provide an open forum for this form of education for supporters and constructive critics of Cyber education. Your post on this Blog may be considered to be part of the American Revolution of Education. :-)

2 comments:

Chrissi said...

Many thanks, Pat, for the advice you left on my blog! I look forward to getting to know more of the teachers and support staff and lending a hand whenever I can! Have an awesome school year!

Chrissi, Cyber School Mom
http://cyberschoolmomdiaries.blogspot.com/

pparris9 said...

Your welcome.

Pat