Welcome to the CT Adult Virtual High School!

The Connecticut Adult Virtual High School (CT AVHS) program, funded by the State’s Bureau of Early Childhood, Career and Adult Education provides students enrolled in Connecticut’s Adult Credit Diploma Programs the option of earning credits online.

The CT AVHS courses are divided into half credit segments and have a seat limit of 24. Students enrolled in a course will have students from any of the other participating Adult Education centers in their class. The teacher of the course is most likely not going to be from your adult education center, but could be from another part of the state. All teachers are CT certified and have familiarity with the adult education community of learners. Course work is just as demanding as face to face classes. Some students find the course work to be a little more demanding of their time and effort. The online courses are designed specifically for the adult education student. All of the courses are designed to include class discussions, assignments, and one-on-one teacher interaction with students, just as you would expect in an on ground course. Teachers have been trained to teach the online course asynchronously, (with the understanding that students will be logged on at different times of the day, and on different days of the week than their classmates, or the teacher). Yes, it sounds tricky – and – yes it does work! Both students and teachers are enjoying it! Each course contains six weeks worth of course material and is delivered in a schedule over an eight week period of time. This allows students a little bit of time to get started and some extra time to finish up their work. Students needing to meet a full credit requirement should be enrolled in both half credit segments of a course. The second segment of each course will begin the week after the first segment ends.

CT AVHS History

Adult Credit Diploma Programs in Connecticut do not have the same resources, community reach, or success.  Web-based distance learning provides Connecticut with the benefit of a system with shared resources that is available to students across the state, regardless of where they are located, or their ability to commute to a traditional classroom setting. The professional development components of this project increase local expertise and standardize educational resources.  The central delivery of student registration, course development, staff development, and program management represent a statewide improvement in learning outcomes, cost efficiencies and program equity.

The Program began in 2002-03 with a charter to create a scalable model for an online program to serve the CT Adult Credit Diploma community. Four LEAs ( Hartford, Vernon, New London and Middletown) participated in a pilot year, from which four online courses and an Orientation to Online Learning course were produced.  In 2003-04 the pilot phase continued with the training of staff, and the delivery of these courses to students from these four LEAs that were enrolled in the ACDP.  A roadmap was produced to outline the CT Adult Virtual High School (CT AVHS) processes. (You will need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to view this document)

Academic year 2004-05 moved the Web Based Learning project out of the pilot phase and into a program trial phase. The Roadmap for the CT AVHS was the foundation for this project design, where the model for developing a statewide virtual high school and the lessons learned from the pilot phase were applied to develop a sustainable structure for the CT AVHS.  The program deliverables were extended to include thirteen LEAs.  Teachers from each LEA were trained to deliver an online Orientation to Online Learning course to their students. Hundreds of students took this course, and subsequently became eligible to enroll in the other online credit courses.  At least one teacher from each LEA was trained to teach online in their certified discipline.  In January of 2005, four full credit courses and six half credit courses—which if taken consecutively across the Spring term equate to 3 full credits—were available to students in the Adult Credit Diploma Program.  A document was also drafted to standardize the curriculum development process for new online courses.   A summer session was also added to the academic calendar.

Academic Year 2005-06 extended the CT Adult Virtual High School to all of Connecticut’s Adult Credit Diploma providers. Orientation to Online Learning is available to all students in the adult education program. For students who wish to continue earning credits online, click on 'courses' to view your choices for the coming terms!

The CT AVHS is helping hundreds of students in Connecticut to earn their High School Diploma, online.

Each participating LEA must have a trained Online Learning Coordinator to administer the program and must assign a trained Mentor to each student enrolled in an online course.  The CTDLC provides this training.