Dear Ignite Christian Academy Families,
Welcome to the 2011-2012 school year at Ignite Christian Academy! I hope you have had a profitable summer and have taken the opportunity to provide educational opportunities for your child. Our school continues on the path of implementation of new ideas, policies, and methodologies to help your child grow academically and increase the value of the education received at ICA.
There have been several changes implemented over the past year, and I want to take a few moments to share those with you.
This summer we have added the new position of Academic Advisor for 9th-12th grade students. These advisors focus on each student in those grades and make regular contact with your child to advise, assist, and encourage your child in his or her schoolwork.
We also began the path toward online classrooms in the spring of 2011. During this time we offered real-time concept courses through a virtual smart board, WiZiQ. This program showed instant success, and we are excited to continue these courses throughout this school year. We have moved from the WiZiQ platform to the WebEx platform and believe this will be a great help to our students.
Currently, we have two types of online classes. We have live classes, and we are working on recorded classes as well. Live classes are not recorded and are only available at the actual time of presentation. Recorded classes are stored and available for download at your convenience. I encourage you to have your child take advantage of these classes to receive direct instruction from a qualified teacher.
We have also changed a few policies of which you as parents need to be aware:
1) Project Grading: Projects are graded in the order they are received. Many projects are demanding of teacher time in grading. We do our best to get projects graded within 48 hours, but during periods of time when an unusually high number of projects come in, this may not always be the case.
2) Project Completion and Unblocking of Tests: All projects within a unit must be completed and graded prior to the test being unblocked for the student. (Keep in mind the project grading policy.) This assists in maximizing the learning and application of the concepts within the unit prior to taking the test and allows students to access teacher feedback on projects before testing those concepts. Students may not be working in more than one unit at a time in any course.
3) Quiz Retaking Policy:
a. Alternate quizzes – If available, the student may request an alternate quiz to increase his or her score for any quiz. These quizzes are averaged with the original quiz score.
b. Original quizzes – If there are no alternate quizzes within the unit, the student is allowed to have one quiz cleared and reset per unit. This includes resetting for accidental completion of quizzes and technical difficulties. Students who have continuous technical difficulties need to contact technical support to resolve the issue.
c. Alternate Tests – In courses where alternate tests are provided, any student who wants to improve a score may ask for an alternate test to be assigned. This score is averaged with the original test score. Students need to be mindful of accidental completion of tests as these completions negatively affect their scores for that unit.
Again, welcome to the 2011-2012 school year! We are excited about the opportunity to partner with you for the education of your child.
God bless,
Deborah K. Secord, Ed.D.
Principal