How Opening the Door To Blended Learning Changed the Game for One Former Virtual School

Springs Studio for Academic Excellence doesn’t operate like most K-12 schools. Formerly known as Falcon Virtual Academy, Springs Studio, located in Colorado Springs, transitioned from a fully virtual school into a school that provides various innovative and engaging blended learning opportunities, from one-on-one tutoring sessions to project-based activities.

With the help of Fuel Education, a blended learning curriculum that provides digital learning solutions for pre–K through 12th grade, Springs Studio took the leap into the blended learning world in an effort to set itself apart from competing virtual schools in the state and more importantly, introduce a new world of learning to its students.

“The goal was to bring back enrollments, but that’s just not the case anymore. We’ve done that 10 fold and we could expand exponentially but our true goal was to get really good at what we do and not just round up a ton of enrollments,” says Dave Knoche, principal of Springs Studio for Academic Excellence.

With only about 100 students enrolled in Springs Studio at the beginning of the re-brand, the school first introduced blended learning once a week through what the school called “iLearning” days.

“We didn’t want to promote isolation so we were giving one day in the building for every level. What we did was build really high level, engaging stuff to do with kids to get them in and work on those 21st century skills,” says Knoche. “It was about collaboration, having fun, engagement and getting together and experiencing what life in a school and in a virtual school could be like and we had phenomenal results. We couldn’t get our kids out of the building.”

Shortly after introducing iLearning days, the school noticed a 30% increase in achievement in students who were leveraging both Fuel Education and the iLearning days.  At this time, 85% of Springs Studio’s students were still fully virtual, with only 15% participating in the iLearning days. In an effort to turn that number around, the school had to define blended learning, in contrast to fully virtual learning, to prospective students.

“All of our families and students coming here wanted that blended model; they didn’t want the virtual model as much. Some people who were not from virtual worlds saw Falcon Virtual and the word virtual and thought ‘I don’t want my kids staring at a screen all day.’ So if you are going to move in a direction of bringing blended learning to the masses, you have to break down the perception of what a virtual school is,” says Knoche.

Springs Studio has now grown to about 522 students, with about 85% of K-5 students, 100% of middle school students and 80% of high school students participating in blended learning.

It is important to note that part of what has led to the success of Springs Studio is not only the learning opportunities provided in the building, but also the learning opportunities provided by Fuel Education.

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