Cody Claver, head of the academy. “In our
21st Century Tutor school, it is out of the realm of possibility.”
Study Foresees Rise in Virtual Source: The Christian Science Monitor
Schooling
Sweet Success
Everglades Restoration
Breakthrough
U.S. Sugar, the nation’s largest producer
of cane sugar, has announced that it is
leaving the Everglades, selling nearly
300 square miles of land to the state of
Florida for Everglades restoration. This
solves two major problems at once,
says Stuart Appelbaum, in charge of the
project for the Army Corps of Engineers.
It reconnects Lake Okeechobee to the
Everglades and halts the flow of pollution
from the lake to the Caloosahatchee and
St. Lucie rivers. Activists say that chang-
ing the flow will provide wildlife habitat,
replenish parcel farmland, protect coastal
estuaries, and put the ‘river’ back into the
River of Grass. It’s the largest step for-
ward yet, and a needed jumpstart in the
stalled $10-billion Everglades restoration
project.
Florida Governor Charlie Crist gets
Educators at the Hoover Institute, a credit for the quantum leap forward
conservative think tank at Stanford in proposing the deal. His brainstorm
University, predict that by 2019, half of came in response to the company’s
courses in grades nine to 12 will be deliv- plea of impending financial ruin after
ered online to homeschools and virtual Earthjustice and the South Florida Water
classrooms. Everything from books and Management District determined to stop
microscopes to radish seeds will arrive its corporate practice of backpumping
via brown trucks. Last year, enrollment dirty farm runoff into Lake Okeechobee.
in online classes reached the one million The $1.75 billion buyout plan for 187,000
mark, 22 times the level of 2000, accord- acres will see the sugar growing and
ing to the North American Council for processing operations shut down over
Online Learning. the next five years.
Online learning is proving more effi-
cient than traditional schooling, enabling
teachers to rely on computers for lectur- Olympic Hope
ing, so that they can better attend to stu- Beijing Games Inspire Cuts in
dents’ individual tutoring, mentoring and Pollution
motivational needs. Most states mandate
a minimum quantity of hours of instruc- It’s been a race to clear up Beijing’s
tion. Quality could be better tracked, pervasive air pollution in time for this
proponents admit, perhaps by tracking summer’s Olympic Games, August 8-24.
course materials completed. Judging that poor air quality would pose
At Idaho Virtual Academy, for a threat to athletes’ health, the Chinese
instance, teachers monitor student prog- government has enacted stricter curbs
ress by tracking their performance on on pollutants, including a summer ban
quizzes after new lessons. on construction and heavy industry near
“It’s not overly absurd for a kid to the capital. Thirty companies to date
show up in a bricks-and-mortar school have voluntarily signed on to the ongo-
and do practically nothing,” comments ing Green Commuter Campaign,
August 2008 23
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