Giving Compass' Take:

• Accelerate to Graduate is a pilot program at Iroquois High School in Louisville, Kentucky where they provide courses for young adult refugees to enroll in with the goal of obtaining enough credits to graduate and receive a high school diploma. 

• How will this approach help refugees to be in control of their education? Are other refugee programs following similar models? 

• Learn how other organizations are supporting refugee education by providing access to online courses. 

Innocent is one of the fastest students in the class. When I need to get something somewhere in a hurry, he is the man for the job. I call his name, explain the task and hand him the book to return to the library or the cord to the computer needed in a room one floor below. He accepts the task with a smile and flies there and back in an amazingly short amount of time. When he returns to class he quickly picks up where he left off on his lessons and begins working.

Innocent is 20 years old and one of 10 children. His family immigrated to the United States a year ago as refugees from a war-torn country. He is currently enrolled in Accelerate to Graduate (A2G) which is a program being piloted at Iroquois High School in Louisville, Ky, where I teach. The program is designed in response to young adult immigrants enrolling in our district with hopes, but little expectation of earning a high school diploma—the minimal entry point for most jobs and higher education in the United States.

This program was envisioned to provide a pathway to high school graduation for immigrants and refugees who are past the traditional high school ages of 14-18. A performance-based program, it is designed to provide concentrated lessons in English language acquisition and core content areas such as math and history.

The key to the program is that once students meet the essential standards for core content classes, they complete the course and are enrolled in additional courses without having to wait for the next semester.

With this program, we seek to put students back in control of their learning by providing a differentiated, rigorous program to prepare them for graduation.

Read the full article about project-based learning program for refugees by Donna M. Neary at EdSurge