10 Years of Re-Imagining the Pathway to a High School Diploma

On any given day in the United States, more than 2 million young people who should be building their futures are instead seeing limited horizons because they dropped out of high school. In hopes of giving these young Americans a last chance at a diploma, Dr. Joseph Wise and a group of reform-minded educators and investors founded Acceleration Academies a decade ago. 

The network has grown from the first academy in Washington State to include 22 campuses operating in Florida, Nevada, Georgia, South Carolina, Texas and, most recently, California — boasting thousands of graduates and currently supporting 5,000-plus students on their educational journeys.  

Those numbers will only grow, as more public school districts invite Acceleration Academies to partner with them in re-engaging students who have dropped out, are at risk of dropping out, or simply need a personalized program with a flexible schedule. 

“There’s always a population of young people where the traditional model doesn’t really work for them,” says Kelli Campbell, an EdTech pioneer who was named CEO of Acceleration Academies in November 2023. “It’s challenging for the school districts to create something that’s unique and flexible. We can do that.” 

The benefit of earning a high school diploma is clear: Over the course of their lifetime, each graduate earns at least $305,000 more than a classmate who dropped out. Economic and societal impacts more than double that number, federal figures show. Each grad also saves society $345,000 in reduced reliance on public assistance, lower health care expenses and lower rates of incarceration. Their futures shine brightly. 

Acceleration Academies is the brainchild of Wise and David Sundstrom, veteran educational leaders who conducted a national research study of 6,000 high school dropouts and saw the need for a different way. While many assume that those who dropped out lacked intelligence, drive or a sense of purpose, their research proved otherwise. 

“It was not because the kids were consciously choosing to reject what was on the table for them. It was just the opposite — they felt they had been rejected by a system that didn’t want them,” say Sundstrom. Wise adds, “ ‘They said, ‘Don’t call us dropouts. We were pushed out. The system pushed us out.’ ”

Public schools are, by necessity, designed to educate large groups of students in largely the same way. Students attend from morning to afternoon, juggle multiple courses, and cluster in classrooms where teachers are hard-pressed to provide individual attention. 

The founders of Acceleration Academies determined that a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t meet the needs of all learners, including ones who badly want to succeed.  

Students who must work during traditional school hours to support their families, suffer from social anxiety, need more one-on-one support, work best when focusing on one course at a time, or want to accelerate their studies and move on to post-secondary education, military service and the workforce — all cry out for a different approach. 

“Is there a better way to do this work?’ ” says Wise. “Unquestionably, Yes!” 

‘How Can We Help You?’ 

In 2014, the first Acceleration Academy opened its doors in the Bethel School District south of Seattle, Washington. 

For Kevin Torres, an idealistic young teacher, the newly opened Bethel Acceleration Academies (BAA) provided an opportunity he had not found in traditional public schools — the chance to work with students one-on-one, in a way that fit their unique needs. 

“I was so jaded by public school at the age of 24 that I was going to leave education and go into financial planning,” recalls Torres, who began as a social studies coach and is now academy Director. But at BAA, he and his colleagues were able to say to students, “You aren’t on pace to succeed but we want to change that — how can we help you?” 

Walk into any Acceleration Academies campus and you will find a place that bears scant resemblance to a traditional school. Instead of navigating bustling hallways and desk-lined classrooms, young people settle into comfortable chairs in a bright and cheerful cafe-style setting to work with educators, small groups of classmates and by themselves. 

The academies are located in spots that offer easy access to public transportation, social services and food. Learners are invited to take one subject at a time, moving on only after they’ve demonstrated mastery. And because the coursework takes place via an online learning platform, students can access their courses when they’re away from an Acceleration Academies site — at home or anyplace where there’s a wifi connection. 

At the same time, academy leaders know there’s no substitute for face-to-face tutoring and support, and students are expected to spend time each week on campus. To accommodate a variety of needs and keep learning going without interruption, the academies are open year-round, with hours that begin in the early morning and extend into the early evening. Educators also make themselves available by phone or video conference after-hours and on the weekends. 

Even the vocabulary is different. Instead of “students,” those who attend Acceleration Academies are invited to call themselves “graduation candidates” (“GCs” for short) to remind them of their goals. The state-licensed teachers are known as “content coaches” to recognize the personalized approach each takes to helping each GC grow academically. 

Acceleration Academies educators recognize that students are hindered not only by academic challenges, but also by personal ones. Every new GC is asked to complete the Graduation Persistence Index (GPI), a proprietary, research-based tool developed by Acceleration Academies to take stock of non-academic challenges and make a plan for overcoming them. 

Career and life coaches (known as guidance counselors in traditional schools) help young people work through social and emotional issues; find aid for housing, food and child care; apply for internships and map out plans for college, trade school, military service or well-paying jobs. Graduation candidate advocates (GCAs) serve as mentors and motivators  for GCs at every step of their journey. 

This structure is no accident; instead, it is rooted in the original research on what leads a traditional student to reject education. From lighting to seating, from location to language, everything about an Acceleration Academies campus is designed to provide a welcoming alternative to the schools from which GCs came. 

“At Acceleration Academies, it really is personalized to the kind of seat you want to sit in,” says Mark Graves, Executive Vice President and Chief Engagement Officer. When Graves approaches school districts about giving Acceleration Academies the chance to reach disengaged learners, he tells them: “We’d like to partner with you to inspire them to take advantage of a second chance, to live life to their full potential.” 

‘We Want to Reach Students Where They’re At’ 

The Acceleration Academies network grew slowly but steadily until the 2020 Covid pandemic temporarily shuttered schools and changed the face of public education. 

Many public educators struggled with how to engage students learning remotely, and when they returned to brick and mortar classrooms. By contrast, the leaders and educators of Acceleration Academies had been honing their skills for years at motivating and supporting students working both from home and in-person. 

The network was so successful at re-engaging learners after the pandemic that, in 2022, Education Week highlighted its success in using a blend of in-person and remote learning to rekindle their enthusiasm. 

“More than two years of academic and emotional disruptions during the pandemic have significantly increased both the number of students who dropped out of high school and the intensity of support needed to get them back on track,” Education Week editor and reporter Sarah D. Sparks wrote in a package of articles carrying the headline Dropouts Now Face a Steeper Climb to Earn a Diploma Post-Pandemic.

“Across the country, more districts are opening or expanding dropout-recovery programs — via district alternative schools, charters and contracted services — and the educators in these programs say they must provide more hands-on care than before the pandemic for students disenchanted with online remote learning,” the article continued. “Acceleration Academies … has seen a dramatic uptick in demand.”

For public school district leaders, the value proposition is clear: Acceleration Academies offer an individualized education at no additional cost to either student or district.

 When an Acceleration Academies campus opens in a district, it focuses on recovering students on that district’s withdrawal list: students who are not showing up for school or who have officially dropped out. 

Academy staff members recruit disengaged students back into education; the partner school district shares a percentage of the per-pupil funding it receives for those students to empower Acceleration Academies to educate them. The district wins in three ways: the number of engaged students participating in education district-wide increases, the funds the district retains finance added educational services district-wide, and — most importantly — more students work toward graduation and move on to meaningful post-secondary pathways, including jobs, technical school, military, and 2- and 4-year year college programs.

In most cases, the academies operate as programs of the district and graduates receive a district diploma. 

Chief Enrollment Officer Lisa Meckley leads a team that uses a variety of tools — email and text messaging, social media campaigns, traditional media outreach, and phone calls — to alert students and families to the opportunities awaiting them. 

When Meckley arrived in late 2021, the enrollment team was reaching disengaged students by visiting their homes, leaving door hangers and making individual phone calls. As the network has expanded, however, she’s led the way to a sophisticated set of outreach tools — targeted emails, phone calls powered by an automated dialing system, an easy-to-use online application, and social media posts that share the stories of success of a growing number of young people at the academies. 

“With two million over-aged and undercredited young adults between the ages of 16-24 in the U.S., there are a lot of people and families that Acceleration Academies can help. You just can’t knock on that many doors,” says Meckley. “Almost all kids have a phone in their hands, as well as their parents. We want to reach the students where they’re at.” 

‘Taking Off Like a Rocket’ 

In recent years, Acceleration Academies has welcomed a new generation of leaders, people with deep backgrounds in non-traditional education, technology — and the ways in which those worlds intersect to offer a distinctly 21st century option. 

Co-founder Steve Campbell will be the first to tell you he came late to the world of education. But when it comes to computer technology, he’s as OG as they come. “I’m 60, and I’ve been programming since I was 10.” 

Campbell helped to develop a number of prominent software systems, most notably the Lending Tree platform that enabled consumers to shop for loans among competing banks. When his attention turned to developing a system for tracking student progress, the company Education Incites was born. His team’s collaboration with Cobb County School District in Georgia resulted in a state-of-the art teaching and learning system that enabled the district to pivot to virtual instruction during the pandemic.

In 2021, Campbell’s firm and Acceleration Academies merged to expand the work of offering a non-traditional high school option that combined deep attention to each student and the technology to track — and accelerate — their progress. 

And the momentum is building; across the nation, school districts, parents and students are intrigued by the unique program and the difference it could make. 

“Now we’re in an era of school choice,” says Campbell. “We’re taking off like a rocket.”

Even in districts with large and thriving alternative education programs, district leaders find that Acceleration Academies can fill an important void. Take, for instance, St. Lucie County Public Schools on Florida’s Atlantic coast. A decade ago, the district had a graduation rate of only 75 percent, putting it in the bottom third of the state’s school districts. Today, it has become one of only three Florida districts to graduate 90 percent or more of its students for 7 consecutive years. 

The dramatic improvement has roots in the commitment by district leaders to identifying struggling students and giving them the support they need to get on track for success. But it doesn’t stop there; since 2016, the district has also relied on Acceleration Academies to reach out to students who had already dropped out in an effort to re-engage them in their education. 

“If there is no coordinated effort to recapture kids who have quit, then we’re failing them twice,” says St. Lucie Supt. Dr. Jon Prince. “With Acceleration Academies, we saw an opportunity to show that all kids matter.” 

As of the fall of 2024, St. Lucie Acceleration Academies has celebrated the graduation of nearly 683 young people who might once have thought a diploma out of reach. A key reason why is that SLAA educators place a premium on keeping students engaged, and in persisting even when a young learner turns temporarily into a “ghost.” 

View photos from St. Lucie Acceleration Academies' May 2024 Graduation →

Amber White, a graduation candidate at St. Lucie Acceleration Academies, disappeared for a time after enrolling in the program. Before long, her phone was abuzz with calls and texts from SLAA Director Paige Latham and her team. “They were really determined for me to come. They kept saying, ‘Where are you? You need to come back.’ ” 

Amber returned, with a renewed sense of purpose. “We’re glad to have you back,” Latham told her. Amber replied, “I’m glad to be back.” 

“The population that we serve, they know how to get lost,” explains Executive Vice President and Chief Education Officer Dr. Margie Sharp. “What we’re trying to do is take this group of kids who have disappeared and re-engage them.” 

To that end, Sharp and other network leaders ask the director of each academy to use the student learning platform — developed by Steve Campbell’s firm and refined at Acceleration Academies — to carefully track each student’s attendance, course progress and overall engagement. 

“The key is not only to implement practices that are effective but also able to track outcomes and then revise practices based on what the data is telling you,” explains Sharp. 

Behind every data point, of course, is a human being. Like so many at Acceleration Academies, the potential to have an impact on the lives of young people is what drew educators like Priscila Alonzo.  

The granddaughter of migrant workers who came from Mexico to the United States in search of greater opportunities, Alonzo grew up in a small South Texas town where most students thought about landing jobs in oil fields rather than moving on to college. 

But a guidance counselor saw her spark and helped her enroll in a program designed to inspire and equip promising teenagers for college. After earning her bachelor’s degree in education at the University of Texas, Alonzo dedicated her career to helping young people see bigger and brighter horizons. 

Today, she leads one of four Acceleration Academies campuses in Las Vegas, Nevada. 

“It’s bringing me back to where I started,” says Alonzo. “So many of these kids struggled in traditional high schools. “Here, anybody who walks in feels like, ‘Ok, I belong!’ ” 

‘We Can Provide the Vision and the Dream’

As Acceleration Academies celebrates its 10th birthday in 2024, the organization has big plans — most notably, impacting more graduation candidates across the country by tripling the number of academies nationwide to 60 over the next few years.

Central to that plan is a system pioneered by Sharp — ”model fidelity” — that ensures each academy deploys the proven educational practices that have thus far produced more than 4,000 graduates.

Every time a new academy opens, a team of veteran educator-coaches trains the new team in the Acceleration Academies model, and then checks in regularly to help fine-tune. 

Miami-Dade Acceleration Academies' third location in Midtown Miami will open in Fall 2024. Here's a sneak peek at this innovative new academy →

That approach is key to the rapid growth the network expects in the years to come. The goal: re-imagining alternative education in a way that uses flexible scheduling, personalized learning and a blend of in-person and remote coursework to provide fresh hope and opportunity to the widest possible range of learners.   

“The company has grown to a place where we have so much confidence in what we are doing. We know that we can make that impact,” says CEO Kelli Campbell. “Now we're ready to bring that impact to more people in more places.” 

For Campbell, the exciting road ahead also represents a through-line from her own past. After growing up in a rural Illinois community as the daughter of parents who didn’t have the chance to finish high school, Campbell became a first-generation high school and college grad and one of the EdTech industry’s leading pioneers. 

“I’m a first generation high school grad and I was able to make my way to being a CEO,” says Campbell. “Any of our graduates can do the same. We can provide the vision and dream to do anything they want to do.”