This includes various local and state staff development workshops with focus on cooperative learning, authentic assessment, and applied curriculum. These professional development activities assure broad-based and uniform familiarity with these topics. In addition to the workshops provided off-site, training in virtual learning is provided at the school for all teachers. A math instructor reported that faculty may spend a summer attending a 60-hour inservice workshop on cooperative learning and applied technology involving mathematics and examining its relevancy to various fields in aerospace technology. Scheduling The academy model and the implementation of VLAs require a flexible and creative scheduling system, allow instructors various forms of collaboration, and provide students with time to work in groups and participate in internships.
Work is organized in academic rotations or individual learning activities.
They brainstorm ways to address the problems assigned to them and divide the work. They can work as a group or individually until regrouping to debrief and assess progress. Then each team rotates to another component of the VLA to focus on a different academic or technical aspect. At the end of the fifth period, the students participate in a debriefing session to assess overall progress and to plan for the next day. To keep all instructors abreast of common progress, the sixth and seventh periods are devoted to planning meetings.