Long Beach Learning Centers

First in the nation academy developed entirely around the idea and the use of the Educational Agent located in Long Beach, California. This is considered the primary education branch of Warp Drive Tech.
While they are listed as a K-12 academy the notion of numerical grades is left at the door. Kids come there to play and learn, and learn as they play. There are plenty of Mentors, but no teachers. Ane moms are sprinkled around the building and grounds.
To the visitor the place does not look like a school and that is the idea. Seating charts, regimented order, and fixed curriculums are not present. What is present are countless computer carrels. Long Beach is currently running the largest educational agent network in the world. They can handle 24,000 students and are still expanding. 
Also present are large airy spaces flooded with sunlight, plenty of opportunity to go outside and lab spaces that some colleges would kill to get. No dumbed down science here. The chemistry lab has real chemicals, the kind that makes Mothers Against Everything suck up their splicers. Fully equipped shops and raw materials are present as well. Any one of any age can participate. If they need a helping or guiding hand it is supplied. "No, you can't do that" is not uttered. Toys, the creative kind are available in plenty. Lego, erector sets, (with the motors) and other construction toys are supplied. 
The gem however is the Educational Agent. The computer screens entice the student no coercion present or required. Nanilan runs the Learning Center from behind the screens. Yes it is big enough it has an AI, Ane Kernel. 
The Educational Agent also allows for home study nearly as good as on site. A Child not up to the social scene today? They can study at home provided you have enough computer. And they are handing out the computers. 
==Reaction==
Mothers Against Everything are not the only one sucking splicers, the Teachers' unions of the Greater Los Angeles school district and the Long Beach school district are sucking so hard they are talking out their asses.
Why? The Learning Center is a threat to their very way of life. If it becomes the norm they will have to change or retire. And the union would rather see children suffer than have to change.
On the gripping hand the parents of the kids lucky enough to get into this place cannot say enough. Their enthusiasm is catching and more Learning Centers both locational and Home study are in the works. Long Beach Learning Center has a 4000 child waiting list and is building as quickly as possible. New classes are filled by lottery. Forty eight sites are currently open. Enrollment per site is limited to 500 to keep things manageable. Eight more sites are planned to open in 2017.
The popularity of the Learning Center is at this point impacting the public school system. They have neither asked for, nor received public funds. It is funded by the Corps of Discovery Academy and tuition.
Another reaction has been a proliferation of other privately run Learning Centers. Everything from tony prep focused Learning Centers to those mixed with religious themes, and Learning Centers with magic aware training as well. Requests for a science free educational agent have been met with derision. Those that hate science are finding you need a lot of it to build an educational agent.
This trend has not been limited to Los Angeles. Other cities are growing Learning Centers as well. Generally the more cosmopolitan the city the more likely you get Learning Centers. The format does not lend itself to the limitation of knowledge. It is not popular in theocracies or totalitarian states.
Category:Education
Category:Long Beach
Category:Technology
Category:CoD
Category:Earth Gazetteer