Following a temporary digital learning model, Edina High School has decided to offer online classes to students in the 2021-22 school year. The new virtual course offerings operate within Edina Public Schools rather than a separate entity or organization. Students will be able to take courses taught by EHS faculty within an asynchronous and synchronous learning environment, allowing students more flexibility within their schedule. 

“We’ve had to think about schools a bit differently, and we’ve learned through this process that we can have a combination of those things that work really well in a traditional sense [in addition to] the flexibility of online learning,” Principal Andy Beaton said.

The availability of online courses are fully determined by the students and their registration preferences. If registration reveals that the number of students is far below the traditional 30:1 teacher ratio, the course may not be offered in a virtual model.

Students now have the opportunity to take both in-person and online courses within the same schedule, markedly different from the full hybrid or online models of the 2020-21 school year. “We knew that we wanted to have online opportunities next year, so we started to talk to teachers about which classes they felt were appropriate to offer [online],” Beaton said. This discussion ultimately led to proposing both online and in-person course offerings for the 2021-22 school year. “We didn’t want to force kids to choose ‘all or nothing,’ I wasn’t interested in saying that if you had to take an online course, it would have to be all online,” Beaton said.

Registration information can be found on the EHS registration page and the specific online course offerings can be found on the course catalog website. Registration closes on Feb. 17 for current EHS students.