Case Study: East Chicago Central High School achieves higher graduation and EOC pass rates with Edmentum (Plato Courseware)

Blended Learning Program Increases Student Achievement in an Urban Environment

East Chicago Central High School, a 1,578-student urban school with a student body that is 97% minority and 85% eligible for free/reduced lunch, faced chronic credit recovery and attendance challenges that left many students behind on graduation requirements and struggling on Indiana End of Course (EOC) assessments. The administration sought a scalable way to help students make up missing credits and improve EOC performance while accommodating inconsistent schedules.

The school implemented a blended learning credit-recovery program centered on Plato Courseware (including Accucess and math/ELA modules), operating a lab open through the school day and into the evening and pairing software-driven instruction with in-person teacher support. In one year the graduation rate rose from 67% to 79.3%, the program recovered 189 credits since January 2012 (as of March 2013), and previously failing students saw gains on EOCs (34% passed Algebra I and 29% passed English).

East Chicago Central High School

Wendel McCollum

Principal, East Chicago Central High School