MASSP News Center

Dear Educator:

The purpose of this letter is to seek input regarding your school’s interest level in participating in a unique no-cost online pilot program that promotes rigorous scholarly research opportunities for select high school students. Michigan Virtual School (MVS) has developed the new Online Scholars Community Advanced Research (OSCAR) opportunity that allows small groups of students (teams) from different high schools throughout Michigan to pursue in-depth academic research on a variety of contemporary topics under the direction of a highly qualified online instructor.

The OSCAR experience is designed to be rigorous and to provide high achieving students with a unique scholarly opportunity to use Internet-based tools for research, communication, collaboration and publishing. All OSCAR course sections include:

• Introduction to research and research methods
• Engaging activities designed to build virtual teaming skills
• Focus on the important topic of plagiarism
• Strategies to help students validate online content and media resources
• Opportunities to learn about the appropriate use of copyright material
• Advanced student use of Internet-based search tools and information resources
• Opportunities to develop and practice 21st Century learning skills (such as critical thinking, problem solving, online collaboration, and media literacy)

The student research teams will develop a hypothesis, settle upon the appropriate methodology, collect data, and generate data supported conclusion(s) in a formal research paper. The student teams will also use Internet-based tools and resources to publish their findings. This one-semester experience can satisfy a student’s need to complete the new online learning requirement and/or enable a student to earn additional course credit in math, science or other content areas.

Please send an email message to Mr. Tim Lewis, Program Manager at MVU (tlewis@mivu.org) to indicate your interest in participating in our fall pilot prior to June 15, 2007 so we can better prepare for the size and scope of our pilot. Do not hesitate to contact me directly if you have any questions or need additional information at (517) 324-5360 or via email at jfitz@mivu.org.

Sincerely,

Jamey Fitzpatrick
President & CEO