Educational Options offered at the Phoenix Center
The Northland Pines Phoenix Center is the Northland Pines School District’s alternative education site and is located in the back parking lot of the High School. This on-campus location presents students with the option to take classes in the high school building. It also allows students to meet with teachers, guidance counselors, attend school assemblies and presentations. Moreover, students at the Phoenix Center are eligible to participate in extracurricular activities.
The Phoenix Center was established in the 2001-2002 school year. It was designed to help students, who, for a variety of reasons, did not fit into the traditional high school setting, and/or have become credit deficient and need some extra help to graduate with their classmates. The goal of the Phoenix Center is to ensure that all students from the Northland Pines School District earn their high school diploma. Note: Students that are enrolled in the Phoenix Center earn the same high school diploma as a traditional Northland Pines student.
The Phoenix Center provides a learning environment in which they feel comfortable and allows them to be successful. The classes are smaller, the issues they’ve had in the past are eliminated, and their course work is geared more toward independent success. Due to the small class sizes, students are able to get the one-on-one attention/help they may need.
Phoenix Center programs: Alternative Education and GEDO-2 (General Education Diploma Option 2). Students enrolled in the alternative education program are about two credits shy of graduating with their class. Forty-five students have graduated from the alternative education program since 2001-2002.
The GEDO-2 program is for highly credit deficient students that are considered very unlikely to graduate. We use the GEDO-2 as a last resort for a student to earn his or her high school diploma. Unless in rare circumstances, a student cannot enter into this program until they reach 17 ½ years of age. Since the 2001-2002 school year, Fifty students have graduated from the GEDO-2 program.
In addition to the Alternative Education and GEDO-2 programs, the Phoenix Center offers a summer work program called S.W.E.E.T. (Students With Educational and Employment Talents). Any student entering grades 10-12 from Northland Pines that is credit deficient is eligible to be in the S.W.E.E.T. program. S.W.E.E.T. is a six week summer work program in which a student can earn one-half to one full credit while being employed. While students learn responsibility and skills that will benefit them beyond high school, our local businesses have a direct impact in helping our students achieve this goal and making this program a big success. This summer marked the fifth year of the S.W.E.E.T. program. Approximately sixty students have utilized this program. This past summer, ten students participated in the program, and all earned high school credit.
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