ACCESS

ACCESS, or Alabama Connecting Classrooms, Educators, and Students Statewide, is an online learning initiative implemented by the Alabama Department of Education to give students and teachers a greater opportunity to learn. ACCESS bridges the gap between what individual schools can provide their students, and what students want or need to know. Courses available to Alabama public high school students include Advanced Placement, elective, and other courses that might not otherwise be available. It is an especially valuable tool in rural areas where the opportunity for learning may not be as great. It is an innovative program that provides an example for other online learning tools. 

ACCESS also provides opportunities for the educators who teach the online courses. The program provides qualified E-teachers from ACCESS site schools to deliver to online class to areas that otherwise would not have access to the course or a certified Alabama teacher to direct it.  ACCESS is a wonderful tool for students in Alabama hoping to make the most of their high school educations. However, many students don't know of the opportunities the innovative program has to offer. When I attended high school my classmates and I had no idea what we could be doing with our education. Instead we settled for what the schools in my rural town had to offer. We weren't slighted in any way, but it would have been nice to know what other opportunities were available to us through ACCESS. As a teacher, I would always make sure my students knew about the chance they had to further their education through ACCESS. It is a blessing to teachers to see students with a thirst for knowledge, and ACCESS is a tool to aid students in quenching that thirst beyond what I could give them.