The landscape of Colorado's online schools has experienced dramatic changes in recent years. The number of online schools has increased and student enrollment has grown from 3,248 in 2003-2004 to 16,464 in 2011-2012. This study seeks to gain a better understanding of online learning and previous experiences in brick-and-mortar classrooms from the perspective of high school students and parents of students in kindergarten through 12th grade.

Colorado has created evaluation rubrics for principals, teachers and nine categories of specialized service professionals designed to capture evidence of professional practices relating to effectiveness. The performance management system includes electronic interfaces and data collection tools for the evaluation rubrics, measures of student learning/outcomes, final effectiveness ratings, and reports with useful and actionable feedback for educators....