Young Learners School is a unique program that partners with school districts, Head Start, and licensed early childhood centers. Young Learners has operated as a Charter School since January 2001, serving children in large and small centers through collaborative agreements. Young Learners is currently contracted with two schools districts and is able to serve all qualified students regardless of where they reside. The vision of Young Learners is to extend to our youngest learners a quality education that will prepare them to enter public school on a comparable level with their peers. Young Learners teachers use the Texas Education Agency Prekindergarten and Kindergarten Guidelines, HISD Project CLEAR, Scholastic Early Childhood Program and other supplemental resources to develop weekly lesson plans.
The Young Learners School Collaborative Model provides:
• highly qualified certified teachers and team teaching
• focus on early literacy skills for reading and numeracy
• special education referral processes
• bilingual education,
• collaboration of transitional activities and services to students,
• increased average daily student attendance,
• curriculum alignment
Children, ages 3-4-5-6, have the opportunity to be in a classroom supported by a Young Learners teacher who is degreed and certified to teach in the state of Texas. Students receive a structured pre-kindergarten curriculum and a certified teacher in the classroom on a daily basis which will result in ensuring he/she is more prepared and ready to learn when they transition to public school. All Young Learner teachers meet the Highly Qualified requirement for the State of Texas.
Young Learners School places a teacher or teachers in collaborative partner sites. A collaborative partner receives one teacher for each group of 20 students for ½ day. If there are two groups of 20 students, one Young Learners teacher will stay for a full day, serving one group in the morning and one group in the afternoon. Some collaborative partners have multiple classrooms and receive additional teachers for each group of 20 students.
Each year a collaborative partner agreement is signed by Young Learners and the partner site. This agreement defines the responsibilities of both partners and is effective at the beginning of the upcoming school year (August) and ends on the final day of school.
Young Learners follows the HISD school year calendar with a few exceptions each year. The collaborative partner will receive the Young Learners calendar with their partner agreement. Additionally, the collaborative partner will receive due dates for all required documents and student assessments. Young Learners provides training meetings for Young Learners teachers each month. Collaborative partner staffs are welcome to be a part of those training meetings. The training schedule is provided to partner sites.
Young Learners has a Professional Development Department, which provides trainings for collaborative partners, and for the community. Young Learners is registered with the State of Texas for Continuing Professional Education (CPE) and can provide required re-certification hours for certified faculty and staff. Additionally, Young Learners partners with Texas Southern University to provide continuing education units (CEU). The Professional Development Department has several prepared trainings available or will customize a training topic for you.