From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An alternative school (sometimes called a minischool), is an educational establishment with a curriculum and methods that are nontraditional.^[1] These schools have a special curriculum offering a more flexible program of study than a traditional school.

Many such schools were founded in the United States in the 1970s as an alternative to mainstream or traditional classroom structure.^[2] A wide range of philosophies and teaching methods are offered by alternative schools; some have strong political, scholarly, or philosophical orientations, while others are more ad-hoc assemblies of teachers and students dissatisfied with some aspect of mainstream or traditional education.

In education, the phrase alternative high school, sometimes referred to as a minischool, is "any junior high school, high school, senior high school, or secondary school having a special curriculum offering a more flexible program of study than a traditional school." ^[3] An alternative high school serves as an addition to a larger traditional junior high school, high school, senior high school, or secondary school.

Sometimes, particularly in the United States, the phrase alternative high school can refer to a school which practises alternative education. This is a much broader use of the term, covering all forms of non-traditional educational methods and philosophies, including school choice, independent school, homeschooling, and alternative high school. However, even the narrower usage of the term may refer to a range of school type such as a school with an innovative and flexible curriculum aimed at bright, self-motivated students; a school intended to accommodate students with behavioral problems; or a school with special remedial programs.^[4]

Magnet schools are public alternative schools which offer innovative courses, specialized training, etc., in order to attract students from a broad urban area and thereby help to desegregate schools.

• Alternative education
• Continuation high school
• Education
• Free school
• Gifted education
• Liberal arts college
• Private school
• Public school
• Special education
• Unschooling

1. ^ http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alternative%20school Definition of alternative school, accessed August 9, 2007
2. ^ Alternative Schools Adapt, by Fannie Weinstein. The New York Times, June 8, 1986, section A page 14.
3. ^ http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alternative%20school
4. ^ Changing Perspectives on Alternative Schooling for Children and Adolescents With Challenging Behavior, Robert A. Gable et al. Preventing School Failure, Fall 2006. Volume 51, Issue 1, page 5.

• Iowa Association of Alternative Education
• International Association for Learning Alternatives

• Claire V. Korn, Alternative American Schools: Ideals in Action (Ithaca: SUNY Press, 1991).