Connections AcademyReviews 623

My daughter recently enrolled into connections academy because she was tried of public schools my daughters been an straight A student and when she tends to get a B she completely spazes out, continue the story well I took my daughter out of public school and put her into Connections Academy and it was the WORST! In the beginning it was ok I had contact with the teachers and I thought everything was going well my daughter would wake up stay at home and work she liked it so I did and it wasnt until one day I came home from work and founded my daughter starting to spaz our once again I asked her what happened she said she has Ds Fs and overdue assignments I said that cant be I quickly grabbed the laptop and looked at her grades and it was true I asked her why is it that is it harder and she said they give her test on things she did not learn and when she submits an assignment it comes up as not submited and when she tries to do it again it says that she dose not have access to it I immediately grabbed my house phone and called the school teachers and the tech support but they did NOT get back to me until the next week i completely went off on all of them my daughter is galdly back in regular school and for the distraction she keeps her self busy DO NOT put your kid into connections academy I am very sure there are different and better home schools connexus is NOT one

My story is too long to tell it all, but I have 3 children now enrolled in Ohio Connections and I regret this daily! I never claimed that any of my children were "geniuses" but all four of my children ate extremely bright. With the curriculum and the absence of teaching, my daughter's self-confidence has plummeted! Because I withdrew my children's enrollment in ECOT later in the year, my kids fell way behind, and it seems as though its impossible for them to catch up without completely overloading themselves with work. It was suggested by a teacher, that they add an extra hour or two daily and work on the weekends to get caught up! You as a teacher, don't even work the weekends! I'm disgusted with this school, if you should even call it that! Its simply a program for the rich family that has stay at home parents and no life outside of SCHOOL! I DEFINITELY SONT BE BACK NEXT YEAR!

The teachers do not teach at the level of work that is required for the children. What do these teachers get paid to do? Each course (Math, Science, LA, SS) should have live lesson. The teachers do not aide in teaching the children. I understand on-line school, I get it. However, the system grades the work. The teachers don't really have to be involved with the students. The parents are the teachers. Parents should be involved in their children's education. However, where are the teachers? What part do they really play. Not sure if we will come back next year.

When we came back from overseas (where we spend 12 years in 4 countries) our children joined San Ramon (one of the best school districts in the country) unified school district. We thought the ratings are high and the schools would be at the same level as our previous schools with International Baccaloria curriculum. Well, little have we known. I have to mention that all three of our kids are highly capable (or gifted and talented as it is called here, which I do not like at all!). And they were all placed on the GaTe program but it did not make any difference for them: the work was finished in 5-10 m and they were just left to read books... Our K, 3 and 8 grade children were getting extremely bored and frustrated with the "best" schools. So we moved to California Connections Academy. Our 8th grader said after the first day that these teachers (even being far away) are more alive and interested in what they are doing than those who were in his public middle school.
We finished a whole year with all As and an honour roll. Was not easy, but it was interesting, challenging, fun and fulfilling. We are going back this year. Yes, it is hard to keep with fitness and socialising, yes it has moments of tremendous fatigue for a learning coach but at the end, you have a state of art education and you give your kids the philosophy you believe in. And you start feeling enlighted and embrace being different. Great school! Great teachers! Great support for learning coaches.

I do not take pleasure in pointing out things that can be improved... this is a kind, not upset just very over it. I will say the company or department that processes the enrollment information is a systematic deplorable disappointment... from loosing paper work to inconsistencies with each call is sad. Im not in an urgent situation regarding online education with my children but I cant imagine if I were. I am not sure if Connections Academy is aware of this but. Connexus enrollment staff istruly in need of help. Extreme embarrassment, seriously

It looks like the majority of these reviews were written by students who didn't like taking responsibility for their work and parents who thought they could just leave their kids to their own devices all day (apparently forgetting that they're kids and need supervision?). The school isn't easy--they expect you to actually work and keep up with deadlines. You can't goof off and twiddle your thumbs till the last minute then expect to get the work in. The only time I've been admonished by a teacher was when I tried to put off my work till the last minute, and the quality showed that. I've had no problem socializing because I actually, you know, leave the house and go out once I'm done with assignments. Try joining a team or something. Meet people outside of the computer.

This system of schooling is not for everyone, if you child is committed to school a self-learner and just love learning and is not a social butterfly, this is great but if not you will need your traditional school my middle schooler loves it and never complains about how much work he has he is in sports and it does give him flexibility if you stay on track finish lessons, most LL have a schedule so my review fall under good for my child the software I give it 2 starts..

Our children have been with Oregon Connections Academy (ORCA) since the beginning; 8 years now for our oldest (7th grade)... Assistant principal and home room teacher seem to be backing each other up in blaming a highly motivated student with blocking her own classes. We have spent endless hours with tech support, to no avail. This school will be losing two long term students and yet they seem not to care. I have sent endless webmails to the home room teacher as has my daughter often with no response. Blaming the student for their incompetence does nothing towards wanting to learn! Learning is not their criteria, saving themselves as bad educators seems paramount!

Be careful of this school! Lots of technology problems and very little communication between the different departments. My son loses submitted lessons on a daily basis, which means wait on them to restore them, which they cannot do - or redo them! Puts him further and further behind and discourages his grades. Mark Reider is an awesome teacher there - one of the few that is dedicated and works to help in any way. So grateful we had him this year. But we can't get acknowledgement of the problem from anyone else there or any real help getting it fixed. The principal of the Arkansas school is completely out of touch with what is happening, and the IT department is nonexistent, unfortunately. The association of Arkansas Charter Schools says there is nothing they can do to help! This is where our tax dollars are going, Arkansas!

This school is horrible. They give your child a bunch of work, the portfolios are ridiculous and your child will fall being because it is not at your own pace like they say. We have had a problem with a teacher over stepping her boundaries as a teacher and she even called CPS on our family and said we had a 12 year old caring for our child, which is ridiculous. When I asked how they could come to that conclusion based of a one week 30 minute live lesson I was met with silence. If any of you know how corrupt CPS can be you can understand the severity of the lie that the this school made up on our family. BEWARE of this School. They WILL make up lies and call CPS on you if they feel you are not doing what they want you to do.

A school is supposed to care for your children. This school does not. Your child is literally a number and they do not care about their success. The school principal for Southern California is *. They dropped my son at the end of the year with a month left for school and did not contact us except by mail. The teachers where willing to re-instate my son but she refused. She was rude and lied, saying she had contacted us numerous times. They have several teachers for each student who call for meetings. They only requested for a meeting with my son. They had locked his account months ago and he could not get on line. When he would try to call, no one was available and they would call back at times when he could not answer the phone. They will all try to make you go in a circle and say they all tried to call, but they never give you the proper information until it's too late and you have failed to meet their deadline. This principal should be fired. You do not want to deal with this school if she is employed here.

*Personal information redacted by admin

So many assignments & portfolios, you will NEVER have time for ANYTHING else! I seriously don't know why they offer or arrange for field trips because you'll never have the time to go. They're usually at least 2 hours away or farther! If you happen to go there goes a complete day of doing assignments so you're now behind. Catching up is something you cant do! When i called the teachers for help all we got was a game of phone tag or they were on vacation and no one else could help! My son was on the computer 24/7! Up all night trying to finish assignments usually until 3 a.m.! My son went from A's and B's to some C's but mostly D's! If you care about your child DON'T, Just don't do connections! You will regret it. What a waste of time and energy! Couldn't even finish up with the semester because of all the expectations! My son has never been so consumed with assignments, portfolios, and basically just trying to navigate through the computer program/programs required.

My daughter is in 3rd grade. This is her first year at connections. As we're approaching the end of the year I asked her if she wanted to go back to a Brick and Mortar school and she refuses! She loves Connections Academy as it gives her the freedom to work at her own pace and skip through sections she doesn't need to waste time on. I noticed other reviews say you cannot work at your own pace. THIS is untrue. The day after a lesson is scheduled it WILL say overdue but that doesn't mean much. Just the fact that it's past the day it was scheduled. You can still finish it in your own time. You can always reschedule all of your assignments and that overdue warning will disappear. As long as you finish all of your assignments by the last day of school you're good. Because lets not forget this is STILL PUBLIC school so they do have to follow state requirements.

A lot of the reviews on this page are from students so, parents, take them with a grain of salt and from a child's perspective lol

The teachers and staff are helpful and it's taught her time management and responsibility. It's also given me the chance to be hands on with her education. I know exactly what works for her now, what she excels in and what she needs help with. We'll never go back to B&M schools.

I am an elite athlete and travel a lot nationally and internationally and attending conventional day school is not an option. I also train about 8 hr/day and really do not have any problem completing assigned work. The Connections Academy ( I am with Capistrano) provides me with all necessary tools to be successful academically. I am in a middle school and already take some high school classes. All my instructors are always there to help me and answer all my questions. This school teaches you how to study and how to learn, it teaches you how to organize and prioritize your time, it prepares you for college were you will be required to be independent. If you are a winner - this school is for you!

When my wife and I first discovered Connexus Academy we were lured in by the promise that it was a work at your own pace school. Signing up for the school was difficult because they kept misplacing information that we sent them. I had to upload/mail them my proof of address multiple times before they accepted it. By the time they did accept it my daughter had missed the first semester of school. So she started off behind and never caught up. She's about to fail the first grade even though the grades in her grade book are excellent. So why is she failing? Because of the insane amount of portfolios that this school has my child doing. My daughter doesn't like school anymore. This school took the fun out of learning for my child and when I saw her crying because she didn't want to attend school one day it was my breaking point. Some times we're in front of the computer for 10 hours a day trying to complete every assignment so we don't fall behind.

This is not a work at your own pace school. If you miss one day of school because you're sick or for a family emergency (my brother almost lost his life from diabetes that he did not know he had so I couldn't log my daughter in for a few days because I was out of town.) you'll fall behind and be 8-10 assignments behind. The workload is too much for a 7 year old to handle and I would rather pay out of pocket to send her to a private school before I attempt this one again. My child has never struggled academically before this. Think long and hard before you decide to send your child to Connexus Academy.

Thanks for reading.

Please don't put your twin's in this junk they hate kids and treat parents very bad they say next school your kids will be doing live lesson via website cam invasion of privacy if u ask me that's why I will not return there next year my kids will be doing K-12 we are leave after 2years of pure hell as specially this year was one of the worst school year for my twins these teacher will mess with your children's self confidence and self motivation I feel there job is to only tear them down when they should be lifting them up my kids the teachers they are the ones that are dumb they love giving our kids zero's for all the hard work our kids do its never enough we as learning coach's aka are the real teacher that make sure our kids are learning if u are looking for teacher support u will never get it here there's have a lot miscommunication there a lot of teachers who have very bad attitudes and can be rude at other time your kids will be treated like a college students this school will and can take over your whole life Curriculum is often too difficult often poorly presented so students can't comprehend.

I am so disappointed in CA-I thought this would be a great alternative for my son. My son is 14 and in middle school, the social piece is where he struggled academically he did great in regular public school. Connections Academy is only concerned with you completing 6 assignments a day-they do not care if you master them and understand. This is not the way to learn, this is just a school that is trying to meet requirements-if you choice to go on a field trip you will get very far behind-so not worth going. I would not recommend this program to anyone. School is about learning and getting excited about learning-this is pure stress and in time this school will get so many bad reviews and the retention rate will be very low it will close down- this school is only for the child who is a robot and can work at lightening speed. Please Mr Goldberg our superintendent in MA you can do better than this!