Big Picture Learning showcased as model for educating students at Obama administration announcement of new Race to the Top Competition

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PROVIDENCE, RI (May 24, 2012) - Big Picture Leaning, a leader in personalized education with fifty schools around the country and over forty schools abroad, was showcased Tuesday as a model for educating students. This special Stakeholders Forum held on May 22, 2012 by Secretary of Education Arnie Duncan announced this new focus aimed at school districts to implement personalized learning to close achievement gaps and prepare students for college and career. The competition will offer $400 million dollars to districts to create such plans.

The new competition asks districts "to show us how they can personalize and individualize education for a set of students in their schools," Secretary Duncan stated. "We need to take classroom learning beyond a one-size-fits-all model and bring it into the 21st century."

The Department of Education included a forum of educators and policy makers as part of this announcement. The forum included Big Picture Learning student Jonathan Caines, who attended the Met School in Providence, RI who is now attending Fairfield University. Caines' interests when in high school was concentrated around business and entrepreneurship. As a result of Big Picture Learning's mission of "one student at a time", Caines individualized learning plan placed him out of the classroom and in the "real world" two times a week in an internship. "A personalized high school education can really prepare a student to become a college student and beyond that for a career." Caines remarks. "My school taught me how to love to learn and become an interactive learner, proactive learner, and gave me the tools I needed to do that. It prepared me as a student for college and beyond that for the real world. "

"We are excited to see these changes being encouraged in schools across the country," states Dennis Littky, co-founder of Big Picture Learning. "For over 17 years, Big Picture Learning has been on the front line of innovative personalized education. Once you find their passion and invite the student to drive their own education, the end results are phenomenal."

Big Picture Learning has been working with school districts around the country, assisting them in creating new school designs that use the very initiatives that the Department of Education is endorsing with this new competition. "Learning must be based on the interests and goals of each student," remarks Elliot Washor, co-founder of Big Picture Learning. "A student's curriculum must be relevant to the people and places that exist in the real world and their abilities must be authentically measured by the quality of their work."

To view the Race To The Top Stakeholders Forum featuring Jonathan Caines' remarks go to: www.ustream.tv/recorded/22777810