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William & Ida Friday Institute for Educational Innovation

VSN Institutes

One of the biggest benefits of the VSN is our Institutes (formerly “Summer Institutes”). This is the opportunity to connect in-person and collaborate with educators in other virtual public schools. 

Two people, a man and a woman, chat and smile in a large meeting room while the woman holds a laptop in her hands.

Upcoming Events

VSN’s regular convenings and institutes are designed to hold space for school teams to work on school improvement goals aligned to VSN design principles. We bring virtual school educators together to share best practices with one another and learn from leading innovators within the field of online, blended and highly personalized learning.

2023-2024 VSN Partner Convening Kick-Off

November 29, 2023

Invitation Only For Partner Virtual Schools

Partner School VSN In-Person Institute

June 17 and 18, 2024

Informational VSN Convening for ALL NC Virtual Schools

August 2024

Register by July 31

 For questions, contact Jaclyn Stevens at jlbell@ncsu.edu.

Our First VSN Institute

This one of a kind event, launched in June of 2022, was designed to energize K-12 educators playing leading roles as innovators in the design, development and implementation of virtual school learning environments. At our inaugural institute, with representatives from 25 virtual schools across the state, the VSN has succeeded in building individual and collective capacity around setting goals and designing plans to meet assessed critical needs for virtual school educators and their programs. We also collaborated to address immediate and longer-term challenges to quality virtual school learning environments, such as human resources (staffing included), personalized learning, parent and community engagement, technology and spaces, and curriculum/instruction/assessment.

Three educators stand in front of a white board where dozens of different colored post it notes are stuck to the board. The educators are looking at and writing on the post-it notes while talking with each other.

The VSN 2022 Institute had 63 participants from across North Carolina, with an evaluation return rate of 80%.

  • 95% agreed that the event agenda aligned with our goals.
  • 82% agreed that event activities, materials and resources were a “value add.”
  • 87% agreed that they felt their collective voice was recognized and heard.
  • 96% agreed that the mission and vision of the VSN has the potential to offer a valuable network.

Participants identified high-level immediate needs that they would like to see from the network.

  • Networking opportunities;
  • Advocating on behalf of NC virtual schools;
  • Support in connections with parents and families; and
  • Resources for social media use in virtual school settings.