“Smart Horizons Career Online Education is really a natural continuation of what I established with the University of Miami Online High School,” Goldman said. “The University of Miami model was a high-tuition, online college preparatory program, but we have a very different clientele for Smart Horizons Career Online Education. We are aiming at the 45 million high school dropouts nationwide who will be able to use SHCOE as a stepping stone to a new career. We determined that with SHCOE, we would develop a model with low tuition—less than a thousand dollars for the entire program. This program will aid students to move forward and earn an online high school diploma and provide the knowledge base to build a viable career.”

Smart Horizons Career Online Education is a private online high school district that gives students returning to the education process an opportunity to earn an 18-credit high school diploma as well as complete course work for a career certificate. Online career certificate courses are currently offered in the fields of health care, early childhood education, transportation services, homeland security, protection services, and office management.

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Recognizing that many dropouts are now adults who often believe they are too old — or too embarrassed — to return to school, Smart Horizons Career Online Education is providing an opportunity for students to earn an 18-credit high school diploma, as well as complete course work for a career certificate in one online program.

To increase the number of students in the program, the Pensacola-based online education service is offering $1,000 scholarships to the first 50 students who apply and meet the criteria for the program.

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According to a new report from Blackboard Inc. and Project Tomorrow, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preparing students to become tomorrow’s leaders, “Learning in the 21st Century: 2010 Trends Update,” 27 percent of high school students and 21 percent of middle school students took at least one online class in 2009, nearly doubling the 2008 numbers of 14 percent and 16 percent, respectively. But the report documents that this still falls far short of meeting student demand, since the majority of high school and middle school students see the availability of online courses as part of an ideal education experience.

“Fifty-one percent of high school students told us that the greatest benefit to online learning was the ability to work at their own pace,” explains Julie Evans, CEO of Project Tomorrow.

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Two innovative Florida-based educational organizations—Smart Horizons Career Online Education (SHCOE), a private adult online high school district, and Compass Rose Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization—have joined forces to provide educational opportunities to students across the nation and beyond.

Founded in 2009 and located in Pensacola, Florida, Smart Horizons Career Online Education has quickly established itself as a leader in delivering affordable, career-based online education to adult students throughout the world. The online education company’s first classes went online in April of this year, offering complete 18-credit high school diplomas, coupled with coursework needed to earn a career-credentialed certificate. This is great news for the roughly 45 million individuals in the U.S. who are either unemployed or are in entry-level positions for lack of a high school diploma or GED.

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Many local high schools do not have enough computers, sufficient network access or even the right rooms to securely test hundreds of students online, educators say. In another tight budget year, finding money for needed upgrades — they could cost $750,000 in Seminole County alone — isn’t easy.

Florida’s track record with computer-based testing is short and problem-plagued, adding to administrators’ apprehension about the test change. The debut of the state’s online reading test last fall and its trial run of computerized FCAT and algebra exams this spring both were marred by mishaps.

And there is the potential for even more trouble in coming years, administrators fear, as the number of computer-based standardized tests increases.

Next spring, some 370,000 ninth- and 10th-graders statewide are to take online the math section of the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test and a new algebra end-of-course exam. A smaller number of older students is scheduled to take FCAT math online in the fall.

A survey by the Florida Department of Education this spring showed that only two districts — and only Brevard County in Central Florida — deemed themselves fully ready for computer-based testing.

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