EPGY Online Courses

EPGY offers a wide range of online courses from the Kindergarten through the University level. Courses can be taken on a course-by-course basis on a year-round calendar. Additionally, courses can be taken through full-time, part-time, or single course enrollment in the Online High School (OHS), a fully accredited, diploma granting, independent school for grades 7-12. While course attributes differ by subject matter, course level, and whether they are offered on an individual basis or through the OHS, the following information is generally applicable.

For a detailed description of courses available, please consult the Online Courses table.

How do the online courses work?
All EPGY courses use the computer as an essential instructional resource. EPGY offers two types of online courses: 1) self-paced/directed study, in which students work individually on the computer with support from an EPGY instructor, and 2) seminar-style courses, of which the online classroom is the defining feature. The online classroom facilitates interaction with the instructor and other students enrolled in the course. Multimedia lectures with animations provide students with expository content, and capture the informal nature of classroom instruction, while preserving a level of rigor appropriate to the subject matter. In the seminar-style courses, weekly real-time online classroom sessions in which students and instructors interact supplement the lectures.

What is the online classroom?
In the online classroom, students connect via the internet, using voice and shared whiteboard conferencing software to create a real-time interactive version of the EPGY lecture environment. The online classroom gives students a robust electronic forum in which they can interact with instructors and other students. These sessions are mandatory for the English courses and are strongly encouraged for other online courses. Students who want to work individually with an instructor or in a small group are also encouraged to attend online classroom sessions. The online classroom also provides an opportunity for students enrolled in self-paced, directed study courses to consult with instructors in the context of office hours.

Who are EPGY instructors?
Instructors are an essential component of online courses. As with traditional classrooms, it is the instructors who are ultimately responsible for teaching the students. EPGY students are assigned to course instructors who are available for additional instructional support by phone, electronic mail, and in the online classroom. Instructors monitor student progress, review student assignments, and help identify and address individual student difficulties. The EPGY instructors have been chosen for their thorough knowledge of the subject, their dedication to teaching, and their expertise in using technology to provide advanced instruction to gifted students.

What does course work consist of?
Most courses include exercises in which students answer questions and receive immediate feedback from the computer. These exercises depend on the subject matter of the course. For example, in mathematics courses, exercises range from simple multiple-choice questions to more difficult questions in which students enter mathematical expressions, to more advanced exercises in which students use sophisticated mathematical software to construct proofs that are evaluated by the computer. In addition to the work that students do within the online course environment, students may also have more traditional assignments that they submit electronically for instructors to evaluate, such as problem sets for Mathematics and Physics courses, essay assignments for English courses, or programming assignments for the Computer Science courses.

For a detailed description of courses available, click on the table below:

	Elementary	Middle	High School/AP Level	University Level
Mathematics
Computer Science
Laboratory Sciences
Physics
Chemistry
Biology
English
Foreign Languages
Chinese
Latin
History
Economics
Music