Alternative forms of secondary education in the USA

Abstract

The article examines the issue of alternative education in the United States as one of the innovative forms of education, which emerged due to a number of factors, including political, economic, social and cultural transformations constantly occurring in the world. These transformations have an effect on the educational environment by contributing to the emergence of non-traditional approaches, new educational forms, and alter parents` views on the education of their children. Changes in the organization of the society, global pandemics, and wars urge parents to seek solutions to the educational problems of their children, because they face new challenges which require immediate response and a new vision to solve them. Acquiring quality education requires an individual approach to each student. However, due to certain students’ characteristics (low level of productivity and mental activity, emotional and behavioral disorders etc.), there is a need in additional teachers and parents’ support. The search for the effective means to promote the development of a student’s personality and expand their knowledge, skills, abilities remains relevant today. Based on the analysis of foreign and domestic scientific and pedagogical literature, the essence of the alternative education is determined, the periodization of its formation and the differences between traditional and alternative education in the United States are substantiated. It is argued that the main stages of the alternative education development are: fragmentary, unified, progressive and universal, exploratory, innovational-reformist and reformist. The content of the concept “alternative school” as a form of alternative education implementation in pedagogical practice is presented in historical and contemporary contexts along with the typology of American alternative schools described by M. A. Raywid. Keywords: alternative education, periodization of alternative education development, alternative form of education, alternative schools, USA, educational transformations.