Education Northwest’s Alternative Education Policy Network is a multi-tiered initiative designed to strengthen connections across the field of alternative education and foster collaborative learning nationwide. By bringing together policymakers, researchers, experts, and practitioners, we’re cultivating a vibrant national network focused on improving outcomes for students in alternative high school settings. Through this network, we’re sharing evidence-based ideas, offering coaching and support to states, and helping shape policies that really work.

Why It Matters

Alternative learning environments can be powerful spaces for student-centered learning and innovation. These programs offer flexible, student-centered models that prioritize relationships, elevate student voice, and define success in ways that are meaningful to each learner. By design, alternative learning environments reduce barriers to learning and school engagement so that all students can realize their potential.

High school alternatives are necessary because traditional systems— including schools, workforce, postsecondary, criminal justice, and others—do not serve all students well or equitably.

Connecting the field and building mutual learning and collaboration

In 2022, Education Northwest conducted a national scan of high school alternatives. Through our scan we learned that, despite their promise, alternative learning environments are too often siloed: Practitioners, policymakers, and state leaders feel disconnected from each other and from the broader systems students navigate (e.g., traditional K–12 schools, reengagement programs, postsecondary, workforce development). This fragmentation can hinder mutual learning about what works in student engagement and prevent young people from receiving the coordinated support they need to thrive, resulting in missed opportunities and disrupted pathways to economic mobility.

In 2024 we formed the State Action Collaborative to begin breaking down the silos. The eight-state collaborative built a foundation for policy change through knowledge and resource sharing and state coalition development. The Alternative Education Policy Network builds on and extends this valuable work.