American School

2200 East 170th Street

Lansing, IL 60438

17 Reviews

School District
Grade

9-12
Type

private

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Reviews

Submitted by parent on April 04, 2023

I feel the school means well and was highly recommended from someone who took it prior to the online program. You do have the option to either use textbooks or online, but for convenience we opted for online. The online program is Edmentum, and I recommend to research it prior to enrolling. The cost seems reasonable but after having to hire a retired schoolteacher, the cost has become ridiculous. I have spent many hours also helping my child and wish I had seen the September review regarding the culinary course as this instructor is nitpicking. Apparently, she has not read over her own lessons as they are filled with typos and errors. Many of the test in this course have fill in the blank where there could be multiple correct answers such as crock-pot/slow cooker or molded/sculpted. Even if you place both correct answers in the blank it will count it wrong. One answer was counted incorrect for using the abbreviation following the answer of "Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC)." For the unit activities, the culinary instructor is grading too strict and marking off for not providing information not requested in the instructions, even when the requirements are 100% met from the rubric. In one activity, she marked off for the type of measurements used in the activity. My child even questioned this when doing the assignment and we instructed them to use the same measurement the instructor presented in the sample. As far as the other courses, the instructors have been reasonable. Unfortunately, they require an extensive amount of research and essays that the tutor (a retired English teacher) expressed are overboard and taking away from gaining other important and useful information. I truly believe my child has written more essays than I did during my entire college career. If your child wants a career in research or writing reports and essays, then this may be the perfect course. However, avoid the culinary course like it were the plague and spend that time teaching your own child how to cook.
Submitted by parent on September 01, 2022

Incompetent teachers some good. Never enroll in culinary. No help whatsoever. Students are on their own. This is for online class. All they did was take my money Also my son as an iep. They say they help special needs. Please don’t bother
Submitted by parent on February 15, 2022

Daughter graduated from here she is now 32. And her brother is now in the program, he started at 6th and is now 8th grade. So far so good. This school is for independent kids who take initiative and will read and do the work.The book version is all we have used and I will say the books and guide can sometime confusing at first. This school works for our family.
Submitted by parent on December 01, 2021

The only good reviews for this school are the ones running it. You can tell by the similar good reviews. Ha.
Submitted by parent on August 25, 2021

This school is the best Teachers also answer fast when You need help
Submitted by parent on March 23, 2021

Sadly, I could not recommend this school to anyone unless they're just trying to get a random credit for a missing course. We've experienced four different online schools in our family, and this one is, by far, the worst. It's the cheapest, but there's a reason for that. The 'instructors' are actually just graders. They are not accessible and when a student asks for help, they are often delayed and extremely unhelpful (referring them to a free online Kahn Academy video, most of the time). These "instructors" seem to be extremely overwhelmed and a few have admitted to being understaffed (although when I've mentioned this to administration, they have denied it). The staff may want to care, but they just don't have time to bother. My students are within a few credits of getting their diplomas, so we will stick with it, but we've been around for three years and it has just gotten worse and worse over that time. The communication is pretty terrible most of the time. Even if you get an answer to your emails, it's usually fairly unsatisifactory and they seem to have a knack for making everything more difficult than it needs to be. The expectations for credits and graduation are not set forth clearly (don't try to take a class "out of order!"). The kids have to keep on top of their teachers to make sure they are doing their jobs and actually grading their work on time. It's a constant battle. For a kid who is good at being self-taught, it's a cheap option to get a diploma. Otherwise, steer far away from this school.
Submitted by parent on March 23, 2021

I definitely can not recommend this school. There is no direct contact to teachers other than through email, and they tell you to expect to wait 3 - 5 business days for any response. It often takes longer, and sometimes a teacher will never respond. Some are at least pleasant, others are not. We had most trouble with high school English.It just takes forever to get through a course because you have to submit something, wait for a return response, at least a week, before moving forward. There is no teacher assistance with studies at all. It is very hard to get help as a parent if you call them.It just is not a good way to learn or move through a child's education. We are very disappointed and considering trying to remove our child and go elsewhere to finish up her last 2-3 courses. Heartbreaking, really. Puts our child further behind, which is hard on her confidence and morale for moving ahead in her education.
Submitted by parent on July 15, 2020

At this time I cannot recommend the school at all. Resources are often unavailable for long periods of time without any notification or partial refunds issued. Replying to inquires are slow at best and mostly non-existent. Taking 10-14 days to unlock a test where my child cannot go further until American School takes action. Will be asking my school district to consider a different option.
Submitted by parent on May 05, 2020

My greatest complaint is with the Middle School Grade 8 English. While the stories and poems that were selected were great, the study guide is a disappointment. It seems overly complex, and there are typos all over the study guide. They have a section in the back of the guide that gives you a key to the answers. Whole sections were missing (a print error) from the answer key for certain lessons. They were not aware of this (I sent them an email). I found other errors throughout the unit, and then found at least three errors on the first unit exam as well, not just typing errors, but ones that would affect the answer to the question. It's as though no one bothered to proof-read their text and this is the ENGLISH grammar book.The math for 8th grade is not much better. My son loved math and just hates this book. The science and history and elective materials seem to be just fine, but I find it ironic that the subjects that are considered the most important (English and Math), are the worst of the lot. We'll use it to finish the year, but we certainly will not be using their materials again.
Submitted by student on February 24, 2020

10/10 amazing, this school is very good and I would recommend it to anyone!
Submitted by parent on July 27, 2019

Fantastic experience with this school from three members of our family. I'm 51 and graduated back in 1986 when it was mostly "snail" mail. Haha. My daughter is 31 and graduated in 2005. She went on to run her own small business for seven years. Now, my son is enrolled and doing very well. Each of us learn and go at different paces and it all worked out great for us. I highly recommend it!
Submitted by parent on July 01, 2019

I was very satisfied with American School.Two of my Sons finished the High School program. I am very grateful for the good Counseler, Amanda.She was so very helpful.
Submitted by parent on August 20, 2018

Horrible it takes 3 weeks to get a test back in the mail that you have to redo because your answers aren't worded perfectly.
Submitted by student on April 14, 2018

Overall not worth the money spent. It seems only 1 in 3 teachers actually cares about the student. Pen Foster is much better.
Submitted by parent on January 16, 2018

I am sorry that I wasted my son's time, effort, and money working with this place.
Submitted by other on June 25, 2017

I took my last 3 years of high school through the independent program and loved it. The first couple years were done at a small private school and then I did a couple classes on my own when I stopped going there. I finished on my own, which took some discipline, graduated and went on to college for Medical Laboratory Science.
Submitted by parent on January 18, 2015

Please do your research and stay far away from this organization. I specifically do not call them a school. My Daughter attended the "organization" for her Sophomore and part of her Junior year. She realized how much she missed the social aspect of going to public school. When we informed them we would no longer be taking their courses, they literally held my daughters transcripts ransom. We had paid them $500 but they wont release a SINGLE, (I'm not asking for all) class transcript unless paid another $600. Not only that, but upon reentering public school, the "education" she had been receiving from them was found to be so sub par my daughter had to take 9th grade classes to catch up. They are not educators, just money collectors. Their customer service is non existent, including their "Principal". They also go to great extents to delete any negative comments. If you truly value your child's educations, please look elsewhere.