This week the percentage of students attending virtual only schools dropped for the first time since early November.
Burbio School Opening Tracker- Map% US K-12 students attending "virtual-only" schools =
49.6% (from 55% last week)% US K-12 students attending "traditional" In-person/every day" schools = 32.4%
% US K-12 students attending "hybrid" schools = 17.8%
The above percentages are set to Sunday, January 17th. Our data is presented as "students attending schools that offer this learning plan" - most districts also offer virtual even when providing in-person. For above, 49.6% of US K-12 students are currently attending schools that offer virtual-only plans, 32.4% offering traditional, etc.
1) During the Fall the number of US K-12 students attending virtual only schools started at a high of
62% at Labor Day, falling gradually to a low of
around 37% by early November . Rising Covid rates and precautionary holiday related breaks concentrated in the Midwest and Northeast took that number back up to
55% as of last week. In the past week the "virtual" number fell to 49.6%, its first drop since before Thanksgiving.
2) We counted schools in 26 states returning from virtual-only to in-person options, generally in small to mid-size districts concentrated in the Midwest and Northeast. Examples include
Bethalto, IL schools,
Lake Central, IN schools and
Franklin City, OH schools. Other examples include
Salem, MA,
Mobile, AL, plus districts in states that had shifted heavily virtual around the holidays such as Wisconsin, Minnesota, Delaware, Rhode Island, Kentucky and Michigan.
4) This coming week another batch of school districts, some of which are larger, plan to return from slightly longer post-Holiday precautionary breaks and the virtual-only figure should drop further. In two examples,
Indianapolis, IN plans to return K-3 students this week and grades 4-12 the week after while
Colorado Springs, CO will return elementary (traditional) and grades 6-12 (hybrid) this week.
5) In larger city news, in addition to
Chicago, where preschoolers and special needs students returned this week,
Atlanta is planning to return K-2 students beginning the week of 1/25.
Columbus OH schools are planning to begin to bring students into the classroom on February 1st.
Boston announced plans to phase in all students from March 1st-April 1st. In this news report, the
Philadelphia Schools Superintendent states an intention to begin getting younger students in the classroom in February.
Cleveland pushed virtual learning until at least February 26th, and
Pittsburgh pushed plans to return students to the classroom until at least February 8th.
Tulsa, OK pushed in-person return to March 22nd.
6) We noted last week the trend of smaller cities struggling to get students in the classroom, many of which have target dates far beyond large cities.
Pawtucket, RI schools will remain virtual for the balance of the year despite pressure from the state to return. "They are the only district in the state that has not come back, so there is really no other reason than they are making that decision," said the State Superintendent in this
local news report. In
Allentown, PA schools will remain virtual through at least April 14th. NJ has several examples of these situations.
Jersey City, NJ will remain remote through at least April 21st,
Trenton is virtual until at least May 3rd. and
New Brunswick, NJ is virtual until at least April 12th.
7) Last week we reported that
Des Moines, IA schools were denied a waiver to stay virtual and returned in person. This week
in Kanawha County, West Virginia (Charleston) the school board voted to stay remote until February 8th, but had to reverse hours later when
the State Board of Education voted that full K-12 remote learning is no longer an option. In
Rutherford County, TN the Director of Schools recommended a January 11th start to "hybrid" in-person to the County Board of Education. However, "no board member made a proposal in favor of the proposal and so the proposal was not adopted" and students returned fully in-person this past week.
8) In
Ohio Governor Mike Dewine is offering priority vaccination to teachers on the condition they return to in-person learning by March 1st.
9) In policy notes that might affect learning plans in 2021, districts in
St Louis County, MO and this one in
Annoka Hennepin, MN announced plans to continue offering virtual only teaching as option for parents for the entire 2021-22 year. Separately, in this announcement out of
Henrico County, VA pushing in-person schooling back the district notes "
In order to make up for lost learning time and to close achievement gaps, HCPS is in the early stages of planning robust, optional in-person summer academic programming. Expect to hear more about this in the weeks to come." In auditing districts nationwide we continue to be struck by the widespread acknowledgement of learning loss among large segments of the student population. Given the additional Federal funding initiatives underway, it would seem that this coming summer could be a practical time to begin addressing this issue.