As of early September, 73 percent of the 100 largest school districts in the country have chosen remote-learning only as their back-to-school instructional model during the coronavirus pandemic.
Those decisions affect more than 8 million students, out of a total of more than 50 million public school students in the United States.
Those are the latest findings from a searchable database created by Education Week, one that EdWeek Market Brief is providing access to for businesses and other organizations trying to monitor the district decisions playing out during COVID-19.
The tracker appears below, and a link to download the data is here.
The nation’s education leaders are making high-stakes decisions about how to reopen schools this fall as COVID-19 rages on. District officials are facing tremendous, competing pressures.
Our data is meant to provide a broad snapshot of how districts will begin the 2020-21 school year and does not track changes after a district’s first day of classes.
Districts’ decisions on reopenings are evolving, week by week. A few recent developments:
The Albany, N.Y., school district recently decided to stick with a hybrid learning model that uses in-person instruction for prekindergarten through 6th grade, and virtual education for higher grades.
The decision came despite pressure the 10,000-student district was facing to move to a completely online program for grades 3 and higher to deal with a massive budget shortfall.
The district says it will lose as much as $23 million in state aid for the current school year, because of cuts imposed on school systems as the state tries to address a budget shortfall.
And Iowa, the Des Moines school district is locked in a standoff with Gov. Kim Reynolds, who has pressed school systems across the state to reopen in-person.
The 32,000-student Des Moines school system has refused, choosing instead to reopen remotely because it views the health risks to students and staff as too high. A judge denied the district’s temporary injunction to keep from having to move to in-person classes, but the district has remained in virtual mode, anyway.
The state has said the district can only close to in-person classes if 15 percent of its coronavirus tests in its county over a two-week period are positive. The Des Moines area’s positivity rate is lower, but it views he risks as too high.
“Local control has long been at the heart of school operations in our state,” School Superintendent Thomas Ahart said in a statement after the judge’s decision.
“In these unprecedented times we need more flexibility, not less, and we believe that is what the legislature intended to provide us.”
Data Note/Methodology
District reopening plans are subject to change based on board approvals and state actions.
Key/definitions of reopening plan types:
- Remote learning only—no in-person instruction. May include exceptions for special populations of students.
- Hybrid/Partial—limited, in-person reopening. May include modifications such as social distancing and student capacity limits.
- Full in-person available for all students—full-time, in-person instruction is either the return to school model or an option for all students.
- Undecided
Reopening date – date listed in district announcement, news report, or district calendar.
This data includes public school districts only.
