Digital learning policy update
The following is a lightly edited excerpt from our forthcoming Digital Learning Annual Snapshot 2022
In the early stages of the pandemic, seemingly every publication and website declared that “COVID-19 changes everything.”
Whether or not the pandemic will have long-lasting effects on K–12 instruction remains to be seen. What is clear, as of late 2021, is that the pandemic had limited effects on policy, aside from the large amount of funding provided from the federal government to states and in turn to school districts.
In the five or so years leading up to the pandemic, changes in digital learning policy were generally incremental. In most years a state or two would allow full-time online schools for the first time. States with extensive online learning activity would create new policies that would tweak funding levels, change attendance accounting requirements, address quality and accountability, and so forth. Cases of clearly fraudulent activity (e.g. A3 in California) would result in calls for large-scale regulatory changes, and subsequently the legislature or other governing body would eventually recognize that new policies often don’t hinder people who have shown they will ignore laws (and ethical considerations). States with state virtual schools generally supported these programs to provide supplemental online courses to students statewide, but very few states added large new state programs to support digital learning.
Since the pandemic hit in spring 2020, we have had the final months of the 2020 legislative sessions (in some cases extended into special sessions to address pandemic-related issues), the full 2021 legislative sessions, and extensive activity by State Boards of Education. The end result, however, is much of the same, in the sense that the pace of change is about the same as it was pre-pandemic. Overall, most states that supported digital learning before the pandemic still do so, and most states that were restrictive still have those restrictions in place, despite the increase in interest in new options among students and families.
A sampling of these and other key policy changes—and in some cases, a lack of policy changes— are explored below:
North Dakota’s SB 2196 (2021) allows alternative measures for demonstrating mastery through waivers of instructional time requirements. This change is allowing districts to offer online schools and courses for the first time, although at this point it appears that the districts that are implementing new programs related to the law are more focused on competency-based learning than on hybrid or online learning.
West Virginia passed a law allowing two online charter schools for the first time, and two such schools will open for the 2022–23 school year.
South Carolina passed Proviso 1.103, which limits full funding to only 5% of a district’s students who choose to enroll in a district-run full-time online learning option. Above the 5% threshold, the district loses almost half of the funding that the student would generate if in traditional face-to-face instruction.
Texas passed SB 15 in a special session of 2021. In some ways the law allows an expansion of online learning, but many restrictions are placed on digital learning options being offered by districts for their own students. The law allows districts to receive full funding for students (good), caps the number of students enrolled in online learning at 10% of district enrollment (bad generally, but possibly high enough to have little immediate impact), and stipulates a variety of other requirements, including some that would restrict access for many students based on prior attendance or state test scores. For a fuller explanation of the law we recommend the Texas Education Agency’s “To the Administrator” memo and FAQ.
Florida’s HB 5101 changes the previous requirement that districts offer three online school options to their students, reducing the requirement to one online option. It also significantly limits the number of online students that a district can enroll into its own online school from outside district boundaries.
Rhode Island has its first online school serving students statewide, having opened for the 2021–22 school year.
Illinois did not update its burdensome remote learning plan requirements to make serving students easier, despite interest from districts in having a path to create long-term online schools. In addition, the Illinois State Board of Education ended funding for Illinois Virtual, the state virtual school providing supplemental courses. In theory, the state’s course choice program would allow students to select online courses. In practice, the course choice program has produced few online course enrollments to this point.
Quite a few states that were generally restrictive towards digital learning by not allowing statewide online schools, not supporting supplemental online courses, and often requiring funding to be based on seat time, remain restrictive. These are generally in the Middle Atlantic region, including Connecticut, Delaware, New York, and New Jersey.
Most states that allowed online schools, supported state virtual schools, or both, pre-pandemic, continued to do so. Aside from the new South Carolina law, for example, most other southeastern states did not enact significant legislation. Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas remain among the states with the most digital learning activity—even with the newly restrictive South Carolina law.
Will 2022 bring bigger policy changes? It’s hard to say, and we prefer to analyze what’s happened as opposed to predicting what may happen. But we’re not yet seeing higher levels of policy activity than normal as we head into the new year (for example bills being proposed), which suggests that the existing patterns will remain in play.
We’re taking the next two weeks off from posting, and will be back on January 6th. Thanks to all our readers, Digital Learning Collaborative members, and all the educators and supporters of schools and students everywhere. Best wishes for the holiday season and for the coming year!