High interest in online school options for K-12 students

Teachers and staff walked an informational picket line in Chaska on Wednesday, pushing for safety as school is set to resume in two weeks.

It’s something many districts have been vocalizing, as well as families.

In fact, numbers show many students are making school selections with safety in mind.

In Bloomington, the district is offering online school to students in grades K-12. It’s called Bloomington Online School, and it’s a one-year commitment that is seeing high interest.

"We were surprised at the amount of interest we got, we started with a conservative pilot model and then we doubled that and then we doubled that again," said John Weisser, the executive director of Technology and Information Services with Bloomington Public Schools.

A total of 1,250 students are registered — that’s the maximum allowed — and roughly 12% of the total 10,000 student population. But Weisser said there’s even more demand.

"We’ve had waiting lists at each grade level, we have families waiting," he shared.

In the Osseo Area School District, roughly 25% of the entire district is enrolled in the district’s online learning academy.

That’s more than 5,000 students, and many of them — 2,335 — are at the elementary level, the district said.

St. Paul School District estimates they will have between 1,800 and 2,500 students enroll in their virtual learning school out of roughly 37,000 students.

Buffalo-Hanover-Montrose Schools said about 17% of students have enrolled in online learning for the first semester.

"We still basically deliver education in the same way that we did 150 years ago," said University of Minnesota educator and researcher Dr. Katie Pekel.

She said COVID-19 is causing a sustained interruption to the norm that will lead to education redesign.

"I think a large segment of the population will go back to school in a physical way like we did pre-COVID, but I think we are going to see some pretty innovative things for kids and families who actually found that this environment worked better for them," she said.

Weisser said he expects Bloomington Online School to become a permanent option for students, even after the 2020-2021 school year.

"Some of these options that we are providing they will live on past COVID, in my mind," he said.