Thousands of local students have signed up for their districts' virtual programs this year in lieu of in-person, distance learning

More than 5,000 students registered for Tulsa Public Schools’ new virtual academy, including about 1,100 high-schoolers and about 1,170 middle-schoolers. There also were about 2,760 students from prekindergarten to fifth grade who signed up for the program.

Ebony Johnson, senior director of student engagement at TPS, said the district didn’t know how high the demand would be for the Tulsa Virtual Academy, which was created to help families that didn’t want their kids to go to school during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

“We knew that due to the pandemic, we needed to offer an educational opportunity that was virtual for our students who would be immunocompromised or their families are immunocompromised and they did not want to have that risk,” Johnson said. “In that regard, we had no idea how many students there would be, but we just knew there would be families that were looking for an option.”

That plan didn’t change when the Tulsa school board voted to abandon in-person instruction and spend the first nine weeks of 2020-21 in distance learning. The alternative learning option didn’t lose any momentum, either.

While 3,360 students signed up for the virtual academy before the Aug. 3 vote, another 1,680 signed up afterward. The deadline to register was Aug. 10.

Many families remained interested in the virtual academy because their children will be able to continue learning remotely once in-person instruction eventually returns, Johnson said. However, they still can choose to transition back to the classroom at the semester break if they deem it safe or don’t like the virtual format.

“It’s a yearlong commitment, but if parents make the decision to change that commitment, they can do that,” she said.

TPS wasn’t alone in offering a virtual alternative plan to families. Every major district in the Tulsa metro has implemented its own version.

Union Public Schools recorded the highest enrollment in the area. About 5,350 students have signed up for the district’s virtual academy, which equates to 35% of the total student population.

Of the approximately 7,000 elementary students at Union, about 2,480 — or 35% — are signed up for the program. About 2,870 secondary students — or 35% — will begin the year virtually.

The district actually launched its full-time virtual academy at the start of last school year. The new program served about 40 students in grades 6-12, said Gart Morris, executive director of instructional technology at Union.

Morris said the first year was a trial period, and administrators expected the academy’s enrollment to grow at a modest rate. That was before COVID-19 entered the equation.

“We were hoping this year we would have maybe a hundred or so in the program,” Morris said. “Jumping to this many was a little bit of a shock to the system.”

Union decided to open the virtual academy to all grades this school year after surveying parents about their interest in having an alternative to in-person learning during the pandemic. Students there will return to the classroom Aug. 24.

About 25% of those surveyed responded favorably to the virtual academy idea. Morris said it’s important to offer families the choice of how they want their children to be taught, especially in times of uncertainty. Many students are immunocompromised or live with immunocompromised family members.

“It’s one of those things where we needed to offer something that kept them with the Union family,” Morris said. “We wanted to take care of our students, and we wanted to keep them with us. So we needed to address those needs and address people’s need to provide safety. I don’t want to say that people are doing this out of fear. They’re doing it out of a concern for safety.”

Overall, there are about 4,700 students at Broken Arrow Public Schools signed up for the district’s virtual program this year. Nearly 2,300 are in prekindergarten through fifth grade, and another 1,200 are in middle school. The other 1,260 are high-schoolers.

Broken Arrow, which begins in-person instruction next month, also did not expect such a large number of students to select the virtual option.

The massive enrollment is part of why the district delayed the start of school for two weeks, said Karla Dyess, associate superintendent of instructional services.

Preparing for a safe return to school and establishing a thorough distance learning plan in case it’s needed is a harrowing task on its own. Beefing up a small virtual program to meet the needs of thousands of students is another beast entirely.

“It’s been a huge challenge; I’m not going to lie,” Dyess said. “What we’re doing is kind of taking it in bite-size chunks. Luckily, I feel like we had a really good foundation for instruction in Broken Arrow already, so the basic instructional components are in place.”

At Bixby Public Schools, where in-person instruction begins Monday, there are about 920 students signed up for its virtual program, which is 14% of the district’s total enrollment.

Bixby Superintendent Rob Miller said accommodating for so many students in an alternative learning mode is a challenging logistical effort, and he doesn’t envy districts that are dealing with much higher enrollment numbers.

Educators need to be assigned to each age group. Virtual class sizes need to be rebalanced. In some cases, teachers will have to be reassigned to other schools with more virtual students.

“If one of our campuses has a disproportionate number of students who selected virtual, then it could mean we’ve got to move teachers from that site — the sites that have fewer students who are doing virtual — to accommodate the class sizes of those that have more,” Miller said. “So that’s where it really does become challenging because you have to tell a teacher a week before school who’s already set up their classroom that we’re terribly sorry, but we need you to move to a new campus and teach maybe even a different grade level than what you’re prepared to do. That’s a huge ask for teachers.

“But at the end of the day, we have to do what we need to do to support students.”

Owasso Public Schools is starting the school year through distance learning — referred to as Pivot to Home — but currently has 1,475 students signed up for its virtual program, which is about 15% of its total enrollment.

About 20% of all students initially registered for virtual at Owasso, but the distance learning announcement on Aug. 4 led to many backing out of the program.

Last year, the district’s virtual program was available only for high-schoolers. This is the first time it’s been offered to elementary and middle school students as well.

Owasso Superintendent Amy Fichtner said the program was expanded because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It likely will remain available to all grades in the future, though probably with much lower enrollment.

Part of why the virtual option remains popular despite the switch to distance learning is the perception of safety for the entirety of 2020-21.

“I think many see that Pivot to Home will return to the classroom, and some have decided for whatever reason, often for a very personal reason, that this is not something they want for their children this school year,” Fichtner said.

At Jenks Public Schools, there are about 2,530 students signed up for virtual instruction — 20% of its overall enrollment. About 1,100 are in kindergarten through sixth grade.

This is the first time Jenks has offered full-time virtual learning, with blended options previously being available for seventh grade and higher.

Lisa Muller, associate superintendent for educational services at Jenks, said virtual instruction presents an extra challenge for younger students, who will need support at home from family members. That’s why the district is dedicating virtual-only teachers at the elementary level. Secondary students likely will see a mixture of full-time virtual teachers and teachers who also teach regularly.

The district actually began exploring the possibility of offering virtual instruction to elementary students several years before the pandemic. Extensive research from administrators made the ongoing expansion of the district’s virtual program much easier to implement, Muller said.

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