Virtual schools: much growth, little analysis

A new study by the National Education Policy Center finds that full-time virtual schools continue to have serious problems with respect to education quality, diversity, accountability, and funding. Virtual schools enroll 248,000 elementary and secondary students in 39 states and the District of Columbia, up 21.7 percent from 2011-2012. A single, for-profit virtual-school provider, K12 Inc., accounts for 82 schools enrolling 87,808 students in 2013, more than one-third of the nation's full-time virtual-school students. Student diversity still lags in the online classroom: Three out of four full-time virtual-school students are white/non-Hispanic; that same group accounts for 54 percent of public school students. Percentages of African American and Hispanic students are far below their respective shares of the public school population. Virtual schools also serve a smaller percentage of low-income students, students with disabilities, and English Language Learners than do other public schools, and compare less favorably to traditional public schools in student achievement and school performance. The report recommends greater efforts to require virtual schools to report more data on student and teacher performance, in part because so little high-quality research exists to justify the sector's rapid growth. It also recommends that policymakers enforce higher quality standards and require greater transparency and accountability on the part of the sector. More

Source:  Public Education News Blast

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Los Angeles Education Partnership (LAEP) is an education support organization that works as a collaborative partner in high-poverty communities.