B.

 Visit the Florida Virtual School Web site (http://www.flvs.net/) and the Texas Virtual
Academy (http://www.k12.com/txva). Do you believe that a distance learning high school
designed along the lines of these schools would be appropriate in your school district? Why or
why not? Discuss advantages and disadvantages of distance learning.

I chose this to respond to this discussion because in this past year of teaching, I have not

seen much positive come from distance learning for students, so when I navigated through the

two websites provided for us and saw the opposite of what distance learning can look like, it

appealed to me. I believe that both the Florida Virtual School (FLVS) and the Texas Virtual

Academy at Hallsville (TVAH) are great examples of the good that online education can afford

our students. If the district that I worked in this previous year had a program even remotely close

to either of these, I am certain that more students would have succeeded and less teachers would

have been over-worked and stressed.

A little background of what my 2020-2021 school year looked like where I worked: I

taught middle school ELAR, students without internet access were allowed to come for face-to-

face instruction on the very first day of school, everyone else received their instruction online.

By early September virtual students whose parents chose to put them back in the classroom

began to “phase in” by grade level. By early November, 40 % of our students were back in the

classroom. Please keep in mind that the teachers were responsible to teach both their face-to-face

students and virtual students at the same time. At one point I was teaching 25 students in my

classroom and 30 virtually-in the same class.

Due to the pandemic this last year, I believe it was hard for any public school to go into

the school year knowing what to expect, and knowing what to. Both FLVS and TVAH have well

established programs that have seen their students excel. Part of their success comes from

experienced and well-trained teachers. According to FLVS website, “Students receive live
instruction and 1:1 support from Florida-certified teachers who have completed extensive

professional development in online education.” If our school and those in the district had

designated on-line teachers who were well trained to teach specifically on-line, I believe that

would have been an excellent starting point for our schools to begin an upward trajectory for

teaching our virtual students.

Another point that I would like to make that would have been beneficial for our school

was having accountability for not only our virtual students, but the parents as well. Most of our

online students failed because they either never showed up to their class, or failed to turn in

work. When making parent calls throughout the year, the phone number was either wrong or the

parents just chose not to answer. On the TVAH website, it specifically states the parent’s role

and responsibility for the child’s education such as, “provide academic support, motivation, and

guidance throughout the school year, communicate with teachers, and report daily attendance.”

I have only touched on a few items in a myriad of procedures that need to be changed for

virtual students in our school district before the start of next school year. I believe that FLVS and

TVAH are great programs to look to for our district and others that are struggling. Each of these

schools comes with years of experience and success for the on-line learning platform, and it

seems that on-line learning will be the “new norm” for more and more families for years to

come.

Resources:

An Established Leader in Online Education. About FLVS - Online Courses for Students in

Grades Kindergarten - 12. (n.d.). https://www.flvs.net/about-flvs.

How it Works: Texas Virtual Academy At Hallsville. How it Works | Texas Virtual Academy At

Hallsville. (n.d.). https://tvah.k12.com/how-it-works.html.