Introduction: Back to the Future with Online Schooling
After meeting with her teachers and the school principal, Laura Bennet’s parents decided she should receive the rest of her education at home. The school district would provide a tutor to collect her assignments from school and meet with her three times a week to help her keep up with her work.
Laura suffered frequent, intermittent migraine headaches that caused her to miss more than half of her school days. Her parents owned a restaurant and worked there every day but Sunday, so homeschooling was out of the question.
The hired tutor scheduled meetings with Laura’s teachers to collect and turn in her assignments, carried books and other materials she needed back and forth from school, and met with her three times a week at her home.
This was twenty years ago.
Flash forward: Today online schooling is available to almost any student in Arizona. Any student with a desktop or laptop computer, audio and camera functions, and a reliable internet connection can learn online.
The online school option is a life-saver for students with physical disabilities, for those who need a flexible schedule, for students who move around a lot, or for those who need to catch up on school credits. There are no restrictions on students who wish to receive their schooling online.
When considering the online school option, let’s consider three points:
- How This Option Emerged
- What Parents Need to Know
- What Arizona Law Says
How Did this Online School Option Come About?
The fast pace of technology might have led us to schooling online eventually, but as necessity is the mother of invention, online schooling boomed when Covid broke out in 2020. With schools closed and lockdowns keeping us indoors, state officials worked hard to make virtual schooling a choice for parents and their children.
By the time the 2020-2021 school year rolled around, there were 70 fully virtual online schools, with 1.6% of total state students attending in Arizona.
In November of 2022, the Arizona State Department of Education created the Arizona Online Instruction Program (AOI) to allow schools to provide online schooling, with courses to be approved by the Arizona State Board of Education for district schools, and the Arizona State Board of Charter Schools for charter schools.
What do Parents Need to Know?
The State of Arizona does not have a state online school, but there are 119 district schools and 22 charter schools that are all authorized to provide online education. Their instruction is available either as full-time or as supplemental learning.
Your children can choose to engage in blended learning or hybrid learning. Blended learning is online instruction that is supplemental to learning in a live class with an in-person teacher, whereas online hybrid learning is independent of the instruction in class.
If your children school online full-time, they will have the same resources available to them as in-person students, including:
- Teachers/instructors/coaches
- Administrator professionals
- Counselors
- Testing managers
- A registrar
- Customer service representatives
- Support staff
Online assisted learning systems, virtual classrooms, meet-ups for collaboration, email, virtual tutoring, and online help desk are also included in the online option.
What does Arizona Law Say About Online School?
Arizona’s statutes specifically address the implementation of online schooling for school districts and charter schools. According to the Arizona Revised Statutes (ARS):
§15-701.01H This section established AOI and the reception of course credits by district or charter school online programs; however, AOI determines whether the credits are counted as core credits or electives.
§15-801 The Arizona State Board of Education or the Arizona State Board of Charter Schools develops standards for online schoolwork according to these criteria:
- The depth and breadth of the curriculum
- Methods addressing students with unique needs and learning styles
- Availability of a private network to protect students from predatory elements on the internet
- School notifications to parents and guardians of state testing requirements
- Maintenance of a daily log of student attendance
Conclusion
If you wish your children to pursue an education online, they will receive almost the exact experience that in-class students enjoy. The only thing missing is live people with whom to interact. However, most virtual schooling provides collaboration opportunities to work together on projects, class discussions, and meetings with teachers.
For parents like Laura’s who needed something special for their child, and for those with other exceptional circumstances, a viable online school option is available for all students in Arizona.