Overwhelming Evidence That Virtual Schools Are Not Working

The National Education Policy Center (NEPC) Sixth Annual Report on Virtual Education, Full-Time Virtual and Blended Schools: Enrollment, Student Characteristics, and Performance, provides a detailed overview and inventory of full-time virtual schools and of blended learning schools, including student demographics, state-specific school performance ratings, and—where possible—an analysis of school performance measures.

School performance measures for both virtual and blended schools indicate that they are not as successful as traditional public schools. Nevertheless, enrollment growth has continued.

Full-time virtual schools deliver all curriculum and instruction via the Internet and electronic communication, usually asynchronously with students at home and teachers at a remote location. Blended, or hybrid, schools combine virtual instruction with traditional face-to-face instruction in classrooms.

The report, beyond adding to the overwhelming evidence of poor outcomes for online schools, documents an interesting trend in the sector. Compared to prior years, there has been a shift in the type of schools with the most growth. We are now seeing more school districts opening their own virtual schools. These district-run schools have typically been small, with relatively small levels of enrollment. But the trend is nonetheless evident. While large virtual schools operated by for-profit education management organizations (EMOs) still dominate this sector, they have lost considerable market share. 

Find Full-Time Virtual and Blended Schools: Enrollment, Student Characteristics, and Performance, by Gary Miron, Christopher Shank, and Caryn Davidson, on the web at: