Indiana schools to use eLearning for remainder of 2019-20 school year amid COVID-19 crisis

Indiana Superintendent of Education Jennifer McCormick announced on Thursday that K-12 students will not return to school at all for the 2019-20 school year.

Good evening i'm hunter petroviak ... thank you for having us in your home tonight.

You just heard state schools superintendent jennifer mccormick today announcing schools are closed for the rest of the school year.but she says learning must go on.

Governor eric holcomb's order requires all schools k-through-12 to provide instruction remotely.

To complete the school year all schools must provide 160 instructional days or at least 20 additional days of remote learning.

Mccormick acknowledged it's going to be a challenge for parents who don't have computers or internet access.

3 the order also presents a challenge to districts that don't have e-learning ... so what does that mean for the state's largest district ... fort wayne community schools?

Fox caleb saylor spoke with parents and the district about how they're planning to make it work.

Serving over 30,000 students, fort wayne community schools has major logistical problems to overcome to meet the executive order announced by state education superintendent jennifer mccormick today.

Stev son attends northside and while he agrees with unsure er, he what plan is rict y only c ncern is i don know if fort wayne community schools has any kind of elearning program really set up for students to really do the program, and if there is, there is really a lot of information to go on.wcs doesn have an elearning program in place like some surrounding districts.

In the past fwcs spokeswomen krista stockman has said it just doesn work for their district, but now they may have to he d a way.

Challenge for us is going to be in the details.

Whether we have to meet the one hundred and sixty days or at least 20 more days of instruction.

What exactly does that mean since we don have elearning.wcs has been working on their plans for two weeks and with spring break ending on monday, they have something in place for most of their students.

Or the students who needed specific credits in order to graduate, they are enrolled in an online program edgenuity.

We did provide laptops in those situations to students who needed them..for other categories of students, starting monday, we have our teachers who are going to be providing lessons for students online and holding office hours daily.wcs knows this plan won reach all students though.

Sherri merrill says she homeschooling her grandchild in elementary school using no electronics at all t home, no electronics.

If t just a it limie d amount of time.

We doing reading, games, board gamee doing workbooks, a few pages everyday that i have them.

Students with limited or no access to electronics and wi-fi that is the problem for fwcs, a problem stockman says they still need to work out with the state.

Oes the state going that we to supply devices to thirty thousand students.

Does the state going that we to have hotspots available?

We in fort wayne, caleb saylor, t.- fox 55 news.

Mccormick says districts have until april 17th to submit their continuous learning plans and that the department of education will work with each district to provide guidelines