With the pandemic still seemingly far from over, more than 500 students from kindergarten to grade 10 within the Hastings Prince Edward District School Board are registered for virtual school this fall, however, those numbers could change slightly this week.
Director of Education Katherine MacIver says families have until this Thursday, August 26, to change their registration.
MacIver says with the release of the board’s Return-to-Learning plan last week, parents may feel they are now in a better position to make the decision that best suits their families.
” … in order to ensure that we have classrooms set up and courses available for students if they are in grade 9 or 10. And, it’s a short window but we feel like parents will be well poised right now to make an informed decision on their child’s behalf.”
She says at this point, parents are being asked to make a commitment to one or the other for the entire school year.
“Right now is when we have the opportunity to move staff around, to create classes and so on and so forth. And so far the response has been fairly minimal as far as requests to go to virtual and also requests to go to brick and mortar. So not a lot of changing of minds right now.”
As of right now, about 400 kindergarten to grade 8 students are registered for virtual school with the public board, along with about 120 grade 9 and 10 students.
Virtual school is not being offered for grades 11 and 12.
Anyone wishing to be considered for reregistration at the K-10 Virtual School, or return to in-person school, can call 613-966-1170, then press 5, then extension 58402.
