Virtual Classrooms

Starting next year, Cy-Fair ISD in Texas will offer a fully online school, a program to accommodate scheduling conflicts and advanced courses, and a program with tuition-based courses outside of the regular school day.

An analysis by PennLive found that the state's two largest cyber schools are substantially less transparent than similarly sized traditional school districts, while some smaller cyber charters are even more transparent.

Inundated with parent interest in a virtual schooling option, Commonwealth Charter Academy hasn't been too concerned about transparency or responsiveness in its board meetings, according to some parents and staff.

Some former employees of Commonwealth Charter Academy say they were asked to develop online curricula that could be sold to other states rather than focusing on Pennsylvania's standards and history.

Some current and former staff at Commonwealth Charter Academy said it started to feel more like a business focused on convincing parents to enroll new students than a school focused on their academic performance.

By 2015, for-profit management companies ran a large share of the cyber schools across the U.S., but for Commonwealth Charter Academy, separating from them brought in more money, independence and control over curricula.

Even after the initial pandemic-era rush to cyber charter schools subsided, Commonwealth Charter Academy has continued to grow because many parents are dissatisfied with their local public schools.

Opening this fall, the Colome Cyber Academy will give students individualized learning plans tailored to their goals, intended to meet growing demand for flexibility amid declining enrollment at traditional schools.

Pennsylvania only renews charters of cyber schools that agree to enrollment caps, but those schools can continue to operate without a charter. Some cyber leaders say this approach gives those schools more freedom to grow.

The private, nonprofit, regionally accredited University of the People has enrolled 200 students from Nevada and over 20,000 from the U.S. in tuition-free online programs in fields such as computer science and IT.

Students enrolled in the Granite State Academy Online Program, an alternative program of Prospect Mountain High School hosted by the online education company K12, will begin instruction Sept. 19.

As a result of a lawsuit from Los Angeles public school parents, the district will have to give regular assessments and outreach to students, additional training to teachers, and disaggregated data to the public.

The nonprofit Education Design Lab's Community College Growth Engine gives community colleges a blueprint and resources to create short, stackable, workforce-oriented educational programs co-designed with employers.

Coinciding with an explosion of AI in the health care industry, higher education programs like the college of nursing at the University of Dayton and Wright State University are using tech to modernize their courses.

Intended to be flexible for students with social anxieties or full-time jobs, a district-run virtual school in North Dakota meets with every student family before enrollment to assess if online learning is right for them.

Cyber charter schools in Pennsylvania spend more money educating students than traditional schools — after removing the costs of maintaining buildings and transporting students.

As of last year, Texas had 24 full-time, public virtual schools in operation serving nearly 62,200 students. In 2014, the state had only a few virtual schools and less than 5,000 students in them.

Some critics of Pennsylvania cyber charters overstate how cheaply they can operate, while advocates overlook how much they receive for special-ed students and how much less they spend on buildings and transportation.