Is it Time for Florida to Repeal the Online Graduation Requirement?

At a recent White House Roundtable, entitled “Kids First: Getting America’s Children Safely Back to School,” Florida’s Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran insisted that, even in the epicenter of a global pandemic, there is no substitute for face to face learning with a teacher. He went on to say that Florida Virtual School, the largest virtual school in the country, “is a second-tier education.”

President Trump agreed saying, “People thought for a long time that (virtual learning) would be the answer but it’s — that’s not the answer. The answer is an old-fashioned one, isn’t it?”

This must have come as quite a surprise to former Florida Governor, Jeb Bush, who continues to celebrate virtual instruction, in general, as “the future of learning” and the recent massive expansion of Florida Virtual School, specifically, as “a great example of getting it right.” As recently as April, Commissioner Corcoran, himself, celebrated the expansion of what he now calls a “second-tier education” system, when the State Board of Education (who also served as the FLVS Board of Trustees) approved the redirection of $4.3 million to increase their student capacity to ultimately serve all 2.72 million Florida public school students.

Why would the Commissioner encourage a $4.3 million expansion of a program he considered to be second-tier?

Clearly, there are politics involved. For a moment we want to ignore the politics surrounding school reopening and the covid pandemic and ask one simple question: Is it time to repeal the requirement that Florida students must pass one online course to earn a high school diploma?

Beginning with the class of 2015, all public school students have been required to pass at least one online course before high school graduation (f.s. 1003.4282(4)). The majority of students satisfy the requirement through Florida Virtual School, often taking a mandated online PE course during the summer (seriously). The graduation requirement is the result of the 2011 passage of  HB 7197, the “Digital Learning Now Act.” The bill, sponsored by then State Rep. Kelli Stargel, required school districts to establish virtual instruction options, authorized the establishment of virtual charter schools and established the online course graduation requirement. The bill was a direct response to former Governor Jeb Bush’s 2010 national campaign, Digital Learning Now!, designed to advance policies meant to “create a high quality digital learning environment to better prepare students with the knowledge and skills to succeed in college and careers.” The project was managed by the Jeb’s Foundation for Excellence in Education (FEE) which, in December 2010 published a report identifying “10 Elements of High Quality Digital Education.” Stargel’s Digital Learning Now Act incorporated many of the elements identified in the FEE’s report including the online course graduation requirement. (For those who weren’t following education policy in 2011, the Staff Analysis of HB7197 demonstrates just how influential the FEE was at the time.)

Jeb’s decade long push towards Digital Learning has been a financial boom to technology companies but there’s virtually no evidence demonstrating the increased in-school screen time, virtual classrooms and/or digital device use actually contribute to learning outcomes for children. Organizations like the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood are now advocating against edtech, which they say “contributes to classroom distractions, the deprofessionalization of teaching, and privacy concerns about student data.”

With the pendulum swinging away from digital learning and towards the face to face instruction with a teacher preferred by both Commissioner Corcoran and President Trump, we believe the Online Course requirement has outlived its usefulness. Why mandate students participate in something the Commissioner has deemed “second-tier”? It is time to repeal f.s. 1003.4282(4) and the Online Course Requirement.

As the Preseident said, “People thought for a long time that (virtual learning) would be the answer but it’s — that’s not the answer.”