Baltimore City elementary students will no longer have access to virtual learning programs starting next school year, after a vote Tuesday night from the city board of school commissioners.
Commissioners voted 7-2 to consolidate two existing virtual learning programs, established in 2021 on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic, into one school for middle and highschoolers.
The vote also closed Charm City Virtual, an online program which currently serves 138 second through fifth graders.
Parents and students urged district leaders to keep the option open for young learners who perform best in alternative classroom settings – especially those who are immunocompromised.
But Angela Alvarez, executive director of new initiatives, said the district simply can’t afford it. Both Charm City Virtual and PORT Virtual Learning Program ran mostly on federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds, which will expire in the summer.
“We, like districts across the nation, are facing the ending of ESSER funds at the end of this year, and so there's a number of hard choices we're going to be having to make through the budget process,” Alvarez said. “There's no scenario that allows us to maintain what exists today.”
The decision to merge the two programs and create a secondary school will ensure that virtual learning can still be provided by the city district, when most others have stopped offering online services completely, Alvarez added.
That school status would allow virtual students to access state funding, Title I and Concentration of Poverty grants, and resources for meals, health services and athletics, she said.
CEO Sonja Santelises pushed back against advocates claiming the district doesn’t care about virtual learning, or the students who utilize it.
“That’s a false narrative,” she said. “The real narrative is we need to do this, we need to do it smart. And we need to learn from people who have learned how to do it efficiently.”
City officials updated the proposal to allow current fourth graders at Charm City Virtual to continue online for the 2024-25 school year at the new program, to address parent and student concerns.
“I am charged with making sure that virtual learning is substantial, and sustainable. And so that's what we're doing,” Santelises said. “If we just wanted to wipe this out and say, ‘We no longer want to do it,’ we wouldn't have made the proposal.”
The CEO said she is in communication with experts about how to run a sustainable and “financially viable” virtual program for early grades, including addressing the unique population of young people from the Department of Juvenile Services who want access.
The two commissioners who voted against a consolidated secondary school voted in favor of a proposal from Commissioner Kwame' Jamal Kenyatta-Bey: form a virtual school for grades K-12.
“We are not in a position at this time where we should retreat, but we should reinforce those things that work,” Kenyatta-Bey said.
Alvarez said the secondary school is “the only option” that wouldn’t run a deficit. Running a school for grades two through eight charged a deficit of $1.3 million – especially with enrollment for elementary grades declining from 279 to 138 over the past three years.
Charm City Virtual families with elementary students will begin receiving specialized support this spring to help transition to in-person schools by September.
