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ELKINS -- The Randolph County Superintendent of Schools has proposed a new plan that may help the county's lowered student enrollment numbers.
Dr. Shawn Dilly told the county Board of Education at its most recent meeting that he feels, with the right virtual learning program in place, the school system may be able to gather back some of the students it has lost to homeschooling.
He said a program offered through Kanawha County Schools provides the same flexibility and support that any home-schooled students would receive.
"One of the things I want to update you guys about this evening is that I have had a little bit of an opportunity to do some additional investigation around the virtual school options, not only for the possibility of our community members, but more importantly looking at how do we support different aspects of Randolph County Schools," Dilly said. "And I wanted to share a couple different things that I have learned within this past week and I just wanted to give you some information."
Dilly said the West Virginia Department of Education currently has a virtual learning program in place that it supports, but that is limited because it's an asynchronous virtual learning program.
"Those who are not familiar with that term (asynchronous), essentially its a program available at any time, but there's no teacher directly teaching you," he said. "There's a teacher in the background, but they are not necessarily interacting with you. This is something that we have not found a lot of success with over the years. It's a model that some kids do well with and some don't."
Dilly told the Board the Kanawha County Schools Virtual Program is different and may be better suited for students in Randolph County.
"They have been operating a program for several years now and were one of the first to adopt a virtual program," he said. "They just started a pilot program and I think it's something that we need to strongly explore as a district."
Dilly said Kanawha County Schools is currently allowing Wayne County to participate in the program. and that those students are still officially considered Wayne County students.
"I think it is something we need to consider," he said "What I really appreciate about it is that our students get to remain our students. We get to keep the students, we get to keep the enrollment, and students get access to a high-quality program and support."
Dilly said one of the benefits of partnering with Kanawha County is that they have been perfecting their virtual model for several years, adding that it would take Randolph County a long time to get to the same level of performance Kanawha has already achieved.
"I don't think we could put together the capabilities that they have," Dilly said. "I think it would be an excellent partnership and we would still retain Randolph County students. We think this is a very viable thing."
Dilly said there is a cost for the program but did not provide further details. He told the board he would collect additional information and provide details in the near future. He said the Kanawha County program is currently supporting approximately 1,500 students in grades K-12.
"I'm excited about the opportunity to work with them (Kanawha County) and I'm going to try and talk to the executive director about getting them up here a little bit later in January for a presentation," Dilly said. "I would encourage parents to look at this because I think it's a positive solution for us."
Virtual learning could be an option for students in Harman and Pickens if the BOE votes to close those K-12 schools next month. Dilly said students only need to have internet access to be able to take part in virtual learning. Some areas of Harman and Pickens currently have no internet access, however.