Children who did well with virtual learning during the pandemic may not be allowed to learn online in the future. Money to pay for online learning runs out this school year and as of now, school leaders are trying to get lawmakers in Austin to approve the money.
While learning at home didn't work for everyone, many students saw the exact opposite.
"She's A/B honor roll and she's never been that. Math, she struggles in Math and that's where she has the B, her confidence is growing every day," said Kathy Martin.
Her granddaughter Zoey thrived as the stress and peer pressure of school was taken away and she focused purely on her studies.
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"I kinda like it more than on-campus school because I learn more and I am not as shy to ask questions," said Zoey Bales.
Enough students grew online to prompt many districts across Texas to say, this has to stick around.
"We would like to offer more choice options for our students within our school district, and this is one of the ways we'd like to do that and we have parents who are requesting that from us right now," said Mike Waldrip, Superintendent, Frisco ISD.
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Texas law only allowed schools to be paid for remote learning during the pandemic and the Texas Education Agency said that was an emergency action, to do it permanently would require a change in Texas law, and if that doesn't happen in the next few days, schools will have to pull the plug next year on virtual learning.
"Even though we may disagree on the fine details of it, we all agree we need some kind of virtual school legislation that opens things up a little bit and allows us to better serve our students," said Waldrip.
45 school districts including some of the largest in the state have signed a letter urging lawmakers not to let this one go untouched. Dallas ISD is building an entire campus devoted to hybrid learning, and others are hiring staff to look at ways to improve virtual offerings.
The Senate is scheduled to debate the idea.
