A Rising Number Of U.S. Children Have The Option Of In-Person School

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Students at Hillsborough High School in Tampa, Fla., wait in line to have their temperatures checked on Aug. 31. According to an updated tracker, Florida is one of three states that will offer full-time, in-person learning to more than 75% of students by Election Day.

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From Labor Day to Election Day, Burbio calculates the percentage of students with access to at least some in-person school will have grown by 22 percentage points, from 38% to 60%. There are large regional variations, with states like Texas and Florida offering full-time, in-person learning to more than 75% of students, while California, Washington, Maryland, Oregon and Hawaii have more than 90% of their students learning only online.

These numbers don’t necessarily speak to the full picture of how children are learning. That’s because a percentage of students choose virtual learning even where in-person school is offered. For example, in New York City, where schools are hybrid, just under half of students are reportedly learning from home.

Burbio says it gathers its information directly from school websites across a national sample of 1,200 districts in all 50 states, including the 200 largest districts in the country.