ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – More than half of the parents in Seminole County and Orange County have yet to chose on which options they want to send their students to school next month as that decision deadline looms.
[RELATED: Everything you need to know about Orange County’s Back-To-School Plan]
[RELATED: Everything you need to know about Seminole County’s Back-To-School Plan]
By Friday at noon, parents in Seminole County will have to chose between four options of learning for their kids next school year including face-to-face, Seminole Connect, Seminole Virtual County Schools and a hybrid of any of those options.
Also by Friday, parents in Orange County will have to choose from their four options. Orange County officials said as of Thursday that of the 212,000 students in the district, around 90,000 have submitted their decision.
Orange County officials broke down the numbers as follows:
- 29.4% prefer face-to-face
- 63.5% prefer LaunchED@Home
- 6.5% prefer OCVS (must apply)
- 0.7% list other as their preference
As of Thursday, Seminole County School officials say only about 40% of the parents had submitted their applications.
There are more than 67,000 students in Seminole County and only about 27,000 have made their decision.
More than 8,600 students have selected face-to-face learning, according to Seminole County School Officials. More than 10,000 have selected Seminole Connect and approximately 5,000 went with Seminole County virtual schools. The remainder of the 27,000 include a hybrid of those mentioned above.
However, according to Seminole County more than 40,000 students and their parents are undecided.
Seminole County mom Melanie Schierenback is one of them.
"I'm hoping by the end of tonight I'll make a decision," Schierenback said. "I think my husband is sick of talking about it. We make a decision and then an hour later I'm like 'I'm so confused.'"
She and her two older daughters are Immunocompromised, she said and it was an easy decision for them. Both her 8th grade daughter and high school senior have decided to do a hybrid of Seminole Connect and Seminole County Virtual School.
However, she is still undecided when it comes to her son going into the first grade.
"When schools closed down in March, homeschooling was torture," she said.
Schierenback said her son has ADHD and has trouble focusing and struggles with reading.
“It’s a matter of I don’t want to make the wrong decision because I don’t want my kids to fall behind academically, but I also don’t want to risk their lives,” she said.
As for mom Nicole Keefer, a nurse who happens to work in the COVID-19 unit at a local hospital. She is also undecided.
She and her husband both work full-time and she said she could be called into work more hours as reopening continue, however she also knows how novel the virus is, and worries about the risk for her incoming 6th grade daughter.
"I'm so torn and I know tomorrow is the deadline," Keefer said. "It's the safety factor with her going back to school. Will she get exposed? Will she get sick? Will she bring it home? How will that be for her? The other aspect is, she wants the social interactions, she wants the normalcy."
Seminole County school officials say if parents don’t decide on an option by noon Friday then their student will automatically be placed in a physical classroom.