Beaufort County school board discusses ending K-8 virtual contract 1 week into classes
One week after the start of classes, the Beaufort County school board is considering canceling a $2.75 million contract for K-8 virtual classrooms that it approved one month ago.
Board member John Dowling made the motion to terminate the contract with K12 Learning Solutions’ parent company, Fuel Education, saying that “the senior staff has lost any confidence at all” in the company.
The school board voted 9-1-1 to postpone voting on Dowling’s motion to Wednesday night, after it discusses the contract further in executive session. Dowling voted no, and William Smith abstained.
The school board on Aug. 4 approved the $2.75 million, year-long contract with K12 Learning Solutions, to be paid for with CARES Act dollars, on a 9-0-1 vote. Tricia Fidrych was absent and William Smith abstained, saying he wasn’t able to read the contract before the vote.
District spokeswoman Candace Bruder said Tuesday night that the district has not made any payments on its contract with K12 Learning Solutions yet.
The company was supposed to provide virtual classrooms for all kindergarten through 8th grade students in Beaufort County School District, which deputy superintendent Duke Bradley said in August would be “considerably more comprehensive than what was hastily implemented last spring.”
Teachers began training on the platform with “demo” logins and classrooms on Aug. 24 after administrators and literacy and numeracy coaches trained other school staff.
The classrooms come with pre-written lessons and assignments that align with South Carolina’s education standards and have the ability for teachers to track their students’ progress.
The contract caused consternation at the school board’s Sept. 1 meeting, when board member Rachel Wisnefski expressed concern that both students and teachers would receive their logins for the platform on Sept. 8 — the first day of school.
Mary Stratos, the district’s chief instructional services officer, said then that a timeline to deploy the virtual classrooms was not included in the board-approved contract.
She added that the district had been aware that students would receive login credentials on the first day of school for several weeks. But she said the district was aware only that teachers would receive credentials at the same time on Aug. 28, about a week and a half before the start of school.
District staff said at the Sept. 1 meeting that teachers would likely not use the platform in the first week of school, instead opting for Zoom to make introductions with students.
At that meeting, Wisnefski moved to amend the K12 Learning Solutions contract “to include deliverable and respective deadlines.”
That motion passed 6-4-1. Earl Campbell, Cathy Robine, Melvin Campbell and Tricia Fidrych voted no; JoAnn Orischak abstained.
Dowling alluded to that motion Tuesday evening, saying that the district could “continue to give CPR” to the company but “the writing was on the wall.”
“The administration has expressed no confidence that the amendment can be met,” he said. “The only question to consider is, ‘Can we count on this company to come through for us?’ The answer that’s been presented to me has been ‘no.’”
Parents expressed concerns about the platform during Tuesday’s public comment session, with one mother of a Beaufort Elementary School student saying that her third grader “was struggling worse than last spring.”
“We were told K12 Solutions was to start in the second week. It has not,” she said. “Why? Is there a problem with the platform? Is this an indication of returning to school? Is this because I chose in-person learning, and if so, why is my child not entitled to virtual learning?”
She added that if the issues continued, she would withdraw her son and send him to private school.
Questions remain about what will happen if the district cuts ties with K12 Learning Solutions, especially about what platform would replace it and how long the district would have to migrate lessons and students from K12 Learning Solutions.
In Miami, a similar move to cut ties with the company left teachers scrambling, according to reporting by the Miami Herald.
The Miami-Dade County School Board voted unanimously at 2 a.m. on Thursday to end its contract with K12 Learning Solutions, following 200 public comments skewering K12’s online classes.
The online class platform was also paralyzed for three days of the first week of classes by a series of cyberattacks, allegedly carried out by a 16-year-old student at the district who was eventually arrested.
The Miami-Dade school board voted to allow teachers to use the platform through Friday, and then sever the district’s relationship with K12.
But on Thursday morning, teachers discovered they had already lost lesson plans and access to the K12 platform, according to the Herald.
This story was originally published September 15, 2020 at 8:17 PM.