Nearly A Third Of CT Students Learning Remotely In October

CONNECTICUT — Nearly a third of all students in Connecticut are learning fully remotely as of Oct. 2, according to the state Department of Education.

In Connecticut all students have the option to attend school remotely. Some schools switch to remote status temporarily after coronavirus cases. A handful of districts are operating fully remote.

There are more than 163,000 students learning fully remotely out of more than 514,000 students. Of those 3.7 percent are classified as “disconnected” or not signing in to class at all. That is a slight drop from 4.6 percent between Sept. 8 and 11 which is when most schools were back for classes.

The SDE is working to release a monthly attendance report for student attendance at the district, school and student-group level. The department expects the report to be done in late October.

In general full in-person classes are more likely in elementary grades than middle and high school grades.

Public school districts remain split on learning models with 38.1 percent fully in-person, 55.8 percent hybrid and 6.1 percent fully remote. Around 25 percent of districts offer different models for different grade levels; the state includes that district under the model offered in the majority of grades.

Related: CT Teachers Concerned Over Ventilation, Engaging Remote Students

The trend has been that more school districts are moving toward full in-person learning; about 34 percent of school districts were full in-person for the week of Sept. 14 and 18 and 59.9 percent were hybrid. Danbury, Preston and New Haven are fully or nearly fully remote.