Exclusive MPIA Results: MCPS Virtual Academy Under the Microscope with a Disappointing Report Card

December 20, 2023

Background

Since the start of the pandemic, questions have arisen based upon both the effectiveness and demand of virtual learning. This has continued as MCPS created a Virtual Academy when most students returned to the classrooms.

Moderately MOCO received an exclusive MPIA response with answers to questions about the MCPS Virtual Academy official enrollment data.

MCPS also recently released data on the report card results from their virtual academy and we’ll take a look at that after the MPIA results.

Virtual Academy Enrollment over time

The following chart was received showing MCPS Virtual Academy enrollment by grade by school year over the past 3 years.

Looking at the grand totals for each of the past 3 school years, you can see that it went from 2629 (2021-2022) to 1565 (2022-2023) and then dropped again to just 878 for the current 2023-2024 school year.

This represents a 40.4% drop from 2021/2022 to 2022/2023 and a 43.9% drop from 2022/2023 to 2023/2024 and a 66.6% reduction from 2021/2022 to 2023/2024.

Virtual Academy Enrollment by School

You can view the full MPIA results for Virtual Academy Enrollment by school here:

FY24-161-Virtual-Academy-Enrollment-by-School

Virtual Academy Report Card Results

With permission, using summary provided by Dr. Jennifer Reesman on X/Twitter about Virtual Academy evaluations by MCPS. The full thread can be found here.

Chronic Absenteeism

Math and Literacy Outcomes

MCPS Summary and Delay to Post

Virtual Academy Cost Analysis

The MCPS Virtual Academy has been paid for by a combination of federal ESSR funding and the operating budget. However, this year the ESSR funding is expected to go away and we are still waiting on the full MCPS budget so it remains to be seen the full cost of this program. The cost per student for the MCPS Virtual Academy operating budget has increased significantly each year but it remains to be seen what will be the cost in the coming year without ESSR funding. Source here.

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