Halton public schools forced to wait for online learning

An increased shift to online learning has created a backlog of Halton District School Board students who have decided to stay home from classes.

An increased shift to online learning has created a backlog of Halton District School Board students who have decided to stay home from classes.

As a result, the board has delayed the start of virtual lessons until Wednesday and possibly longer as it works through the new waitlist for the virtual classroom.

An email sent to parents said the delay has been caused by an increased demand for the virtual learning model in the past few days.

Last week the board indicated that 29 percent of elementary students an 15 per cent of high school students had opted to stay home. There are 66,000 students in the entire system.

Those numbers now appear to be increasing based on reports as parents have second thoughts about sending their children back to school amidst rising numbers of COVID-19 cases in Ontario.

In the email to parents the board said it is working as quickly as possible to build classes and assign teachers to them and that parents will be alerted once their children have access to their virtual classrooms.