After shifting to online learning in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Lansing School District is opening a new online school option this fall.
The district is accepting applications for what’s been dubbed Capital Area K-12 Online.
It will be staffed by Lansing teachers but available to any student in mid-Michigan.
School board president Gabrielle Lawrence says the district heard a lot of positive feedback from families of students with learning disabilities and others who simply liked the convenience of online instruction.
“So we thought, hey…if kids are thriving in this environment and this format, why make them come back into a building?” Lawrence says. “Especially kids who maybe would’ve considered leaving the school system altogether if they became too fed up with it.”
Lawrence says Capital Area K-12 Online will offer many of the same extracurricular programs as brick-and-mortar schools.
It will also take part in the Lansing Promise college scholarship program.