TAMPA, Fla. — Tens of thousands of students across Tampa Bay will be taking their classes online this school year.
Many parents are opting for an online learning option to protect their students from COVID-19.
Hillsborough County plans to start all students online for the first four weeks of school.
That means students will need reliable internet connections and either a laptop or a tablet so they can get online. 10 Tampa Bay asked all of our local school districts how they plan to help students succeed digitally, here are the answers we received:
Citrus
The Citrus County School District is prepared to give a laptop or tablet to all students who may need one. They'll be outfitting some buses with wifi and distributing some hotspots to help students access the internet.
Hernando
Families that have chosen one of the two virtual learning options within the district will be required to provide digital devices and internet for their students.
Hillsborough
The district gave out 40,000 laptops and tablets last semester. They're working on a plan to distribute more, but have not finalized those plans yet.
Pinellas
The district has given out 31,000 laptops and tablets. They plan to distribute a total of 73,000 devices. The goal is to give each student 1st through 12th grade a computer or laptop by 2023. They also have 1,000 wifi hotspots to distribute to students without internet access.
Polk
The school district has given out 23,000 devices already. The district also has 500 MiFi (or portable wi-fi devices) and 50 buses with cellular wifi access.
Sarasota
The district is still determining how many devices they will give out. They're working with families to assess needs. When distribution does happen, it'll be similar to the last semester when parents were contacted with an appointment time to pick up their sanitized device.
