SCRANTON, Pa. — Laurie Kohut's daughter Brooke is a sophomore at West Scranton High School. She has special needs and thrives on routine.
When we stopped by the Kohut home on Wednesday during a virtual school day, she was watching TV with no schoolwork to do. This will count as a full school day on the calendar.
"You get up, you get on, there might be class, there might not be class," Kohut said. "There might be something to do; there might not be something to do. It might be, get on for 10 minutes, and then you're dismissed for the rest of the day, and there's nothing else to do."
Kohut says of the four virtual instruction days this winter, Brooke hasn't had much time in the virtual classroom.
"I would say total maybe three hours, maybe."
Luckily, we haven't had much snow this winter, so there haven't been many virtual school days. But Kohut is worried about the long-term.
"As a taxpayer and as a parent of a child who really needs this — she's already had so much regression because of the pandemic — I don't think it's unfair of us to ask the teachers and the school district to supply this. I mean, if you're going to say there's virtual instruction, there should be virtual instruction pretty much all day."
Patrick Ruddy has two kids at Carbondale Area Elementary School, where he shares similar concerns.
"Sometimes, in my mind, I think they're just trying to use these days to not extend the school year. And to an extent, I kind of get that. But if you're only tacking on three or four, I really don't see what the big deal is."
We reached out to the superintendents for both school districts.
Scranton Superintendent Melissa McTiernan said, "The expectation is that teachers in grades K-12 conduct live lessons according to their normal daily teaching schedules."
McTiernan said parents who have concerns should reach out to administrators.
Carbondale Area Superintendent Holly Sayre said, "The feedback I have received regarding remote-learning days has been positive in the past."
Sayre plans to send a survey to parents on the topic.
But this problem is not specific to any one district.
The Pennsylvania Department of Education's guidance for districts says the department still considers the COVID pandemic an emergency for this school year. In an emergency, districts may "reduce the length of time of daily instruction for various courses and classes."
We contacted the department, asking what the plan is for when it no longer classifies the pandemic as an emergency. We are waiting to hear back.
Of course, there's some debate on this. Some parents prefer having virtual school days, so their kids won't have to make up snow days in June.