Compromise still blocks KY efforts to regulate virtual schools, but offers limits

The General Assembly on Friday adopted a compromise on a controversial merged bill that could both keep a low-performing, fast-growing virtual school open and grant five calamity days to weather-stricken districts.

Critics are concerned that revisions to House Bill 241 are just another way for some GOP lawmakers to push through school choice which would allow for taxpayer funds to be used for programs other than public schools.

Friday is the last day before the veto recess begins in the General Assembly.

Lawmakers held a conference committee on the bill Thursday because the House wouldn’t agree to Senate changes that blocked the Kentucky Department of Education’s efforts to rein in the Kentucky Virtual Academy in the Cloverport Independent School District.

The compromise bill still said as of Friday morning that state education officials until 2028 can’t implement any cap, limitation, or restrict enrollment for a virtual program or withhold any funds based on the district’s operation of a virtual program.

After a conference committee Thursday between both chambers, lawmakers made changes to House Bill 241, sponsored by Rep. Timmy Truett, R-McKee. The Senate agreed to them with a 31-6 vote. The House of Representatives concurred on the revised bill Friday morning unanimously 91-0. It now goes to Gov. Andy Beshear to consider whether to sign it into law.

“I’m good with the compromise. My school calendar bill kept everything that it had in it and we were able to put guardrails up for Cloverport. I’m so glad that this bill is now behind us, and our districts can now start planning for their end of the year activities,” Truett said after the bill passed, noting the limits the compromise puts on virtual schools.

The Kentucky Board of Education had sought an enrollment cap as Cloverport Independent School District, which has about 250 students enrolled in in-person classes and about 2,800 enrolled in a new virtual academy, came under fire for issues including poor test scores, failing to administer state tests to enough students and failing to comply with state regulations on class sizes.

Cloverport’s online program, Kentucky Virtual Academy, has a contract with Stride, a for-profit company that has been scrutinized in other states. The district pays the company much of the funds it receives from the state.

Cloverport Independent Superintendent Keith Haynes asked the Herald-Leader for an open records request when the newspaper asked how much the district paid Stride since opening in 2023-2024.

Truett said that the compromise retains what he originally wanted in the bill: For this school year only, in districts that have been ravaged by flooding, sickness, winter weather, and the search for an interstate shooter, House Bill 241 allows the Commissioner of Education to give them five calamity days that don’t need to be made up if they have added time to the end of the school day. Districts that don’t use the calamity days can eliminate five low attendance days.

Prior to the compromise, Truett had been upset that Senate Republicans are trying to use his bill to allow the Kentucky Virtual Academy to stay open .Senate Republicans merged House Bill 241 with Senate Bill 268, sponsored by Sen. Aaron Reed, R-Shelbyville, which stopped an effort to regulate the Kentucky Virtual School.

For the past several days, Senate Republicans have tried to block the Kentucky Department of Education’s efforts to rein in the Kentucky Virtual Academy.

Haynes and some lawmakers have said the cap, which would essentially limit the number of virtual students at 10% of a school district’s in-person enrollment, would have shut down the Kentucky Virtual Academy.

Parents have said the program helped their children in a way that others could not.

In at least one instance, the compromise puts fewer limits on virtual schools

Joe Ragusa, a Kentucky Department of Education spokesperson, said Friday evening that for middle and high schools, the law previously limited teachers to no more than 150 pupil hours per day, unless a school decision making council provided for a larger number.

That serves as a class size maximum for those teachers at the middle and high school level who teach multiple classes per day with different students in each class. It is calculated by multiplying the time length of each class by the number of pupils enrolled in the class. For example, if a teacher is assigned to teach five one-hour classes per day with 25 students in each class, the teacher would teach 125 pupil hours for the day.

The Free Conference Committee Report that included the compromise provides that the 150-hour maximum is doubled to 300 for middle and high school teachers in virtual programs, Ragusa said.

An independent school district with a virtual program enrollment of greater than 2,000 students and that has an elementary, middle or high school in the lowest-performing five percent of all schools in its level based on the school’s performance in the state accountability system can’t enroll more students in the district’s virtual program in the grades served by that school. The cap must remain in place until all the district’s elementary, middle or high schools are no longer in the lowest-performing five percent.

Enrollment caps tied to academic performance don’t apply to students with siblings in the virtual school, whose parents are in the military or whose physician signs a written document saying the child needs the virtual school for medical reasons.

A virtual school can enroll students on a full-time basis in kindergarten through grade twelve.

Beginning with the 2025-2026 school year, the statewide total enrollment of out-of-district students in virtual programs offered by school districts must not exceed an enrollment cap of 1% of the previous year’s total statewide student enrollment in all school districts.

By July 1, 2025, and each year after until June 30, 2028, the Kentucky Department of Education must publish on its website the previous year’s total statewide student enrollment in all school districts and the 1% value of that number.

The Kentucky Department of Education department and the virtual schools have to closely monitor the growth of virtual schools with out-of-district students.

Virtual schools can’t enroll out of district students after June 30, 2028 without the permission of the General Assembly. Local school boards have to develop policies to deal with virtual students who won’t take state mandated tests.

This story was originally published March 14, 2025 at 10:48 AM.